Jim Kershner’s This day in history

From our archives, 100 years ago

Members of a Spokane jury were part of an odd courtroom test. They were given a mug of “foaming Budweiser” and asked to drink it.

Seven of the 12 jurors, including one woman, said, “Here’s how!” and gulped the beer down. The other jurors declined.

They later learned that the beer had been doped with 20 drops of laudanum, a narcotic. It was part of an experiment, allowed by what must have been an exceptionally lenient judge, to see if the jurors could tell that a mug of beer contained laudanum.

A Spokane man was suing Washington Water Power, the streetcar company, for $15,000 in damages. He apparently had been stumbling around near Front Avenue and Division Street when he was struck and injured by a streetcar. The company claimed it was his fault because he had been drinking beer in a saloon.

The man claimed that it wasn’t his fault because his beer had been doped with laudanum without his knowledge. The defense attorney claimed that was impossible, since he would have detected the drug by taste and smell. Yet in the experiment, none of the jurors detected the laudanum.

The story in the Chronicle failed to address one key question: Did the jurors stay awake for the rest of the trial?

Also on this date

(From the Associated Press)

1922: The Supreme Court, in Leser v. Garnett, unanimously upheld the 19th Amendment to the Constitution, which guaranteed the right of women to vote.