The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1907-07-05

| merce from being employed as cOndults
for articles hurtful to the public health
safety or morals, and may remove OBJ
structions from the highways of com.
merce, whether they be physical or eco
nomic, whether they may be sand bars
mobs or mOnOpolies.
| 1.-The power of congress may be eX-
ercised by prohibition and by prescrip.
| ton.
| Congress has prohibited combinations
in restraint of interstate and foreign
trade and has prohibited the carriage OF
diseased cattle, explosives and lottery
tickets and congress has prescribed that
certain safety appliances shall be used
upon railroads doing an interstate bus
mess. The one class of laws is designed
to keep the channels of commerce free
and unpolluted; the other is designed to
secure the safety of the employees and
patrons of the carriers.
"In my judgment, the power to reg,
ulate commerce between the states does
not carry with it the power to prohibit
commerce, unless the prohibition has for
its purpose the facilitation, safety OF
protection of commercial intercourse, Oh
the accomplishment of some other ma
tional purpose.
"The power to regulate interstate
commerce does not extend to the laying
of an arbitrary embargo upon the law
fully produced harmless products of a
state, nor to the right to defeat the pol
| lev of a state, as to its own internal af-
| fairs.
81 concede that the national power to
regulate interstate commerce carries
with it the right to prohibit commerce
| in order to secure equity of commercial
right, or to prevent restraint of or in
reference with commerce, but not to
prohibit the shipment of the innocuous
products of producers within state
who are pursuing a course sanctioned
| by the laws of the state and in no wise
in itself interfering with interstate
commerce. If prohibition of interstate
trade is within the iarbitrary power of
congress, it might be exercised so as to
exclude the products of particular states
or sections of the country. Congress
then might prohibit The shipment of cot
ton or wheat to promote the interests
of wool or corn.
"There is no authority for any such
proposition. The power of prohibition
| has never been sustained except as
against articles noXious or dangerous in
themselves. 1t is not possible to find
even suggestion that in respect to
natural products which are prime nee
essities, congress can prohibit commerce
| in them between the states in order to
| enforce it's conception of what would be
a wise policy regulation of state.
"The power of the federal government
cannot be increased except by new
grants of power through amendment OF
the constitution. The efficiency, how
ever, of the federal government will
progressively increase through the appli-
cation of existing federal power to the
growing complexities of social and COM
mercial conditions.
"What changes in these conditions
may be in store for US no man can Tore
tell. What social Establishments may
follow the application of the federal
commercial power to such changes Is
likewise unknown The power is fixed
and definite factor; no one has pretend
ed to define the boundaries of the sub
iect upon which it operates.
Human government is human nee
essitv. 1t is all the stronger and more
effective i'm times of dire need for not
having been experimental with and its
fiber strained in times of tranquility.
"The way to make real progress IN
needful legislation, and to permanently
retain each advance, is to move wisely
along legitimate lines. This is land of
law as well as of liberty, and the lib
ertv of the aw-maker is subject to re-
straints as well as the liberty of the in
dividual. Congress can only do what 1T
is possible to do under the powers dele
gated to it by the body politics, which
is the people. To do anything more
would be futile usurpation; to do any
less under those powers than the best
interests of the people demand should be
done would be neglect of duty
cit is beside the question to urge the
desirability and popularity of measures
if congress has no power to enact them.
Our heartiest sympathy may be enlisted
in MANY movements and yet our Judg-
ment NAV be compelled to reject the
means proposed for their accomplish
ment. | remember and am impressed
by the words of President Roosevelt in
his first message to congress, that The
men who demand the impossible or the
undesirable serve as the allies of the
forces with which they are nominally at
war, for they hamper those who would
endeavor to find out in rational fashion
what the wrongs really are and to what
extent and in what manner 1t Is prac-
ticable to apply remedies F"