(DAVIS, J., dissenting.) ( S. v. Wray, 72 N.C. 253, and S. v. Wool, 86 N.C. 708, distinguished; S. v. Dickerson, 1 Hay., 468 (407); S. v. Boyett, 10 Ired., 336; S. v. Presnell, 12 Ired., 103; S. v. Hart, 6 Jones, 389, cited and approved.) The defendant was indicted under the statute for selling liquor to a minor.

An indictment charging the commission of an offense on Sunday (here selling liquor), when the doing the act on that day is the gist of the offense, though it names the day of the month which does not fall on Sunday, is sufficient, and may be supported by proof of its commission on a Sunday. (State v. Wool, 86 N.C. 708; State v. Drake, 64 N.C. 589, cited and approved). INDICTMENT for misdemeanor tried at November Special Term, 1883, of NEW HANOVER Criminal Court, before Meares, J.

The local option statute, the validity and constitutionality of which are unquestioned in this case, are plain and unambiguous and there is no room or need for construction or interpretation, and no exception can be engrafted upon the law by judicial construction. See authorities cited under last proposition; also, Rothschild v. State, 7 Texas Ct. App. 536[ 7 Tex. Crim. 536]; Smith v. State, 18 Texas Ct. App. 454[ 18 Tex. Crim. 454]; Murray v. State, 2 S.W. Rep. 757; Sedgwick on Con. and Stat. Law, 231; State v. Gummer, 22 Wis. 441; Commonwealth v. Kimball, 24 Pick., 366; State v. Woodward, 34 Me. 293; Carl v. State, 89 Ala. 93; State v. Wool, 86 N.C. 708; Gault v. State, 34 Ga. 533; Noecker v. People, 91 Ill. 468. If the court should be of the opinion that it is a matter of doubt whether sales of alcohol made by appellant in the course of its business as alleged would be in violation of the local option law, still the injunction should be refused in the sound discretion of the court as a matter of public policy, and appellant should be required to resort to his legal remedy through the courts having jurisdiction to hear and determine the questions involved when the prosecution is instituted.

For a further discussion of this question see the case of Ball v. State, supra. To the same effect is 56 Ind. 156; 72 Ind. 294; 76 Ind. 526; 11 Am. and Eng. Enc. of Law, 703; 86 N.C. 708. For the reasons indicated, the judgment is reversed and the cause remanded.

As to this very matter of the sale of spirituous liquor to minors, it has often been held that the lack of intention to violate the law did not exculpate, if, in fact, the defendant did the act, or authoried [authorized] it to be done, which constituted a breach of the law. S. v. Wool, 86 N.C. 708; S. v. McBrayer, 98 N.C. 619; S. v. Scoggins, 107 N.C. 959; S. v. Lawrence, 97 N.C. 492; Farrell v. The State, 30 Am. Rep., 614, and numerous (562) cases cited in the notes thereto. A principal is prima facie liable for the acts of his agents done in the general course of business authorized by him, as where a barkeeper sells liquor, or a clerk sells a libel, or prints one in a newspaper.

This disposes of the defendant's exception to the refusal of his Honor to quash the indictment, and also of the exception to the charge in regard to the jurisdiction. As to the questions involved in the exceptions to the refusal of the court to charge as requested in regard to the sale for medicinal purposes upon the prescription of a physician, and to the charge in relation thereto as given, there has been some conflict in judicial decisions; but in the late case of S. v. McBrayer, 98 N.C. 619, Merrimon, J., delivering the opinion of the Court, in commenting on the case of S. v. Wray, 72 N.C. 253, relied on by counsel for defendant, said that case "went to the extreme limit of the power of interpretation"; and much stress, in S. v. Wray, was laid upon the fact that the sale was not only upon the prescription of a physician, but was made by a druggist, whose business it was to sell medicine upon prescriptions, and though in conflict with a dictum in S. v. Wool, 86 N.C. 708, this Court will not go, by construction or interpretation, beyond the ruling in S. v. Wray. To do so would tend (683) to impair the force of the statute, weaken its restraining power, and often to defeat the legislative will, by rendering evasions and violations of the law easy. It is not pretended that defendant kept whiskey for sale as a medicine, as druggists do, and for which they are required to pay a license. Tax Acts of 1887, ch. 135, sec. 21. This disposes of the other exceptions.