Source: https://www.legalcrystal.com/case/90315/delamater-vs-south-dakota
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 04:20:11+00:00

Document:
The general power of the states to control and regulate, within their borders, the business of dealing in, or soliciting orders for, the purchase of intoxicating liquors is beyond question.
The purpose of the Wilson Act, 26 Stat. 713, as a regulation of interstate commerce was to allow the states to exert ampler power as to intoxicating liquors when the subject of such commerce than could have been exercised before the enactment of that statute, which enabled the states to extend their authority as to such liquor shipped from other states before it became commingled with the mass of other property in the state by a sale in the original package.
Since the enactment of the Wilson Law, which expressly provides that intoxicating liquors coming into a state should be as completely under control of the state as though manufactured therein, the owner of intoxicating liquor in one state cannot, under the commerce clause of the Constitution, go himself or send his agent into another state and, in defiance of its laws, carry on the business of soliciting proposals for the purchase of such liquors.
Although a state may not forbid a resident therein from ordering for his own use intoxicating liquor from another state, it may forbid the carrying on within its borders of the business of soliciting orders for such liquor although such orders may only contemplate a contract resulting from final acceptance in another state. Vance v. W. A. Vandercook Co., 170 U. S. 438 , distinguished.
The law of South Dakota imposing an annual license charge on traveling salesmen selling, offering for sale, or soliciting orders for intoxicating liquors in quantities of less than five gallons is not unconstitutional because repugnant to the commerce clause of the Constitution of the United States.
The highest court of South Dakota having held that the act imposing a license on traveling salesmen soliciting orders for intoxicating liquors is a police regulation, and not a taxing act, it is within the purview of, and not in conflict with, the Wilson Act. Pabst Brewing Co. v. Crenshaw, 198 U. S. 17 , followed.
and if it did, that it was void because repugnant to the commerce clause of the Constitution of the United States. Exception was taken to the refusal to give the instruction. The federal ground was reiterated in motions to arrest and for a new trial, and the supreme court of the state, to which the cause was taken, in affirming the judgment of conviction, expressly considered and disposed of such federal ground. 104 N.W. 537.
All the assignments of error involve the proposition that the state statute, as construed and applied by the court below, is repugnant to the commerce clause of the Constitution. It is manifest, as the subject dealt with is intoxicating liquors, that the decision of the cause does not require us to determine whether the restraints which the statute imposes would be a direct burden on interstate commerce if generally applied to subjects of such commerce, but only to decide whether such restraints are a direct burden on interstate commerce in intoxicating liquors as regulated by Congress in the act commonly known as the Wilson Act. 26 Stat. 313, c. 728. For this reason, we at once put out of view decisions of this Court which are referred to in argument and which are noted in the margin [ Footnote 1 ] because they concerned only the power of a state to deal with articles of interstate commerce other than intoxicating liquors, or which, if concerning intoxicating liquors, related to controversies originating before the enactment of the Wilson Law.
not therefore concerned. We are hence called upon only to consider whether the general power of the state to control and regulate the liquor traffic and the business of dealing or soliciting proposals for the dealing in the same within the state was inoperative as to the particular dealings here in question, because they were interstate commerce, and therefore could not be subjected to the sway of the state statute without causing that statute to be repugnant to the commerce clause of the Constitution of the United States.
"That all fermented, distilled, or other intoxicating liquors or liquids transported into any state or territory or remaining therein for use, consumption, sale, or storage therein, shall, upon arrival in such state or territory, be subject to the operation and effect of the laws of such state or territory enacted in the exercise of its police powers, to the same extent and in the same manner as though such liquids or liquors had been produced in such state or territory, and shall not be exempt therefrom by reason of being introduced therein in original packages or otherwise."
from other states before it became commingled with the mass of other property in the state by a sale in the original package.
The proposition relied upon, therefore, when considered in the light of the Wilson Act, reduces itself to this: albeit the State of South Dakota had power within its territory to prevent the sale of intoxicating liquors, even when shipped into that state from other states, yet South Dakota was wanting in authority to prevent or regulate the carrying on within its borders of the business of soliciting proposals for the purchase of liquors, because the proposals were to be consummated outside of the state, and the liquors to which they related were also outside the state. This, however, but comes to this -- that the power existed to prevent sales of liquor, even when brought in from without the state, and yet there was no authority to prevent or regulate the carrying on of the accessory business of soliciting orders within the state. Aside, however, from the anomalous situation to which the proposition thus conduces, we think to maintain it would be repugnant to the plain spirit of the Wilson Act. That act, as we have seen, manifested the conviction of Congress that control by the states over the traffic of dealing in liquor within their borders was of such importance that it was wise to adopt a special regulation of interstate commerce on the subject. When, then, for the carrying out of this purpose, the regulation expressly provided that intoxicating liquors coming into a state should be as completely under the control of a state as if the liquor had been manufactured therein, it would be, we think, a disregard of the purposes of Congress to hold that the owner of intoxicating liquors in one state can, by virtue of the commerce clause, go himself or send his agent into such other state, there, in defiance of the law of the state, to carry on the business of soliciting proposals for the purchase of intoxicating liquors.
Passing from these general considerations, let us briefly more particularly notice some of the arguments relied upon.
without directly affecting interstate commerce. But, as by the Wilson Act the power of South Dakota attached to intoxicating liquors, when shipped into that state from another state, after delivery, but before the sale in the original package, so as to authorize South Dakota to regulate or forbid such sale, it follows that the regulation by South Dakota of the business carried on within its borders of soliciting proposals to purchase intoxicating liquors, even though such liquors were situated in other states, cannot be held to be repugnant to the commerce clause of the Constitution because directly or indirectly burdening the right to sell in South Dakota -- a right which, by virtue of the Wilson Act, did not exist.
"In Vance v. W. A. Vandercook Co., 170 U. S. 438 , the operation of a liquor law of South Carolina was considered. By the act in question, the State of South Carolina took exclusive charge of the sale of liquor within the state, appointed its agents to sell the same, and empowered them to purchase the liquor which was to be brought into the state for sale. The fact was that, by the act in question, the State of South Carolina, instead of forbidding the traffic in liquor, authorized it, and engaged in the liquor business for its own account, using it as a source of revenue. The act in addition affixed prerequisite conditions to the shipment into South Carolina from other states of liquor to a consumer who had purchased it for his own use, and not for sale. Considering the Wilson Act and the previous decisions applying it, . . . insofar as it took charge in behalf of the state of the sale of liquor within the state, and made such sale a source of revenue, was not an interference with interstate commerce. Insofar, however, as the state law imposed burdens on the right to ship liquor from another state to a resident of South Carolina, intended for his own use and not for sale within the state, the law was held to be repugnant to the Constitution because the Wilson Act, whilst it delegated to the state plenary power to regulate the sale of liquors in South Carolina shipped into the state from other states, did not recognize the right of a state to prevent an individual from ordering liquors from outside of the State of his residence for his own consumption, and not for sale."
"As was well said by the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts: 'While the legislature cannot impair the freedom of McKie to elect with whom he will contract, it can prevent the foreign insurers from sheltering themselves under his freedom in order to solicit contracts which otherwise he would not have thought of making. It may prohibit not only agents of the insurers, but also brokers, from soliciting or intermeddling in such insurance, and for the same reasons.' 175 Mass. 156. "
The ruling thus made is particularly pertinent to the subject of intoxicating liquors and the power of the state in respect thereto. As we have seen, the right of the states to prohibit the sale of liquor within their respective jurisdictions in and by virtue of the regulation of commerce embodied in the Wilson Act is absolutely applicable to liquor shipped from one state into another, after delivery, and before the sale in the original package. It follows that the authority of the states, so far as the sale of intoxicating liquors within their borders is concerned, is just as complete as is their right to regulate within their jurisdiction the making of contracts of insurance. It hence must be that the authority of the states to forbid agents of nonresident liquor dealers from coming within their borders to solicit contracts for the purchase of intoxicating liquors which otherwise the citizen of the state "would not have thought of making" must be as complete and efficacious as is such authority in relation to contracts of insurance, especially in view of the conceptions of public order and social wellbeing which it may be assumed lie at the foundation of regulations concerning the traffic in liquor.
3. The contention that the law of South Dakota was a taxing law, and not a police regulation, and therefore not within the purview of the Wilson Act, is in conflict with the purpose of that law as interpreted by the Supreme Court of South Dakota. State ex Rel. Griggsby v. Buechler, 10 S.D. 156. Besides, the contention is foreclosed by the ruling of this Court in Pabst Brewing Co. v. Crenshaw, supra.
Robbins v. Shelby Taxing District, 120 U. S. 489 ; Corson v. Maryland, 120 U. S. 502 ; Asher v. Texas, 128 U. S. 129 ; Stoutenburgh v. Hennick, 129 U. S. 141 ; Leisy v. Hardin, 135 U. S. 100 ; Lyng v. Michigan, 135 U. S. 161 ; Crutcher v. Kentucky, 141 U. S. 47 ; Brennan v. Titusville, 153 U. S. 289 ; Caldwell v. North Carolina, 187 U. S. 622 ; Norfolk & W. R. Co. v. Sims, 191 U. S. 441 ; Rearick v. Pennsylvania, 203 U. S. 507 .
In re Rahrer, 140 U. S. 545 ; Rhodes v. Iowa, 170 U. S. 412 ; Vance v. W. A. Vandercook Co., 170 U. S. 438 ; American Express Co. v. Iowa, 196 U. S. 133 ; Adams Express Co. v. Iowa, 196 U. S. 147 ; Pabst Brewing Co. v. Crenshaw, 198 U. S. 17 ; Foppiano v. Speed, 199 U. S. 501 ; Heyman v. Southern Ry. Co., 203 U. S. 270 .

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