Henry Billings Brown

“ It is a fatal objection to the statute that it undertakes to settle in one trial the rights of two parties to a criminal cause whose interests are adverse, and to try two distinct and disconnected issues, viz. the guilt of the principal defendant and the innocence of the prosecutor, upon testimony applicable to but one of such issues. ”

“ The unnecessary hardship of the statute is the more manifest when compared with certain sections of the Revised Statutes of the United States, having a similar object. Thus, by section 970, when, in certain prosecutions instituted by a collector of customs or other officer, judgment is rendered for the claimant, but it appears to the court that there was reasonable cause for the seizure, the court shall cause the proper certificate thereof to be entered, and the claimant shall not be entitled to costs, nor the prosecutor be liable to suit. ”

“ A party may be convinced of the existence of a tippling or gambling shop at a certain place, or of other means by which the morals of the community are corrupted or debased, and yet upon the trial, from the peculiar or secret nature of the business, may be unable to prove the charge. ”