¶1The indictment is well enough, and should have been thus held. The gist of the offense with which the defendant was charged, was the unlawful traffic and dealing in spirituous liquors. A violation of the statute under which the indictment is drawn may occur in two ways : First, by a druggist having no license as a dram-shop keeper, selling intoxicating liquor in less quantity than one gallon. Second, by such druggist, being unlicensed as aforesaid, giving away a similar quantity of intoxicating liquor. The statute is in the disjunctive. In such cases, it is allowable to use the word and instead of the disjunctive or. And it is held bad pleading to employ the disjunctive in such cases, and fatal to do so. This is the view taken in State v. Fitzsimmons, 30 Mo. 236, and in the elementary works. State v. Fancher, 71 Mo. 460, and cases cited. Therefore, judgment reversed and cause remanded.
76 Mo. 56
State v. Pittman
Decided October 15, 1882
Supreme Court of Missouri · decided 1882-10-15
—Hon. J. H. Nicholson, Judge. The indictment charged that defendant, being a druggist, did unlawfully “ sell and give away ” intoxicating liquors in less quantities than one gallon, without having a dramshop keeper’s license. It was founded on section 1, page 166, Session Acts 1879, which makes it an offense to “sell or give away,” etc. Defendant demurred to the indictment, as charging two distinct offenses, and being, therefore, bad for duplicity.
Relies on State v. Fancher · State v. Fitzsimmons
Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know
Reversed · Decided 1882-10-15
How this case has been cited
Cited by 16 later decisions — most recently February 1931
16 state decisions
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
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