State v. Rushing
| Decision Date | 15 November 1897 |
| Docket Number | 12,608 |
| Citation | 22 So. 798,49 La.Ann. 1530 |
| Court | Louisiana Supreme Court |
| Parties | THE STATE v. J. C. RUSHING |
Submitted November 6, 1897
APPEAL from the Second Judicial District Court for the Parish of Webster. Watkins, J.
M. J Cunningham, Attorney General, and A. J. Murff, District Attorney (P. A. Simmons, Jr., of Counsel), for Plaintiff Appellee.
R. C Drew, for J. C. Rushing, Defendant, Appellant.
The defendant, sentenced for attempting to extort money by threats, takes this appeal.
The question raised by the motions to quash and in arrest of judgment is the constitutionality of the legislative act No. 63 of 1884, under which the indictment was preferred. It is urged that the act violates Art. 29 of the Constitution, requiring the legislative act to embrace but one object, and that to be embraced in its title.
The object of the statute is to define the offence of attempting to extort money by threats or other unlawful devices, as the title expresses it. Our predecessors deemed an act of the same character, and of nearly the same language, an instance of obscure legislation, and held it to be unconstitutional because of the objection urged to this act. Act No. 64 of 1884; State vs. Heywood, 38 An. 689. The statute for consideration is one long section and does require very close examination to determine its scope and purpose. We understand it to make it an offence to send or cause to be sent to another any letter, postal card or written or printed matter threatening to accuse him or her of crime, misdemeanor fault, infirmity, etc., or to make known any such faults, misfortunes or failings, or to injure his or her good name or reputation, or to cause him to be subjected to any public scandal, or shall threaten to kill, wound or murder him or her, or subject him or her to any bodily harm with intent to extort money, property, or to procure the release of any benefit, advantage or immunity. The statute then makes it an offence to maliciously follow, pursue, or intrude upon another at his home, residence, office, or any public place, with the intent already specified, to extort money, and the statute further proceeds with greater amplitude of language than that used in the first part of the statute to define the offence of threats of wounding, killing, maiming or inflicting bodily harm on another, or molesting or troubling him, or of accusing him of crime, misdemeanor or faults, or to make known his faults, misfortunes or failings, or to injure or impair his good name, or subject him to scandal, ridicule or unpleasant...
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