The New Orleans daily Democrat. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1877-1880, 1878-05-17
ACT NO. 8.

yesterday had q number OF persons tried be-
fore ReC.,rder Smith for selling lottery tickets
in violation OF the Infamous act No. 2 of 1874.
Three OF the parties were convicted and fined
$25 each, with the alternative of going to the
parish prison for five days. Two of the gentle
men convicted paid the fine, but the third.
being unable to do SO, was sent to prison,
where he is now. Besides these three con-
victed. Mr.. F. A. Gonzales and Mr.. Plassan.
both highly respectable merchants, were
arraigned, having also been arrested on
affidavits made by spies of the Lottery
Company. When Mr.. Gonzales was
called before the court it turned out that
the spy had made an affidavit against
the wrong man, as the witness provided for
the occasion was unable to identify him as
the party who had sold Havana lottery
tickets Mr.. Gonzales, therefore, after hav-
ing undergone the humiliation and vexation
Of arrest and having been forced to give bond
for his appearance at court was released by
the merciful Judge. He had not. it turned
out, committed the crime against the lottery
monopoly.
Mr.. Plassans case is even more extraordi-
nary. One Of the lottery spies had made an
tickets. When arraigned before the recorder
the lottery attorney produced as his witness
a miserable creature, named Frisby-Gen
Frisby we believe, he Is called-a convicted
and notorious periurer, and a man of the low
est and basest instincts. This hireling Of the
company swore point blank that Mr. Plas-
san had sold Havana lottery ticket. For
tunately Mr.. McCarty, the partner of Mr.
Plassan, was able to testify positively that
he (Plassan) had never done any such thing;
otherwise Mr.. Plassan, on the testimony of
convicted perjurer, would have been bound to
give up S25 or go to Jail.
We do not deem it necessary to comment
on these outrages. The bare mention of the
facts show the character of the law under
which this monopoly recklessly violates the
personal liberty Of citizens and robs them of
their money. Such a law would excite
Indignation even in Russia; but in
this free State rich and well or
gained monopoly is more powerful
than the constitution; there are no rights of
the people it is bound to respect, or which it |
may not violate with impunity. In a card
published in the Times and Picnyune yester-
day morning the Lottery Company de-
clare their purpose to maintain their
rights, and claim that they have twenty
decisions of courts maintaining the con-
OF their franchises and the !
laws they have purchased from corrupt |
Their statement is false in |
spirit If not in letter. They have not single |
decision Of an unsupported court affirming the
constitutionality Of their franchises. Before
the Inauguration of the present adminstra-
ton they owned nearly all the district judges, |
the Supreme Court and the Federal courts !
In this city. The decisions they may have
obtained from these tribunals nobody re-
spects; they were decisions rendered by
the judicial tools and hirelings of the
Lottery Company. We understand that the !
recent decisions OF the present Supreme
Court in the case of the State of Louisiana
ex rel. Herbert Geale ct al. vs. Recorder
Smith, alirms the constitutionality OF act
No. 9. Such is not the case. The court
in that case simply decided against the pro-
cess by which it was attempted to bring the
merits OF the question before that body. The
act in question is plainly unconstitutional,
and the people who have been made the VIC
Tins OF it should proceed vigorously against
the officials who, in violation of their juris-
diction and Of the constitution, may enforce
it's tyrannical and odious features.
The Republicans were disposed at first to
ridicule the National Greenback- Labor party
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