State v. Dorsett

Defendants assign as error that the trial judge ruled the Ordinance to be constitutional and denied the motions to quash the warrants.

A statute or ordinance is presumed to have meaning and will be upheld if its meaning is ascertainable with reasonable certainty by proper construction. Hobbs v. Moore County, 267 N.C. 665, 149 S.E. 2d 1. If a statute is susceptible to two interpretations, one constitutional and the other unconstitutional, the former will be adopted. Milk Commission v. Food Stores, 270 N.C. 323, 154 S.E. 2d 548. The ordinance attacked in this case is clearly criminal in nature…