Court Opinion

ID: 6737073
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-07-20 23:19:18.555203+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:01:49.464000
License: Public Domain

Bruce, J.
(specially concurring.) I concur in the opinion of Mr. Justice Burke. The relative spheres of the courts and of the legislatures in the matter of the so called police power control seem now to have been well defined by the courts of the county, and especially by the Supreme Court of the United States. In Planters’ Bank v. Sharp (1848) 6 How. 301, 319, 12 L. ed. 447, 455, we find the following: “It is to be recollected that our legislatures stand in a position demanding often the most favorable -construction for their motives in *204passing laws, and they require á fair rather than hypercritical view of well-intended provisions in them. Those public bodies must be presumed to act from public considerations, being in a high public trust; and when their measures relate to matters of general interest, and can be vindicated under express or justly implied powers, and more especially when they appear intended for improvements, made in the true spirit of the age, or for salutary reforms in abuses, the disposition in the judiciary should be strong to uphold them.”
In the Sinking Fund Cases, 99 U. S. 718, 25 L. ed. 501, Mr. Justice Waite, in speaking for the court, said: “Every possible presumption is in favor of the validity of a statute, and this continues until the contrary is shown beyond a rational doubt. One branch of the government cannot encroach on the domain of another without danger. The safety of our institutions depends in no small degree on a strict observance of this salutary rule.” In the case of Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co. v. McGuire, 219 U. S. 563, 55 L. ed. 337, 31 Sup. Ct. Rep. 259, the court, among other things, said: “There is no absolute freedom to do as one wills or to contract as one chooses. The guaranty of liberty does not withdraw from legislative supervision that wide department of activity which consists of the making of contracts, or deny to government the power to provide restrictive safeguards. Liberty implies the absence of arbitrary restraint, not immunity from reasonable regulations and prohibitions imposed in the interests of the community. . . . Where the legislative action is arbitrary and has no reasonable relation to a purpose which it is competent for government to effect, the legislature transcends the limits of its power in interfering with liberty of contract; but where there is reasonable relation to an object within the governmental authority, the exercise of the legislative discretion is not subject to judicial review. The scope of judicial inquiry in deciding the question of power is not to be confused with the scope of legislative considerations in dealing with the matter of policy. Whether the enactment is wise or unwise, whether it is based on sound economic theory, whether it is the best means to achieve the desired result, whether, in short, the legislative discretion within its prescribed limits should be exercised in a particular manner, are matters for hie judgment of the legislature, and the earnest conflict of serious opinion does not suffice to bring them within the range of judicial cognizance. . . , ‘The *205legislature, being familiar with local conditions, is, primarily, the judge of the necessity of such enactments. The mere fact that a court may differ with the legislature in its views of public policy, or that judges may hold views inconsistent with the propriety of the legislation in question, affords no ground for judicial interference, unless the act in question is unmistakably and palpably in excess of legislative power. . . . If there existed a condition of affiairs concerning which the legislature of the state, exercising its conceded right to enact laws for the protection of the health, safety, or welfare of the people, might pass the law, it must be sustained; if such action was arbitrary interference with the right to contract or carry on business, and having no just relation to the protection of the public within the scope of legislative power, the act must fail.’ ” See also People v. Smith, 108 Mich. 527, 32 L.R.A. 853, 62 Am. St. Rep. 715, 66 N. W. 382; Wenham v. State, 65 Neb. 394, 58 L.R.A. 825, 91 N. W. 421; Powell v. Pennsylvania, 127 U. S. 678, 32 L. ed. 253, 8 Sup. Ct. Rep. 992, 1257; Holden v. Hardy, 169 U. S. 366, 42 L. ed. 780, 18 Sup. Ct. Rep. 383; People v. Bellet, 99 Mich. 151, 22 L.R.A. 696, 41 Am. St. Rep. 589, 57 N. W. 1094; State v. Olson, 26 N. D. 304, — L.R.A.(N.S.) —, 144 N. W. 661, 13 Columbia L. Rev. 667. The trend of authority in the United States, indeed, is undoubtedly in support of the proposition that the main question for the courts to determine is whether the subject-matter is one over which the legislature can exercise a supervisory control, and that the questions of method and of exigency are questions which must generally be left for the legislative bodies to decide. If a regulation is within the scope of the legislátive power and its purpose is not arbitrary supervision, but the protection of the public, the mere fact that it may be unwise in the opinion of the courts or involve an added expense upon the consuming public is no justification for judicial interference. The main arguments against the provisions of the statute which are now under consideration are that their enforcement might possibly prevent the sale of lard in packages in the state of North Dakota, or might so increase the cost of manufacture that an added price would have to be paid by the consumer. These matters, however, are for legislative, and not judicial, determination. The legislature is drawn fresh from the people. It has the power to appoint committees to examine and to investigate. It and the governor, who has the power *206to veto and to prevent tbe passage of unpopular and unsocial legislation, have determined that the rest of this added expense shall be run, and have determined that the prevention of fraud and of short weights is at the present time the paramount necessity. It is too late to contend that the legislature in the proper case has not the power to provide for the size of packages when that size may have a tendency to prevent a deception in weight. ( See cases on size and weight of packages and of bread, etc., cited in the principal opinion.)
The reasoning of counsel for respondent may not appear conclusive to this court, but we cannot say that the legislature was not justified in considering it to be so. “Lard,” says counsel for the state, “is a household necessity which is largely used in cooking and baking, and, for convenience in handling, as well as for other reasons, it has become a universal and extensive practice to pack lard for sale in pails or containers of convenient size for meeting the requirements of the ordinary householder buying lard. These pails have acquired by usage the designation of 3-pound pails, 5-pound pails, and 10-pound pails. The actual net weight of lard they contain depends upon the whim of the manufacturer. The actual amount of lard in these several pails put up by the defendant is as follows: In 3-pound pail 2 pounds, 6 ounces of lard; in the 5-pound pail 4 pounds, 2 ounces of lard; in the 10-pound pail 8 pounds, 10 ounces of lard. In the mind of the average buyer, however, the pail contains the number of pounds of lard which its name implies; that is, the 3-pound pail represents 3 pounds, the 5-pound paid represents 5 pounds, etc. In the absence of any law requiring the net weight of the commodity to be disclosed, the manufacturer or merchant has the opportunity to actually and even wilfully deceive as to the actual contents of the package. He may reduce the net weight of the lard, or increase the weight of the package; and unless the container is opened and the contents actually weighed, the consumer must depend upon the representations of the maker or merchant as to the real amount of lard he is getting. In actual practice the representations of the maker or merchant are accepted and acted upon by the general run of consumers. Nay more — the popular conception as to the quantity of lard is the conception accepted and acted upon by the ordinary buyer; and the maker and merchant can merely tacitly adopt the popular conception, and profit accordingly at the expense of tho *207buying public. In short, they can take advantage of the popular conception as to the quantity of lard, and thereby collect without the buyers’ actual knowledge the same price for the weight of the package as they get for the contents. As a result of this practice the buying public not only may but actually have been paying large sums for tin and packing which they would not have paid had their attention been specifically directed to what they were doing. . . . Labels disclosing the net weight are not effective in actual practice, because the popular designation of a package will continue to prevail in spite of labels. Then, too, labels are oftentimes and in fact generally are unheeded. The ignorant heed them not because they do not understand them. The busy housewife as a rule does not notice them. Then, also, labels are easily removed or displaced either by intention or design. . . . The only' safeguard to insure the effectiveness of such a law is to standardize the package; that is, to make the net contents correspond with the popular designation of the package. . . . The reason for not permitting fractions of a pound is obvious. If fractions of a pound were permitted, the difference between the size and appearance of two pails of different weights would not be readily discoverable, and hence deception and misrepresentation would be greatly facilitated. For example: It would be difficult without careful examination to see the difference between 2-J-pound pail and a 3-pound pail.” These reasons may not appear conclusive to the court, but we cannot say that the legislature was without reason in considering them.
Nor, too, is there any force in the contention that the statute in question is in derogation of the interstate powers of the Federal Congress. The most recent cases upon the subject, and upon which counsel for the defendants principally rely (Savage v. Jones, 225 U. S. 501, 56 L. ed. 1182, 32 Sup. Ct. Rep. 715; and McDermott v. Wisconsin, 228 U. S. 115, 57 L. ed. 754, 47 L.R.A.(N.S.) 984, 33 Sup. Ct. Rep. 431) make it clearly appear that the mere fact that Congress may have passed a so-called food and drugs act has not tied the hands of the state in the case in question. State statutes in such cases are only invalidated where they interfere with or frustrate the operation of the acts of Congress. It cannot be said that the act in question does this. It is merely supplementary thereto. All that the act of Congress says is that if the weight of the package is given upon the label it shall be the *208correct weight. The cases of Savage v. Jones, and McDermott v. Wisconsin, in fact, are authorities for, and not against, the state in this case. It is true that in the latter case, the statute of Wisconsin was held invalid; but the statute of Wisconsin forbade the use of the Federal label altogether. Federal regulations of interstate commerce have perhaps been widely extended, but we do not believe that the courts have yet construed the power so as to take from the states the inherent right of self-protection; nor can we believe that it was ever intended hy the framers of our government that the protection of the people of a state from fraud and adulteration should be dependent upon the whim of a Federal Congress, located thousands of miles away, with no knowledge of local conditions, and located in what the late Justice David J. Brewer has termed the “lobby camp of the world.” It also appears to me that in the case at bar the question of interstate commerce is not really involved, as the original package seems to have been broken.