The Richmond Indiana palladium. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1854-1855, 1855-11-15

mote the welfare and prosperity q he people
We assume il as established. then. thai tie
LIQUOR act in question Is absolutely p-oHIbito
~ Of the manufacture sale. and Use IS hev-
craze. bv tie peopie of this sac. Of WHISKY.
ale. porter and beer. The oPluIo- has been
advanced that the manufacture for sale on oi
H.. sac i not prohibited, bur Il has rot The
substance Of A shadow: and The morality of
that law which prohibits the dis;rioU a ..
paupersm and crime. disease AMI Ge.th, a
home. but permits them 10 be 50. riea
amongst our nrishbors, i not 70 be eitsIri -
And We may as well renla. 4 here a. ans y ..es-
tina, if the rnanufac AMI sac al Ia, ara
Giles are proper tU b. C,sr.ei oT II ~s-
for any purposei;i Is No. competent s9r .ht
government to take the business from the peo-
Die and monopolse it. TIE government can
not tarn druggist and become the sole dealer
in medicines in tie State. And why? Because
the business was at and before the organiza
ton of the government and IS property al all
times, private pursuit OF the people, as much
SO as the manufacture and sale of brooms. to-
bacco, cloths, and the dealing in tea, coffee and
rice, and the raising of potatoes; and the gov
eminent was organized to protect the people
in such pursuits from the depreciation of
powerful and lawless individuals, the baronS
OF the middle ages, whom they were TOO weak
to resist single handed by force; and for the
government now to seize upon those pursuits
is subversive of the very object for which it
was created "A government IS guilty Of in
vasion upon the facilities of industry possessed
bv individuals hen i. appropriates 10 itself
a particular branch Of industry, the business
of exchange and brokerage for example; or
when il sells the exclusive privilege Of conduc-
ting it." SAYS Political Economy. note to
P l34.
There are undertakings of public charac-
ter such as the making OF public highways.
providing q uniform currency, &c, that sin
gle individual has not power to accomplish,
and which government must, therefore, prose
cute; but they are not the ordinary pursuits Of
the private citizen.
These, certainly as the general rule, and
we are now prepared TO name an exception,
the government cannot engage in.
This is all we shall here say upon this point
Time and space forbid that we should elabo-
rate all that arise in the case.
The question now presents itself.
Secondly. Could the legislature of this
State enact the prohibitory liquor law under
consideration?
Few, ifany. judicial decisions will be found
10 aid in investigating this question, as no
such law, in a country possessed of judi
ciary and constitution limiting the legisla-
tive power, has, till Of late, been enacted
! Some twelve hundred years ago Mahomet
made such law part of his religious creed
I in opposition to the Jewish and Christian
/ systems which recommended the moderate,
/ but forbid the excessive use of Intoxicating
liquors This law of Mahomet Koran, PIP.
! 25 and 90, was perhaps the first prohibtory
act, but it does not appear to have been adop-
ted by civilized nations tilt is late revival in
some shape or other in one more Of our sis
ter States. Hence, it has not often, if at all,
! as to this poin: passed under judicial conside-
ration.
\ number af European writer's aural.
! public, and civil law are cited by counsel on
behalf of the State % show the extent Of legis-
lative power; but those writers, respectable.
able, and instructive upon some sub ects a
they are admitted to be, not authority here
upon this point. They are dangerous, indeed
utterly blind guides to follow in searching for
the land marks oflegi>lative power in our free
and limited government; for they had in view
when writing, governments as existing wher
and where they wrote under which they
lived and Lad been educated, and which had
no written constitutions limiting their powers
governments, the theory OF which was tha
they were paternal in character-that all pow
er was in them by divine right, and they
hence, absolute: that the people of country
had no rights except what the government o
that country gracously saw fit to confer upon
them, and tia; it was his duty, like as father
toward his children To command whatever il
deemed expedient for the public good with
out first in any manner, consulting that pub
lie. or recognizing in is members any indi
ydual rights.
Indeed. the discovery of the great doctrine
of rights in the people as against the govern
L L
above referred TO lived. Such governments
as those described, could adopt the maxim
quoted by counsel, tina. the safety of the peo-
pie is the supreme law. and act upon il; and
being severally the sole judges of what thei,
safety, in the countries governed, respectively
required, could prescribe what the people
should eat and drink, what political. mora
and religious creeds they should believe in
and punish heresy by burning at the stake
all for the public good. Even in Crest Brit
ain, esteemed 10 have the most liberal con
stitution the Eastern continent, hagn1
Charta, is not of sufficient potency to restrain
the action Of Parliament as the Judiciary Dc
not, as a settled rule, bring laws to the test o
its provisions. Laws are there overthrow
only occasionally by judicial construction
But here we have written contitutons which
are the supreme law which our legislatures
sworn to support. within whose restric-
tons thew must limit their action for the pub
lie welfare, and whose barriers they canno
overlap, under any pretext Of supposed safe
ty of the people; for along with our writer
constitutions We have a Judiciary whose duty
il is, as the only means OF securing TO the PEG
pie safety from legislative aggression, 10 annu
all legislative action without the pale of those
instruments. This duty Of the Judicial de
partment. in this count Y, was demonstrated
By Chief Justice Marshall in Marberry v
Madison, Cranch 1877. and has since been
recognized as settled American Law. The
maxim above quoted. therefore as applied tc