Howell v. State

78 S.E. 859, 13 Ga. App. 74, 1913 Ga. App. LEXIS 40
Court of Appeals of Georgia·Decided July 8, 1913·No. 4927·Published·Cited by 14 cases

Opinion

Russell, J.

Howell was indicted for the offense of being intoxicated on certain highways and public streets of Dalton, Georgia; it being alleged that his drunkenness was manifested hy boisterous and indecent condition and acting, by vulgar, profane, and unbecoming language, etc. On arraignment and before pleading to the merits, he filed a plea setting up a former conviction of the same offense by the recorder of the City of Dalton. The court struck the plea, and a ruling is invoked here, as it was in the court below, as to whether one punished under a municipal ordinance for the offense of public drunkenness can thereafter be tried in a State court for á violation of section 442 of the Penal Code.

It is a general rule that municipal ordinances can not occupy the field covered by State laws. Where the State has penalized a certain act, the exercise of this power on the part of the State excludes the right of a municipality to punish for the same act, unless by express legislation the State has authorized it so to do. It would seem, therefore, that the plea of former jeopardy, filed by the defendant in this - ease, would he ineffectual as related to almost any municipal ordinance, because it would have devolved upon the defendant, when arraigned in the municipal court, to plead to the jurisdiction of the court, upon the ground that the offense charged was only cognizable in and triable by the State courts. If the offense charged against the defendant had not been that of drunkenness, he might have relied upon such rulings as those of the Supreme Court in Kahn v. Macon, 95 Ga. 419 (22 S. E. 641), and Moran v. Atlanta, 102 Ga. 840 (30 S. E. 298), and that of this court in Cotton v. Atlanta, 10 Ga. App. 397 (73 S. E. 683). Where an offense is covered by a statute of the State, in which the State has reserved to itself the sole right of dealing with the act forbidden by law, this fact will afford to one accused of violation of a municipal ordinance which attempts to punish for the same act a perfect defense in a municipal court. On the other hand a municipality may punish for an act which is forbidden by the penal laws of the State, if into the act penalized by the ordinance there enters some essential ingredient not necessary to constitute the- statutory offense, or if the ordinance can be violated even though there enter not into the act thereby denounced some [76] ingredient essential to the consummation of the act which is made a crime by the State law. IJpon this point see Callaway v. Mims, 5 Ga. App. 9 (62 S. E. 654); Athens v. Atlanta, 6 Ga. App. 245 (64 S. E. 711); Alexander v. Atlanta, 6 Ga. App. 329 (64 S. E. 1105); Callaway v. Atlanta, 6 Ga. App. 354 (64 S. E. 1105); Dorn v. Atlanta, 6 Ga. App. 529 (65 S. E. 254).

In the present case this court can not tell, nor could the superior court, whether the ordinance of the City of Dalton is invalid upon the ground that it impinges upon the State law and thereby enables the municipality to usurp the functions of the State; for no ordinance is in the record. Neither the superior court nor this court takes judicial cognizance of municipal ordinances. It may not be the duty of the municipality, in making out its case, to produce evidence of the existence of the ordinance under which the defendant in the municipal court is being tried; for the mayor or recorder, as the case may be, can perhaps be presumed to know that there is a municipal ordinance applicable to the ease upon trial. This court held, in Collins v. Dalton, 12 Ga. App. 119 (76 S. E. 1053), that the judgment rendered might import the existence of an ordinance forbidding the.act to which the sentence and judgment in this case related; but we have held also that judicial cognizance does not extend to municipal ordinances. Dorsey v. State, 7 Ga. App. 367 (66 S. E. 1096). Eor this reason, one who seeks to review a judgment of a municipal court which is predicated upon an alleged municipal ordinance must, in the record, present the ordinance, so as to enable the reviewing court intelligently to pass upon the question.

It is contended that as section 442 of the Penal Code provides that it “shall not be construed to affect the powers delegated to municipal corporations to pass by-laws to punish drunkenness or disorderly conduct within their corporate limits,” the plea of former jeopardy is good, and should not have been stricken. In the original act (Acts of 1905, p. 115) the language used is that “nothing contained in this act shall be construed to affect the power heretofore or that may be hereafter delegated to municipal corporations to regulate the liquor traffic and pass by-laws to punish drunkenness or disorderly conduct within their corporate limits.” It would seem that this language is broad enough to have authorized the City of Dalton to pass a by-law punishing drunkenness [77] upon its streets, and even, in such an ordinance, to define the offense exactly as defined in section 442 of the Penal Code; and, of course, in that event, a conviction in the municipal court would be a bar to any prosecution for the same act in the State court, and a timely and proper plea of former jeopardy should be sustained. However, so far as appears from the record in the present case, we are left completely in the dark as to the nature of the ordinance passed by the City of Dalton. And even if, under the ruling in Collins v. Dalton, supra, we might assume that an ordinancé had been passed containing such provisions as would authorize the municipality to punish for the offense of drunkenness, still we do not know whether the ordinance is thus restricted. Nor was the trial judge informed upon this point by the production of the ordinance itself. If the City of Dalton, by its ordinance, sought only to penalize drunkenness at some other place than those mentioned in section 442 of the Penal Code, the act forbidden by the ordinance would be differentiated from the State offense, because it could be committed without the ingredients of manifestation which are essential to constitute a violation of the State law, and the judge could properly have stricken the plea of former jeopardy, upon the authority of Athens v. Atlanta, supra, and other cases cited.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Howell v. State, 78 S.E. 859, 13 Ga. App. 74, 1913 Ga. App. LEXIS 40 (Ga. Ct. App. 1913).

78 S.E. 859 (Howell v. State) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

Related

Peoples v. State
216 S.E.2d 604 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1975)
Finch v. State
112 S.E.2d 824 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1960)
Hannah v. State
102 S.E.2d 624 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1958)
Smith v. State
77 S.E.2d 764 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1953)
Sloan v. City of Moultrie
7 S.E.2d 760 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1940)
Wright v. City of Atlanta
7 S.E.2d 215 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1940)
Chappell v. State
198 S.E. 791 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1938)
Holcombe v. State
187 S.E. 599 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1936)
Ramey v. State
151 S.E. 55 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1929)
Gunn v. State
140 S.E. 524 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1927)
Loach v. City of LaFayette
91 S.E. 1057 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1917)
Ellis v. Golden
90 S.E. 495 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1916)
Morris v. State
90 S.E. 361 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1916)
Jefferson v. City of Perry
90 S.E. 365 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1916)