[DOWNLOAD] "Commonwealth v. Corbett" by Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts # Book PDF Kindle ePub Free

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eBook details

• Title: Commonwealth v. Corbett
• Author : Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts
• Release Date : January 17, 1940
• Genre: Law,Books,Professional & Technical,
• Pages : * pages
• Size : 68 KB

Description

LUMMUS, Justice. The defendant, a registered pharmacist, was convicted by a Judge of the Superior Court, sitting without jury,
upon a complaint charging that the defendant sold to one Stilphen 'certain articles for the prevention of conception to wit:
condoms.' The complaint was brought under G.L.(Ter.Ed.) c. 272, § 21, which has remained in substantially the same
form since its original enactment as St.1879, c. 159, § 1. By that section, 'Whoever sells, lends, gives away, exhibits,
or offers to sell, lend or give away an instrument or other article intended to be used for self-abuse, or any drug, medicine,
instrument or article whatever for the prevention of conception or for causing unlawful abortion * * *,' is guilty of felony.
The Judge denied the request of the defendant for a ruling that upon all the evidence he could not be found guilty, and reported
the case. The present case requires an interpretation of that section of the statutes. The public policy of the Commonwealth in the
creation of crimes is not for this court to determine, but for the Legislature. Our function is merely that of discovering
the meaning of the words that the Legislature has used, bearing in mind that under the American system of law a citizen is
not to be punished criminally unless his deed falls plainly within the words of the statutory prohibition, construed naturally.
His deed is not to be declared a crime upon ambiguous words or by a strained construction. Coolidge v. Choate, 11 Metc. 79,
82; Commonwealth v. Pentz, 247 Mass. 500, 143 N.E. 322; Libby v. New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad, 273 Mass. 522,
525, 526, 174 N.E. 171, 73 A.L.R. 101; Connally v. General Construction Co., 269 U.S. 385, 46 S.Ct. 126, 70 L.Ed. 322; United
States v. Resnick, 299 U.S. 207, 57 N.E. 126, 81 L.Ed. 127; People v. Shakum, 251 N.Y. 107, 113, 114, 167 N.E. 187, 64 A.L.R.
1066; People v. Wallace & Co., 282 N.Y. 417, 26 N.E.2d 959.

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