majority"> MONTGOMERY, J.:

The indictment was found at Fall Term, 1897, of Rockingham Superior Court which was convened on the 31st of October, and charged the defendant with a failure and refusal to pay his taxes for the year 1897, to the Sheriff of the County, on or before the 1st day of September, 1897, or on the first of November next following. The defendant was put on trial and the jury returned a special verdict. Upon the facts found in the verdict the Court pronounced judgment in favor of the defendant and the State appealed.

If there was a purpose to get a speedy decision by this Court upon the construction of Sections 52 and 53 of Chapter 168, Acts 1897 (an Act to raise revenue), a most unfortunate venue was selected for the trial of the indictment. We are happily relieved of -the necessity of discussing that question in the matter now before us except to a very limited extent.

One thing is certain, among many other things uncertain, in the Machinery Act, and that is that all taxes shall be due on the first Monday in September in each year; and also that no collecting officer shall sell property for taxes before the first day of November next following; and indeed, in certain Counties of the State, not until after the 15th of March in the next year. The law cannot require impossibilities of its subjects, and, as it would be physically impossible for the tax collectors to receive the entire taxes due by all of the people of the whole State and for the tax payers to pay their taxes, in one day, the day on which they become due (the first of September), we must necessarily hold that the failure or refusal to pay taxes before the day on which the collector’s right to sell begins, is not an indictable *619 offence in contemplation of the Act. The Comity of Rock-ingham is one of the Counties in the State excepted from the general provisions of the Revenue Law as to the time at which taxes can be collected by distraint and sale. The Sheriff in that County cannot sell property for taxes until after the 15th of March following the September first on which the taxes became due. This being so, of course the defendant who is a citizen and tax-payer of Rockingham County, could not be lawfully indicted for the non-payment of his taxes until the 15th of next March, if indeed he then could be, (upon which question we express no opinion for the reason that the matter is not before us.)

If it was intended by this appeal to test the power of the General Assembly to discriminate between the different Counties of the State as to the times at which the people shall pay their taxes, it is to be observed that such laws have been common in our past legislative history, and they have not been assailed so far as we know on the ground that they were unconstitutional. The early marketing of the products of the Eastern Counties enables the people of those counties to pay their taxes earlier than the people of the Western Counties can. conveniently pay theirs, because of the necessary lateness of the marketing of their chief crop. Such Statutes, although local, are still public laws. _Tliey affect everybody alike in the localities where they prevail and confer no exemptions or special privileges upon any. There is no violation of the principle of equation of taxation and the State, during the fiscal year, receives its revenue from all of its people under laws operating justly throughout the whole State.

Under the police power, the sale of liquor has been regulated by Statutes applicable to particular localities. State v. Chambers, 93 N. C., 600; State v. Wallace, 94 N. C., 827. Indeed, a Statute regulating the sale of cotton, as to hours *620 •of sale and quantities sold, in particular counties, lias been held to be constitutional. State v. Moore, 104 N. C., 714.

The judgment pronounced by the Court upon the special •verdict was correct and the same is affirmed.

Affirmed.

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