Ah Lim v. Territory of Washington
Washington Supreme Court
Appeal from District Court, King County. The facts are slated in the opinion. The smoking and inhaling of opium is a vice, and the validity of all laws having for their object the restraint of such vice, must be construed by the same rules of construction as laws having for their objects the restraint and regulation of other vices. It cannot be made a legal wrong for one to become intoxicated in the privacy of his room.
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Appeal from District Court, King County. The facts are slated in the opinion. The smoking and inhaling of opium is a vice, and the validity of all laws having for their object the restraint of such vice, must be construed by the same rules of construction as laws having for their objects the restraint and regulation of other vices. It cannot be made a legal wrong for one to become intoxicated in the privacy of his room. Tiedeman on Limitation of Police Powers, ?¿ 68. The right of every man to do what he will with his own, not interfering with the reciprocal rights of others, is accepted among…
1Opinion of the Court
The opinion of the court was delivered by
Dunbar, J.
The defendant was indicted at the August term of the district court for King county, for the crime of smoking opium, as follows, to wit (omitting the formal part of the indictment): “ The said Ah Lim, on the 27th day of September, A. D. 1889, in the county of King, in the district aforesaid, then and there being, did then and there willfully and unlawfully smoke opium, by then and there burning said opium and inhaling the fumes thereof through an instrument commonly known as an opium pipe, contrary to the form of the statute,” etc.
To this…
2Cases cited3 opinions
- Fletcher v. PeckSupreme Court of the United States · 1810
- People v. . WestNew York Court of Appeals · 1887
- Williams v. CammackMississippi Supreme Court · 1854
3Cited by110 opinions
- Ritchie v. PeopleIllinois Supreme Court · 1895
- McCamant v. BatsellTexas Supreme Court · 1883
- Taggart v. . MurrayNew York Court of Appeals · 1873
- In re CraneIdaho Supreme Court · 1915
- Dickinson v. Railroad Co.West Virginia Supreme Court · 1874
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