The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1890-04-29
RUM CAN GO INTO IOWA.
THE SUPREME COURT NULLIFIEs
A PROHIBITORY LAW.

A Refusal to Allow Liquor to Enter
.hs state Interferes With Inter
state Commerce-The Right to Sell
the Article Imported Inseparabie
from the Right to Import 1t.
WASHINGTON, April 2S-The United
States supreme court to-day rendered an
orinion 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 railroad to Keokuk,
Ia, where their agent, nonresident,
offered it for sale in the original cases. The
liquor was seized by A. ]. Hardin, marshal
OF Keokuk, under the prohibition laws of
Iowa. Leisy & Co. brought suit
against the marshal, alleging that the
seizure was unconstitutional and void,
being in violation Of the clause of the con-
stitrtion giving the United States the ex-
elusive right to regulate interstate COM
merce. The Keokuk court decided in favor
of the liquor men, but on an appeal to the
supreme court of Iowa the prohibitionists
won, whereupon the liquor men brought the
case to this court. The suit has become
widely known as the "original package"
case and has attracted great deal of
attention.
JUSTICE FULLER's OPINION.
Chief Justice Fuller delivered the opinion
of the court to-day. The court SAYS the
power vested in congress to regulate COM
merce among the several states is power
to prescribe the rule by which that COM
mercee is to be governed, and is power
complete in itself, acknowledging no limi-
tations other than those prescribed in the
constitution. 1t is co-extensive with the
subject on which it acts, and cannot be
stopped at the external boundary of state,
tut must enter its interior and must be
capable Of authorizing the disposition
Of those articles which it introduces. so that
they may become mingled with the common
mass OF property within the territory en-
tered. A state may provide for the security
of the lives and property of its residents,
but a matter confided exclusively to con-
gress by the constitution is not within the
jurisdiction Of the police power of state,
unless placed there by congressional action
PARTICULAR SUBJECTS.
If particular subjects of interstate com
merce do not require the application of a
general or uniform system, the states may
legislate in regard to them with view to
local needs or circumstances until congress
otherwise directs, but this power is not
regulate commerce among the states
The court quotes the statements of the
Federalist in support of this conclusion.
That ardent spirits are subjects Of inter-
state commerce is not denied, and the court
then asks if state in the absence of con-
gressional legislation can prohibit their
importation from abroad or from sister
state or their sale by an importer. If i'm
portation cannot be prohibited without
brr ri rat ha VT
question, the court says. is, when does i'm
ported property so become part of the COM
mon mass of property within state as to
be subject to its unimpeded control?
A MARYLAND CASE.
In Brown VS.. Maryland it was laid down
by the great magistrate who presided over
the court for more than third of a cen
tury Chief Justice MarshalD that the point
of time when prohibition ceases and the
power of a state begins, is not the instant
when the article enters the country, but
when the importer has SO acted upon it that
it has become Incorporated and mixed up
with the mass Of property in the country,
which happens when the original
package is 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
eral conviction that commerce ought to be
regulated by congress; that the right to sell
any article imported was an inseperable
Incident to the right to import it, and that
the principles expounded in the case applied
equally to importations from sister state
as from foreign country.
INVOLVED IN THE OTHER CASES.
Although the precise question now before
the court was not ruled upon in that case,
the court says it thinks it was virtually in
volved in the Brown case and also IN the
Bowman case in which an act of the state
OF Iowa forbidding common carriers to
bring intoxicating liquors into the state
without first being furnished with certifi-
cate as prescribed in the act was declared
Invalid because essentially a regulation of
commerce among the states. The opinion
OF the court In the Bowman case
was delivered by Justice Matthews,
and dissenting opinion, delivered by
Justice Harlan, discussed the question in
all its phases, and while determination of
whether the right of transportation of any
article of commerce from one state 10 an
other includes by necessary implication
the right of the consignee to sell it in un-
broken packages at the place where trans
portatlon terminates, was in terms re-
served, yet the argument of the majority
conducts inestibly to that conclusion. This
decision is quoted at length.
WHEN THERE IS A CONFLICT.
Whenever" says the opinion of the
chief justice, ''the law of state amounts
essentially to regulation of commerce. as it
does, when it prohibits directly or indi-
riectly the receipt of an imported commod
ny or its disposition before it has ceased to
become an article of trade between one
state and another, it comes in conflict with
the power which, in this particular, has
Deen exclusively in the general government,
and is therefore void. Undoubtedly
u is for the legislative branch of the state
governments to determine whether the
manufacture of particular articles of traffic
win lnJuriously affect the public, and it is
no1 Tor congress to determine what measures
one state may properly adopt as appropriate
VI needful for the protection of public
~ ;i1lorais, life or safety; but Notwithstanding
~ Is not vested with supervisory power over
an.aIters OF local administration, the respon-
si;ollty Is upon congress, 80 far as the regula-
@ slon Oh interstate commerce Is concerned, to
.ei9ove restriction upon a state in dealing
Win imported articles which have not been
mingled with the common mass of property
therein
DISCRIMINATION IMPOSSIBLE.
Whatever our individual views may be
$50 S 70 the deleterious qualities of particular
,Leiic,eS, we cannot hold that any articles
"HlCl congress- recouni1as as s,,hiactc af