The Portland daily press., 1890-04-30
1T DEALS A BLOW TO PROHIBITION.
The Supreme courts Decision in the
"onginaI Package" Case.
Liquor May Be Sold by the man Who
Imports 1t.
The Transaction Being Regarded as
Interstate Commerce.

WASHINGTON, April 29.-The opinion in
the ''Iowa original package" case delivered
in the United States Supreme Court, yester-
day, is of great interest to all states in which
prohibition prevails.
Gus Leisy & Co. are beer brewers In
Peoria, Ill. They sent some of their product
in sealed kegs and cases by means of the
railroads to Keokuk, Iowa, where their
agent, nonresident, offered 1t for sale in
the original cases. The liquor was seized,
under the prohibition laws of Iowa. Leisy
& Co. brought suit against the marshal,
alleging that the seizure was unconstitu-
tional and void, being in violation of the
clause of the Constitution, giving the United
States the exclusive r.sht to regulate inter
State commerce. The Keokuk court decided
in favor Of the liquor men, but on appeal to
the Supreme Court of Iowa the Prohibition
lists won, whereupon the liquor men brought
the case to this court. which now reverses
the Judgment of the Iowa Supreme Court.
The suit has become widely known as the
"original package" case, and has attracted
great deal of attention.
Chief Justice Fuller delivered the opinion
of the court. The court says the power
vested 10 Congress to regulate commerce
among the several states is the power to pre-
scribe the rule by which that commerce is to
be governed, and is power complete in it.
sell, acknowledging no limitations other
than those prescribed in the Constitution.
Ii is coextensive with the subject on which
1t acts, and cannot be stopped at the external
boundary OF state, but must enter its in
terror, and must be capable of authorizing
the disposition of those articles which it in
PRODUCES, SO that they may become mingled
with the common mass OF property within
the territory entered. A state may provide
for the security of the lives and property of
Its residents, but matter confided exclusive
ly to Congress by the Constitution Is not
within the jurisdiction of the police power
OF the state, unless placed there by Con-
gressional action.
Ii the Importation cannot be prohibited
without Congressional authorization, the
next question. the court says, Is, when does
the Imported property SO become part of the
common mass OF property within state as
to be subject to its unimpeded control? In
Brown against Maryland it was laid down
by the great magistrate who presided over
the Hs,c court for more than third OF a century:
time when, the prohibition ceases and the
power Of the state begins, is not the instant
when the article enters the country, but
when the importer has so acted upon 1t that
it has become Incorporated and mixed up
with the mass of property in the country,
no longer such in his hands that none Of the
evils which proceeded from the feebleness
OF the federal government contributed more
to the great revolution which introduced the
present system than the deep and general
conviction that commerce ought to be re-
gulated by Congress; that the right to sell
any article imported was an inseparable in
cident to the right to import it, and that the
principles exp0unded in the case applied
equally to importations from state as from
foreign country.
The court then takes up the case of Peirce
against New Hampshire, which has been
one of the chief authorities of those advo-
eating the validity of the Iowa statute. The
defendant in this case was fined for selling a
barrel of gin, which he had imported from
Massachusetts and sold contrary to the laws
of New Hampshire. In this case, Chief
Justice Taney held that the State had the
right to make such law for the protection
OF its Inhabitants, and that the mere grant
OF power over interstate commerce to the
general government cannot be construed to
be an absolute prohibition to the exercise Of
any power over the same subject by the
"But," says the court ''conceding the
weight properly to be asc1ibed to the judi
cial utterances of this eminent jurist, we
are constrained to say that the distinction
between subjects in respect of which there
can be of necessity only one system or plan
of regulation for the whole country, and
relating to commerce. mere aids rather than
regulations. does i, not appear to
us to have been sufficiently
recognized by him in arriving at the
conclusion as announced. That distinction
has been settled by repeated decisions of
this court, and cannot longer be regarded as
open to re-examination. The authority of
Pierce against New Hampshire, in SO far as
1t rests on the view that the law of New
Hampshire was valid because Congress had
made no regulation on the subject must be re-
garded as having been distinctly overthrown
by numerous cases."
Justice Gray delivered dissenting opinion
in behalf of himself and Justices Harlan and
Brewer. The dissenting opinion says that
the protection OF the safety, the health. the
morals, the good order and the general well
fare of the people is the chief end of govern
ment. All statutes of state must of course
give. way so far as they are repugnant to the
National Constitution and laws. But an in
tention is not lightly to be imputed to the
trainers Of the Constitution or to the Con-
gress Of the United States to subordinate the
Protection OF the safety, health and morals Of
the people tn the promotion of trade and
commerce.