State v. Phillips
Tennessee Supreme Court
This was an indictment against the defendant, for malicious mischiefs in the circuit court of Anderson county. The indictment charged that the defendant killed a’ dog, and was predicated upon the act of 1808, chapter 9, section 2, which enacts, that: “Any person who shall cut out the tongue, cut off the ear or tail, or shall put out an eye of any beast, or otherwise dismember or disfigure such beast maliciously or of purpose; or shall wilfully and maliciously kill, destroy…
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This was an indictment against the defendant, for malicious mischiefs in the circuit court of Anderson county. The indictment charged that the defendant killed a’ dog, and was predicated upon the act of 1808, chapter 9, section 2, which enacts, that: “Any person who shall cut out the tongue, cut off the ear or tail, or shall put out an eye of any beast, or otherwise dismember or disfigure such beast maliciously or of purpose; or shall wilfully and maliciously kill, destroy or wound the beast of another, shall be fined not exceeding $200, and be imprisoned not exceeding three months.” To this…
1Opinion of the CourtMcKiNNEY, J.
It will not do therefore to give a literal construction to the aet. For such a construction would make it malicious mischief to kill a dog, or a cat, or any other beast in which may be held a qualified property, a thing which the Legislature never could have intended.
The Legislature intended in the passage of the above aet, to protect those well known domestic animals used for food, labor and other domestic purposes, in which the owners by the eommon law had an absolute property; and not such as are only the sublets of a qualified property by the same law, and such as are kept for pleasure…
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