Case ID: f-cas_25/html/0675-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "THE COURT.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Case No. 14,875.
    UNITED STATES v. COULTER.
    [1 Cranch, C. C. 203.] 
    
    Circuit Court, District of Columbia.
    Dec. Term, 1804.
    Disorderly House—Selling Liquor to Negroes —Sunday Selling—License.
    The practice of selling spirituous liquors, in a public manner, to aegroes and slaves, assembled in considerable numbers, and suffering them to drink the same in and about the house on the Sabbath, constitutes the offence of keeping a disorderly house, although the owner may have a tavern license
    [Cited in State v. Crawford, 28 Kan. 733.]
    Indictment for keeping a disorderly house.
    Mr. Morsell. for the defendant,
    contended that a disorderly house is only indictable at common law as a common nuisance, and that actual disorder must be proved. Coulter had a license to keep a tavern; he is only prohibited by statute from selling on Sundays; from dealing with slaves, &e.
    Mr. Jones, for the United States.
    A bawdy-house is indictable as a common nuisance, and yet it is not necessary to prove that any one person has been disturbed by it. The tendency to corrupt the morals makes it a common nuisance.
    
      
       [Reported by Hon. William Cranch, Chief Judge.]
    
   THE COURT.

The license does not authorize the defendant to sell to slaves or negroes on a Sunday; it is therefore no justification as to those facts. The practice of selling spirituous liquors in a public manner to negroes and slaves, assembled in considerable numbers, and suffering them to drink the same in and about the house on the Sabbath, constitutes the offence of keeping a disorderly house.

Verdict guilty. Fined ?10.