Case ID: nc_5/html/0291-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "By the Court.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Sears and others v. West.
    1 From Craven.
    A billiard table erected and used merely for the purpose of amuse? ment, is liable to the tax imposed on “ billiard tables,” in the same way as if used for the pmposes of gaming'.
    This was an action of 'trespass, to recover damages from the Defendant for haying taken out of tfye possession of the Plaintiffs a billiard table. The Plaintiffs were the owners of the table, which, previous to the first day of April, 1807, they caused to be erected in the town of> Newborn, at their own expense; not for any purpose of emolument, or to be employed as a gaming table, but for their private and individual amusement. They liad constantly kept up the table since its erection, for the purpose which originally induced them to .have it built. The Defendant, being Sheriff of Craven county, levied on the table for the tax which he conceived was diie therefor to the State, for the year 1807. If the tax be due thereon, and the levy therefore legal, it was agreed that judgment should be entered for the Defendant: if otherwise, for the Plaintiffs, and damages to be assessed to six pence.
    Gaston, for the Plaintiffs,
    contended, that the act of ,1804, ch. 31, permitting the use of billiard tables, and imposing a tax on them, related only to such tables as were erected and used for the purposes of gaming: that the act of 1798, ch. 19, “ for the prevention of vice and immorality, by suppressing excessive gaming,” prohibited the use of all “ gamingtables.” The act of 1804, ch. 31, tolerated the use of billiard tables “ for the purposes of gaming,” and imposed a tax on them. As the object of the first act was to suppress gaming, and of the latter to tolerate gaming upon billiard tables, it cannot be supposed that a table erected merely for the purposes of amusement, and not of gaming, came within the purview of the act. Such construction ought to he put upen a statute as may best answer the intention which the makers had in view — Plow. 232 — 11 Rep. 73. This intention is sometimes to be collected from the cause or necessity of making the statute: at other times from other circumstances, Whenever this can be discovered, it ought to be followed with reason and discretion in the construction of the statute, although such construction seem contrary to the letter of the statute — PZow. 205. A thing within the letter of a statute, is not within the statute, unless it be within the intention of its makers. J
    
   By the Court.

The object of the act of 1798, ch. 19, was to suppress excessive gaming, and also to remove the temptations to idleness and dissipation,” as these contributed to the main vice. The act therefore forbids the use of “ gaming tables,” generally, with a proviso, that it should not extend to billiard tables until the first day of April, then ensuing. The act of 1804, ch. 31, tolerates the use of billiard tables, but imposes a tax upon that use. By that act, every man -«who “ erects and keeps” a billiard table, is made liable to the tax. The Legislature seems to have considered the use of the billiard table as conducive to idleness and dissipation, as well as a mean by which excessive gaming was promoted. We are therefore of opinion that judgment should be entered for the Defendant.