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49 Mass. 525

Commonwealth v. Thayer

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court

Decided October 15, 1844

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court · decided 1844-10-15

This was a complaint against the defendant for selling to Albert Hersey one glass of spiritous liquor, on the 19th of February 1844. The form of the complaint, mutatis mutandis, was the same as in the next preceding case, against the same defendant. At the trial in the court of common pleas, before Ward, J. “ it appeared that the defendant was keeper of a public house in which was a bar and a bar-keeper.

Decided 1844-10-15

Dewey, J.

¶1The question whether the defendant sold the liquor, as alleged in the complaint, was submitted to the jury under proper instructions. The government alleged a sale to Albert Hersey of one glass of spiritous liquor, and was bound to establish the fact. To constitute such sale, there must be the assent of the two parties; there must be a vendor and a vendee. But no words need be proved to have been spoken. A sale may be inferred from the acts of the parties, and no disguise which the parties may attempt to throw over the transac tion, with a view of evading the penalty of the law, can avail them, if in truth such sale is found to have taken place. The ruling of the presiding judge, as to the payment of any part of the money, and the receipt thereof in payment for the liquor, constituting a sale, was correct.

¶2It is no objection to the form of the complaint, that the sale of the cake was not set forth. The law does not require, in such cases, a contract of sale to be set out with all the terms, conditions and stipulations, or the precise consideration paid for the thing purchased. It only requires a direct allegation of a sale of liquor, leaving the circumstances to be disclosed by the evidence offered to support the charge.

¶3Exceptions overruled,

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