The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1897-12-23
WIN The COWS LEAVE HOME.

Because our State Supreme cour
fudges are learned and IA .rly old, it mus
not be surmised that they are snailisl
In their gait. Now and then they froli,
along on fantastic toe, while their eyes
sparkle with seller light. If sic itn
ad astra S their usual upward way, thel
now aid then strike the earth with /,
sic itur I'd urben, which, being liberall,
interpretei for the purposes of this case
means, This way to Town!
1t having been the case of "Broadfoo.
against the town of Fayetteville" {
decision was yesterday handed down.
The COW of MIR. Broadfoot, who lives
In the country near Fayetteville, strayeo
into that town. Her name was Mag
gie." The authorities apprehended hel
and Mr. Broadfoot was fined S1.00. He
refused to pay more than % cents, al
according to the State statute providing
that country people whose COWS stray
into town shah pay only one-fourth the
fine charged town folks who turn theil
cows loose in town."
Fayetteville claimed that the act was
unconstitutional:
l. Because the State Constitution for
bids special privileges to any set of men
2. Because the 18th Amendment to
She United States Constitution prohibits
a State from denying the equal pro-
lection Of the laws to any of its citizens.
The court stood by the country people,
upholding the statute, which makes Mag
gie's lunch stand her in only 25 cents.
Brushing aside for the purposes of this
discussion the irrelevant trifes of the
Constitutions of the United States and
of North Carolina as inhumanly human,
we come to another and deeper phase
which, in their breezy frame of mind,
seems to have escaped the notice of
our busy bench.
We REFER Of course, as will have prob
ably been anticipated by the more acute
members of the profession, to the cows
attitude in the matter. As far as we
have seen, maggie" was not put on
the sinnd and, therefore, her state OF
mind will have to be arrived at psyche
logically and analogically.
Had the aegis Of the Constitution been
spread over Maggie, and she had been
allowed to appear in her own defense,
we can imagine the stenographer taking
some such notes as these:
maggie did not attempt to prove an
alibi; she plead guilty to being on the
day specified in place called Fayette-
vile, when his honor, Chief Justice
Faireloth asked:
maggie, did you not know that you
were not in the country, and that ergo
you were destroying $100 town grass?
Maggie: 81 did not, your honor"
Judge Clark: "Maggie, why did you
think you were in the country!"
Maggie: cit looked the same as home
to me, your honor"
Judge Furches: "Do you mean to tel
this court, Maggie, that there is any
grass on Fayetteville"
Maggie: "Your honor, the best I eve
eat"
Judge Montgomery: maggie, wa!
grass the only bucolic phenomenon tina
you saw that day in that said placer
Maggie, soft and low: "Your honor
no sir, l saw one man coming down /;
road who walked slow like shepherd
Judge Douglass: ''Then Maggie, OF
your honor as cow, you swear tina
you saw no evidences of life, and tina
you thought you were in the countr
right"
Maggie: "Not only on my honor, aye
on my buttermilk / swear it."
"At. the conclusion Of the testimon!
the word innocent! burst, in confusion
simultaneously from the lips of tn
Judges, the untimeliness of it being, II
doubt, pardonable from the gallantry c
the Bench. the clearness of the defens'
and the gentle sex Of the accused"
This was the high line on which tn
ease should have been presented.
would have established the same
cents rates for Maggie, and would hay
established them without doing violent
either to the fantasies of constitution
or to the feelings of the cow.