New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1856-02-15
GOVERNOR NDTHE ASSEMBLY.

In bis Annual Message to the Legislature Gov.
Clark referred to the well known fact that in the
City Of New-York, the Prohibitory Liquor Law
had been, Through the cOnniyance OF magistrates
"and Executive officers, fagrantly disregarded on
"the pretense of its uncOnstitutionality Some
gentlemen of the Assembly have attempted to cast
severe censure upon the Governor for speaking
thus disresyectfully of magistrates; but we appre-
bend that be said nothing more than the truth.
Just previous to July A, the Mayor of Newly
Issued an order to the Police with special refer
enee TO this law He called their attention to the
duties required of them by its 18th section, viz;
"TO arrest any person seen in the violation OF the
first section, and to seize all liquors kept in vo-
'lation of that section" At the same time he said
10 every policeman Of the city, "You will not be
"authorized in seizing any foreign liquor, or in
"afresting for the sale of the same, except upon
warrant issued by competent magistrate upon
Testimony other your own" "an error IN this
"regard may lay YOU liable to severe personal re-
responsibility, inasnuch as you are hereby ex-
"pressy enioned to seize no such liquors" And
lest this should not suffice TO deter faithful police
men from performing the duties the law required
of them, he added: "The conviction under the
compliant is essential for your own protection.
What more, we ask, could the Mayor have done
to insare "a most fragrant disregard of the law 2"
So much for our chief executive officer, aud now
we come to the conduct Of the magistrates. Early
in July complaint was made, and quasi trial
had before the Recorder, who, without hearing any
argument TO sustain the law, declared it unconstl-
tutiona; said that no ofIense had been committed,
and DISCHARGED the accused The satisfaction this de-
csion afforded 10 the parties showed that the whole
affair was farce concOcted and managed by the
enemies of Prohibition, who hoped, with the sham
of judicial decision against it, to this law
TO be "hagrantly disregarded." AT the next Court
OF General Sessions the Recorder charged the
Grand Jury not to bring in any indictments nor en-
terrain any complaints under the law on the ground
that il was unconstitutional; and that all imported
liquors are exempt from its operation. The pro-
mitigation OF this charge was another influence,
causing the law to be still more fagranty disre
carded" Soon after this the City Temperance
Alliance brought bona fde case before the City
Judge, Sidney II. Stuart, esq. To avoid the ques-
ton as TO imported liquors, the complaint was
made for the sale of domestic whisky According
to law this case should have been tried at the
Special Sessions; but after repeated arguments and
adlournments, and taking several weeks to write
his opinion, Judge Stuart sent the to the Cen
eral Sessions, to await the slow and uncertain &C.
ton of the Grand Jury, and 10 be tried, if tried at
all, by the same Recorder who had already decided
the law to be unconstitutional, and had forbidden
the Grand Jury to find indictments under it. This
appeared equivalent to an indefinite postponement
and added still more to the inducements TO flag
ranty disregard the law.
The Temperance Alliance followed this case to
the Grand Jury, and in September obtained an in-
dictment. This was quashed by the Recorder on
the ground that the law was unconstitutional. In
this case also there was no argument before the
Recorder in favor Of the law, and the multitude Of
rumselers shouted at the increase of influence I'M
der which the law should be more and more - flag
ranty disregarded." At the next term of the Court
Of Over and Terminer. Judge Roosevelt charged
the Grand jury in the same strain as the Recorder
and for mainly the same reasons.
Gov. Clark must have been familiar with these
matters of public notoriety in the City OF New
York. He must have known also the position OF
the Mayor of Albany. who is, ifpOSsible, eyenmore
regardless of the law than Mayor Wood posi-
ton taken however like that OF the Mayor OF New
York, before any judge of any court had given even
an Incidental opinion, much less a legal decision
upon the consttutiOnality of any part OF the law.
Ii is not strange, then, that the Governor should
have used the words at which the gentlemen Of the
Assembly have taken such ofense nor that he