Page:1862 Territory of Dakota Session Laws.pdf/203

186 . 117. If any judge, justice of the peace, sheriff, or other officer bound to preserve the public peace, shall have knowledge of an intention on the part of any two persons to fight with any deadly weapon or weapons, and such officer shall not use and exert his official authority to arrest the parties and prevent the duel, every such officer shall be fined, not exceeding one hundred dollars.

. 118. If any person or persons shall, in any newspaper or handbill, written or printed, publish or proclaim any other person or persons as a coward or cowards, or use any other opprobrious or abusive language, for not accepting a challenge to fight a duel, or for not fighting a duel, such person or persons so offending, on conviction, shall be fined in a sum not exceeding five hundred dollars, or imprisoned for a term not exceeding three months. The publisher or printer of any such newspaper, handbill, or other publication, may be summoned as a witness, and shall be required to testify against the writer or writers of such handbill or publication; and if any such printer or printers shall refuse to testify in relation to the premises, either before the grand or petit jury, he or they shall be deemed guilty of a flagrant contempt of the court, and may be punished by fine and imprisonment, or either: Provided, however, That the testimony given by any such witness shall, in no case, be used in any prosecution against such witness.

. 119. A libel is a malicious defamation, expressed either by printing or by signs or pictures, or the like, tending to blacken the memory of one who is dead, or to impeach the honesty, integrity, virtue, or reputation, or publish the natural defects of one who is alive, and thereby expose him or her to public hatred, contempt, or ridicule; every person, whether writer or publisher, convicted of this offence, shall be fined in a sum not exceeding five hundred dollars, or imprisoned not exceeding one year. In all prosecutions for a libel, the truth thereof may be given in evidence in justification, except libels tending to blacken the memory of the dead, or expose the natural defects of the living.