San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1897-01-23
RIGHTS OF CITIZENS.
THEY MUST BE PROTECTED BY
THE HIGHER COURTS.
What State May do and May Not do
Synopsis of Rulings by Supreme
Judge Shiras.

of the opinion in the case of the south
Carolina dispensary law, delivered in
the Supreme court of the United
States Monday by Chief Justice Fuller
for Justice Shiras was yesterday avail
able for examination. After having
disposed of the question of jurisdiction
Justice Shiras says:
1--WE are now brought to the more
important and difficult ffuestion wheth-
er the so-called dispensary law of the
State of South Carolina is, indeed, as
to some or all of it's parts, invalid, as
being in conflict with the constitution
IF the United States and acts of Con-
gress made hereunder. Is that stat
ute lawful exercise of the police pow
er of the state?
THE difficulty is shown in the fire.
quent and elaborate dissents in many
of the cases presenting similar ques-
tions. Still, it can be safely said that
the differences of opinion thus mani
tested have not been so much upon
fundamental principles, as upon ques-
tions of the construction and meaning
of the various state statutes that have
been under consideration.
1.-THE evils attending the vice of in
temperance in the use of spirituous
liquors are so great that natural
reluctance is felt in appearing to in.
terfere, even on constitutional grounds
with any law whose avowed purpose
is to restrict or to prevent the mis-
chief. So long, however, as state leg
islation continues to recognize wines,
beer and spirituous liquors as articles
of lawful consumption and commerce,
so long must continue the duty of the
Federal courts to afford to use and
commerce the same measures of pro-
lection and laws of the United States
as is given to other articles. .
1T is important to observe that the
statute before us does not purport to
prohibit either the Importation, the
manufacture, the sale or the use of in
toxicating liquors. 80"
''Tnose operations are tunred over to
state functionaries, by whom, alone,
or under whose direction, they are to
be carried on"
Discussing the allegation that the
law was an inspection law, Justice
Shiras reviewed the decisions of the
court upon state inspection statutes
to regulate other articles, and the opin-
ion concludes:
"In the light of these cases the acts
of South Carolina of Jan. 2, 1895, must,
as those of its provisions which af-
feet the plaintiff in the present suit,
stand condemned.
ct is not an inspection law. The
prohibition of the importation of the
wines and liquors of other states by
citizens of South Carolina for their
own use is made absolute, and does
not depend on the purity or impurity
OF the articles. Only the state func-
tionaries are permitted to import into
the state and thus citizens who wish
to use foreign wines and liquors are
deprived of the exercise of their own
judgment and taste in the selection
of commodities. To empower a state
chemist to pass upon what the law
calls the 'alchoholic purity of such i'm
portations by chemical analysis, can
scarcely come within any definition of
a reasonable state inspection law.
ut is not a law purporting to for
bid the importation, manufacture, sale
and use of intoxicating liquors as
articles detrimental to the welfare OF
the state, and to the health of the in
habitants, and hence it is not within
the scope and operation of the act Of
Congress of Aug. 1890. That law was
not intended to confer upon any state
power to discriminate injuriously
against the products of other states
in articles whose manufacture and
use are not forbidden, and which are
therefore the subjects of legitimate
commerce. The question whether
given state law is a lawful exercise OF
the police power, is still open, and
must remain open. to this court. Such
a law may forbid entirely the manu-
facture and sale of intoxicating liq-
ours and be valid. Or It may provide
regulations for the inspection and sale
Of all domestic and imported liquors
and be valid. But the state control,
under the congressional legislation re-
ferred to, established a system which,
in effect, discriminates between in
terstate and domestic commerce in
commodities to make and use which
are admitted to be lawful.
"It was pressed on US, in the argu-
ment, that It is not competent for
state, in the exercise of its police
power to monopolize the traffic in in
toxicating. liquors, and thus put itself
into competition with the citizens of
other states. The phase of the sub
ject is novel and interesting, but we
do not think it necessary for US now
to consider II. 1t is sufficient for the
present cases to hold. as we do, that
when a state recognizes the manufac-
- ia To-