Ex parte Keeler

Citations

• 45 S.C. 537
• 31 L.R.A. 678
• 23 S.E. 865
• 1896 S.C. LEXIS 11

Syllabus

<p>1. Court — Habeas Corpus — Contempt—Proceedings.—A party who has been adjudged guilty of contempt of Court will not be released upon habeas corpus, unless the proceedings under which he is imprisoned are null and void, in whole or in part.</p> <p>2. Legislature — Liquors —Nuisance—Remedy—Constitutional Rights. — The Legislature has the right to declare places where liquors are sold to be common nuisances, to provide summary remedies to abate the nuisance, and such remedy is not unconstitutional because they deprive the party of those rights which, under the Constitution, he is otdinarily entitled to.</p> <p>3. Legislature — Penitentiary — Injunction — Liquors — Contempt — Remedy—Court—Nuisance.—To justify the Legislature in passing an act enabling a Judge to commit a citizen to hard labor in the State penitentiary, for violating an injunction restraining him from engaging in the sale of intoxicating liquors, it must appear (1) that the interest of the public generally require these stringent remedies, and (2) that they are reasonably necessary to accomplish the purposes for which it was enacted; and in determining if such remedies are reasonable, the Court will consider the value and nature of the property involved in the nuisance, and the difficulty of its suppression.</p> <p>4. Pine and Punishment — Dispensary Act oe 1894 — Art. I., Sec. 38, Con. oe 1868. — The fine and punishment imposed by section 22 of the Dispensary Act of 1894 is not cruel, excessive or unusual, nor contrary to the provisions of section 38 of article I. of the Constitution of 1868.</p> <p>5. Mr. Chiee Justice McIver dissenting.</p>