Case Name: PEOPLE v. PIERCE
Court: New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division
Jurisdiction: New York
Decision Date: 1903-06-30
Citations: 83 N.Y.S. 79
Docket Number: 
Parties: PEOPLE v. PIERCE.
Judges: 
Reporter: West's New York Supplement
Volume: 83
Pages: 79–83

Head Matter:
(85 App. Div. 125.)
PEOPLE v. PIERCE.
(Supreme Court, Appellate Division, Third Department.
June 30, 1903.)
1. Municipal Ordinance — Obstruction of Street — Power of City to Par°.
A city charter authorizing the council to pass ordinances prohibiting the gathering of persons upon the public streets, and empowering the police to disperse such gatherings, and, upon refusal of the persons congregated to disperse, to make summary arrests, and to prosecute them as disorderly persons, warrants the enactment of an ordinance providing that it shall not be lawful for any person to collect a crowd in the streets, to the hindrance of free and unmolested travel.
2. Same — Authority of Legislature.
The Legislature may empower a city council to pass an ordinance prohibiting the collection of crowds in the streets, to the hindrance of travel.
3. Same — Violation of Ordinance — What Constitutes.
An ordinance punished collecting a crowd in the streets, to the hindance of free and unmolested travel. Accused drew a crowd of from 50 to 70 people to hear him deliver a public speech. The street was about 65 feet wide. The crowd mostly collected at one side, leaving a passageway wide enough for a horse and carriage on the other. Held, that the evidence supported a finding of a violation of the ordinance.
Parker, P. J., dissenting.
Appeal from Montgomery County Court.
Clinton H. Pierce was convicted of violating a city ordinance, and from a judgment of the county court affirming the judgment of conviction he appeals.
Affirmed.
The ordinance under which this prosecution was had was stipulated to have been duly published and entered, and to have been an ordinance of the city of Amsterdam upon the 28th day of September, 1901, and for several days prior thereto. It reads as follows:
“It shall not be lawful for any person or persons to make and countenance or assist in any noise or disturbance or improper diversions in the streets or alleys, or in any place in the city, or who shall collect in crowds to the annoyance and disturbance of citizens or to the hindrance of free and unmolested travel, or to lounge, loaf or idly stand upon any street or corner, lane or alley, or at or near any bridge, railroad crossing or depot, or in or about any entrance, hallway or passageway or vestibule of any church, hall, place of amusement, factory, store, office, bank or other public buildings, or upon any unenclosed premises adjacent to any street or sidewalk, unless by consent of the owner or occupant of any such premises which are not public.
“Sec. 2. Every person violating any provision of this ordinance shall be liable to a fine of five dollars for each offense.”
The defendant was convicted of having violated that ordinance upon the 28th day of September, 1901, and was fined $5 upon such conviction. The county court affirmed the conviction, and from the order of affirmance this appeal is taken.'
Argued before PARKER, P. J., and SMITH, CHASE, CHESTER, and HOUGHTON, JJ.
Benjamin Matterson, for appellant.
Frank G. Kelsey (Louis G. Carpenter, of counsel), for the People.

Opinion:
SMITH, J.
From the evidence it appears that upon the 28th day of September, 1901, the defendant was upon West Main street — one of the public streets of the city of Amsterdam — speaking in the public highway of the street. He had drawn a crowd around him of about, as the evidence shows, from 50 to 70 people. He was' standing just north of the center of the street, and about 20 or 30 feet from the curb. The street was about 65 feet wide. The crowd was mostly collected upon the north side of the street, so there was a passageway still left for a horse and carriage upon the south side of the street. The defendant was first asked by a police officer if he had a permit, to which he refused to respond. The officer then requested the defendant to stop speaking, which the defendant refused to do, whereupon he was arrested.
Upon this appeal it is contended by defendant's counsel, first, that the city of Amsterdam had no authority to pass the ordinance in question; and, secondly, that the defendant was not guilty of a violation thereof. As to the authority of the city to pass the ordinance, there can be little doubt. The charter of the city authorizes the common council, among other things, to pass ordinances "to prohibit the gathering or assembling of persons upon the public streets of the said city," and to authorize the police to disperse such gatherings, and, upon the refusal of persons so congregated to disperse, to make summary arrest, and to prosecute them as disorderly persons; and all such persons were declared to be disorderly persons. This provision of the charter of the city of Amsterdam would seem to give to the common council of said city full authority to pass the ordinance in question. That the Legislature might give such authority to the common council would also seem to be undoubted. In Davis v. Massachusetts, 167 U. S. 47, 17 Sup. Ct. 255, 41 L. Ed. 666, Justice White, in writing for the court, said:
"For the Legislature absolutely or conditionally to forbid public speaking in a highway or public park is no more an infringement of the right of a member of the public than Cor the owner of a private house to forbid it in his house. When no proprietary right interferes, the Legislature may end the right of the public to enter upon the public place by putting an end to the dedication to public uses. So it may take the less step of limiting the public use to certain purposes. If the Legislature had power under the Constitution to pass a law in the form of the present ordinance, there is no doubt that it could authorize the city of Boston to pass the ordinance."
The more difficult question arises under the second contention of defendant's counsel, to wit, that he has not been shown to have been guilty of any act which constitutes a violation of the ordinance. While the wording of the ordinance is not strictly correct, there can be no ambiguity as to its meaning. A person is forbidden to collect a crowd in the streets, to the annoyance and disturbance of citizens, or to the "hindrance of free and unmolested travel." It cannot be necessary to show that some travelers who attempted to pass through the crowd were actually hindered thereby. They might well have passed from the street before reaching the crowd that was before them, in order to avoid collision with the crowd. Sixty or seventy people in a public highway 65 feet wide must constitute, to an extent, a hindrance to free and unmolested travel upon that highway. No person could drive a horse through a street thus conditioned, without greater care, even though a passage be left sufficiently wide for his horse to'pass. The natural and necessary consequence of collecting a crowd in a highway is to limit the freedom of its use. But whether or not such a crowd, as a matter of law, can be said to be a hindrance to free and unmolested travel upon that street, it is at least a question of fact, which has been determined by a jury against the defendant, and upon, as I think, abundant evidence. The apparent purpose of the ordinance was to prohibit just such public meetings in the street, and the act of the defendant in collecting this crowd was, in my judgment, a clear violation of the prohibition of the ordinance, which rendered him liable to the penalty which he has been adjudged to pay. The judgment of conviction was, I think, clearly right, as was its affirmance by the county court.
Judgment of conviction affirmed.
CHASE, CHESTER, and HOUGHTON, JJ., concur.