It can only throw a compiler error if you use a 0 literal (or constant), because it cannot determine the runtime value of a variable denominator at compile-time (obviously).

It does not force you to check, but if you wanted to "catch" the "exception" (really, "recover from the panic"), here's how you would do that. Note that this is admittedly a somewhat unidiomatic use of recover(): http://play.golang.org/p/dAQ01dus9Y