St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1894-05-26
SCALPERS KNOCKED OUT.
Continued From Eli: st Pare.

the police power of licensing persons
TO conduct the business OF dealing in
such tickets.
Third-lt deprives the citizen of his
property in such tickets without due
EYproceSs of law.
:. Fourth-ltis an unlawful interference
with interstate commerce.
p Fifth-It discriminates between incor-
porated and nOn-IncOrporated carriers
of passengers, because section imposes
penalty OH The former and not Oh the
! latter for refusing to redeem unused
| tickets.
+ Before examining the provisions OF
| the act OF entering upon the consider
alton of these objections, it may be
l1welI to refer briefly to few elementary
| principles applicable to such cases.
| = That the transportation of passengers
| by common carriers is a proper subject
or police regulation by the state is un-
| questioned. And if business itself is
Itle subject of police regulation, then SO
| are all its incidents and accessories.
| That the matter OF the issue and trans
fer of tickets as evidence of the con-
| tracts OF the carriers IS an incident and
| accessory of the business needs no az
| gument.
| And where business is proper sub
| ject of the police power, the legislature
may. in the exercise of that power, adopt
any measures not in conflict with some
provision of the constitution that it sees
| fit, provided only they are such as have
some relation to and some tendency TO
accomplish the desired end; and ii the
measures adopted have such relation
or tendency the courts will never as
sumo to determine whether they are
| wise or tine best that might have been
adopted. State s.Donaldson. Al Mimi.
"A; Ripe VS.. Becker, 81 NV. Rep. 33l.
| Furthermore, courts are not at liberty
to declare statute unconstitutional
because in their opinion it is opposed
to the fundamental principles of re-
publican government, unless those
principles are placed beyond legislative
encrOachment by the constitution, or
because it is opposed TO spirit sup
posed to pervade the constitution. but
not expressed in words. OF because it
is thought to be unjust or oppressive or
to violate some natural, social or
political rights of the citizen. unless it
can be shown that such injustice is
prohibited or such rights are protected
by the constitution.
Except where the constitution liza
| imposed limitations upon fhe legislative
| power. it must he considered as practi-
cally absolute, and to warrant the Judi
ciary in declaring statute invalid they
must be able 10 point out some cOnStl-
tutional Limitation which the act clearly
transcends.
| With these elementary propositions
i'll mind, we proceed to consider the
evils, or supposed evils, which the leg.
islature designed to remedy, and the
measures which they have adopted to
| asserted and believed Ito what extent
! correctly is not important that spurious
| and stolen tickets, and tickets which
| had expired by limitation or that were
| not transferable, were often put on the
market to such all extent as to work
| great frauds upon both the public and
the carriers; that frequently those
selling such tickets were irrespon-
| sible, so that the party defrauded
had no redress; that the business
of trafficking in sucn tickets often fur
nlshed an inducement to railway EN-
ployes to steal tickets OF Issue spurious
ones and put them on the market. 1t
was also commonly believed that, in
Iorder to evade statutes designed to Sc
cure uniformity of rates and 10 prevent
| determinations, some carriers of pas
I SengerS were i'll the habit of placing
large blocks of their tickets with "scalp-
! erS" Ostensibly not their agents, for sale
at cut rates, 70 remedy these and SIM
liar abuses, real or supposed. this stat
ute was passed. That ali its provisions
have some relation to and tendency to
I accomplish this end is quite clear. Do
| they transcend any constitutional limi-
tatlon upon legislative power?
l. 1t seems to us that most of the objec-
lions to the act, certainly the first two,
|, are based upon radical miScOnceptiOn
of its provisions and Of the character of
transportation tickets as property.
Counsel for the defendant seems to
| assume, first, that such tickets are ven.
dlble chattel property; which are the lie.
Ultimate subject of barter and sale, the
same as any other chatteis, and second,
that the statute is designed to be
license law in the ordinary sense of
the term. With these two premises as
| sumed. the task of successfully assai.
ing the validity of the act is very easy
| one.
While RAILROAD ticket'' is in one
sense property, yet it is not mer chan
disc or chatrel. 1t is merely the evil
dence OF the contract of the carrier to
| transport the holder between the points
and on the conditions therein named.
| Treating it as the contract itself, it is in
the nature of chose in action. No one
with whom carrier makes such coll
tract has any inherent constitutional
right to in SiSt that it should be assign
able. AT common law all chooses in &C
| ton were nOn-assignable, and if the
legislature had deemed it necessary, in
order to prevent the supposed evils. to
provide that all transportation tickets
! should be non-tranSferable, or even to
prohibit the issue of tickets altogether,
and require carriers of passengers to
collect fare in cash. we fail to see why
they had not the power to do so.
I Again. tha act has nnt ths. fret
ment Of License law in the common
meaning of the term. 1t must he borne
In mind that these tickets are the con-
| tracts, or evidences of the contracts, of
the carriers, hence in the nature of
things can in the first instance be issued
or sold only by the carriers themselves,
who. as matter of course. have the ex-
elusive right to appoint their own
agents for that purpose. Now what the
act provides is that the carriers shall
| only issue or sell their tickets through
| agents appointed in a particular man.
ner and the evidence of whose appoint
ment has been authenticated by
| certain formalities. While the Ger
titicate of compliance with these
| requirements, issued by the state, is
called license" yet it is merely the
| evidence of the appointment of the
agent. its purpose being to secure and
| preserve PUBIC Written evidence OF that
fact so as to prevent evasions of the
! law and to enable every one who buys
ticket to ascertain whether the per-
son with whom he is dealing actually
represents, and has authority to bind
| the carrier. The agent is given no au-
| thority to sell or deal i'll tickets of other
carriers. but only authority to sell the
| tickets of the carrier appointing him
! and providing him the certificate of
! such authority.
[ So far from granting any special priv
I lleges t" the carrler,it imposes burden
upon him; first, by limiting his right to
issue Or sell tickets to agents provided
with certificate from the state of their
authority, and second, by requiring him
|, TO repurchase or redeem unused tickets,
And then,in order to prevent the frauds
| already referred TO. the act prohibits
entirely the sale. barter or transfer
within the state of the whole or any