The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1922-05-19
CHILD LABOR law
HELDTOBEIMALID
FEDERAL HIGH COURT DE-
CISIoN TO-DAY
NORTH CAROLINA CASE
One of Most vitality Important
Questions To Reach Su-
. preme Tribunal.

Washington, D. c., May 15.-The
child labor case was today held by
the supreme court to be unconst-
tutional and not valid.
The decision of the court was rem
dered in a case brought by the gov :
eminent against the Drexel Furni-
ture Company of North Carolina
and was one of three cases brought
the law, and in all of which the Uni
ted States district court decided
against the government.
What was generally regarded as
one of the most vitality important
questions to reach the supreme
court in recent years, involving the
extent 20 which the courts will in
terpret the motives" of congress
in determining the constitutionality
of it's exercises of the right to i'm
pose excise taxes, was presented in
the child labor cases. *
North Carolina Cases.
These cases, three in number,
came from North Carolina, where
the United States district courts
held that the excise tax levied by
congress upon mines and factories
employing child labor waa an un-
constitutional enroachment upon
the prerogatives of the states in the
exercise of their police powers. The
same issue was presented to the
case, brought by members of the
Chicago Board of Trade.
Solicitor general in presenting the
views of the government contended
the people, and not the courts,
should inquire into the object of
congress in levying taxes which
may have the effect of extending
federal control into the field of reg
ulatory governmental activity for
merly exclusively occupied by the
state. Unless the supreme court
adopted the doctrine, and as one of
the three coordinate branches of
the government, refused to investi.
gate the motives" of congress in
enacting excise tax, legislation, the
nation, he insisted, would be con-
fronted with "a serious dilemma"
What Court Held. % A..
The court should hold that such
a tax imposed by congress cannot
be nullitied by attributing to con-
gresS an Interior motive, the solicit
tor general insisted, declaring that
otherwise IAN intolerable burden
may be put upon the court" and re-
quire it in the future to determine
the purpose which congress may
have had in the enactment of any
tax law which may be challenged.
The solicitor general frankly stated
that should the court refuse to
question the motives" of congress.
then 1t would be possible for "the
powers of the Federal government
to be utilized to secure detectives
which are beyond the scope of feder-
al power"
Opponents of the child labor law
contended that the court should
take judicial notice of what was
characterized as the constant en-
roachment of congress upon the
strictly local affairs of the states.
and consider the motive behind each
Federal law, regardless of whether
1t imposed an excise tax. They
pointed out that when the supreme
court hold unconstitutional the for
mer child labor act, in which the
penalty was the exclusion of child
labor products from interstate com
merce, congress promptly re- enacted
1t in the form of the present law
by merely substituting an excise tax
as the penalty. 1t was insisted that
the court never intended that such
regulatory measures, enroaching up
on the police powers of the states,
could be made legally effective by
merely a change in the form of pen
atty imposed. -