Court Opinion

ID: 9546827
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:35:58.973831+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:16:54.468201
License: Public Domain

HENRIOD, Justice
(concurring and dissenting) .
I concur only in the result.
The main opinion contends that much mischief has resulted from the common belief that postdating is a defense under the statute. Not so much that a court could judicially notice it, and not nearly so much, if we wish to indulge in conjecture, as has the execution of worthless promissory notes. Much is made of the idea expressed in the old saw that the state of a man’s mind is as much a fact as the state of his digestion,1-hence his intent is provable, though difficult. Granted, but intent is no factor if we follow the weight of authority holding a postdate not the subject of prosecution under bad check acts.2 We may as well say that we follow the minority and not the general rule. State v. Taylor, upon which Mr. Justice Crockett leans so heavily, was brushed aside in 95 A.L.R. 496 with the following: “The courts in the more recent cases have taken the view that such a check is not within the contemplation of such statute,- — the Missouri court * * * (State v. Taylor) being the only exception.”
As the main opinion asserts, it may be that “The rapid concourse of modern business and commerce requires the reliance upon many and often far-flung credit transactions,” but facile as it is to a judge another,' rapid business or the peregrinations of credit transactions should not preclude us from cocking an attentive ear for the fundamental rights of an accused, invoking the established authorities which presently inoculate him against a statute such as ours, and reminding ourselves of the traditional policy of resolving doubts in his favor.
It would not seem overburdensome in the law merchant to require that business men look at a check’s date to determine whether it is a demand order to pay or only an assurance that funds will be available in the *143future. If they knew that a postdate would give rise to no criminal responsibility under the bad check statute, but must be treated as a promise to which only civil responsibility attaches, either they would refuse to accept it or treat it for what it is, a promise in futuro, — like any promissory note they customarily may receive in the course of their business, relying, on the ability of the issuer, like that of the maker of a note, to pay when the day of reckoning arrives.

. Edgington v. Fitzmaurice, 1885 L.R., 29 Ch.Div. 483.

. 95 A.L.R. 496; People v. Mazeloff, 229 App.Div. 451, 242 N.Y.S. 623; State v. Crawford, 198 N.C. 522, 152 S.E. 504; State v. Byrd, 204 N.C. 162, 167 S.E. 626; Com. v. Massaro, 97 Pa.Super. 149; Seaboard Oil Co. v. Cunningham, 5 Cir., 51 F.2d 321, certiorari denied 284 U.S. 657, 52 S.Ct. 35, 76 L.Ed., 557. See Anderson v. Bryson, 94 Fla. 1165, 115 So. 505. And see also In re Scott, 85 Cal.App. 170, 259 P. 101.