Railway Co., 125 U. S. 465; Leisy v. Hardin, 135 U. S. 100; Lottery Case, 188 U. S. 321.

It is argued that the result of engrafting the provisions of the Enabling Act upon that part of the act of 1895 which remains unrepealed is a statutory system "so incongruous and indefinite in purpose and effect that it would be impossible to enforce it."

This contention is based largely upon the fact that the prohibition of the manufacture, sale, barter, etc., of intoxicating liquors within those parts of the State that were known as the Indian Territory and Osage Indian Reservation, and the other parts of the State which were Indian reservations on January 1, 1906, and the prohibition of the shipment or conveyance of such liquors from other parts of the State into the portions just mentioned, is subject to a proviso that the legislature may provide by law for state agencies for the sale of such liquor for medicinal purposes, for the sale of denaturized alcohol for industrial purposes, for the sale of alcohol for scientific purposes, and for the sale of liquors to bonded apothecaries.

It is argued that in the interim between the admission of the State and the enactment of legislation for establishing state liquor agencies, there would necessarily be a period of considerable duration (as the event happened, it was over four months,) during which, in what was formerly the Indian Territory, it would be doubtful whether sales of liquor would be punishable in the Federal or in the state courts, and whether according to the act of 1895 or under the different penalties of the Enabling Act. It may be conceded that until the State took action, in accordance with the constitution, for the establishment of agencies for the sale of liquors for the limited purposes mentioned, such sales could not be made at all, and that all sales which otherwise were in violation of the prohibition of the constitution were punishable in the courts; to what

extent punishable in the Federal courts, and to what extent in the state courts, it is not worth while to spend time in considering. Some temporary confusion and uncertainty may be unavoidable upon the establishment of a state government under such conditions; but this has little bearing upon the question before us.

A more serious argument is that which is based upon the effect of the constitutional provision respecting the establishment and maintenance of state agencies for the disposition of liquor, after the state legislature shall have provided by law for such agencies; for when such a law has been enacted we are brought to the permanent condition of things that was in the contemplation of Congress.

And here it is urged that as to the offense of carrying intoxicating liquor into the Territory, it must be that the introduction thereof for supplying the needs of the state agencies was permitted by the Enabling Act, and that the provisions of the act of 1895 must be taken to be repealed to that extent, leaving the act in force against the introduction of liquor for other purposes. But it is said (to quote from the brief): "If that was the purpose of the Enabling Act it entirely fails to express it, because it does not provide who may so introduce liquors into the Territory, and who may not, for the purpose of supplying local agencies, and the law would be so framed that neither court nor layman could ascertain by reading it by whom and under what circumstances such introduction was innocent or criminal."

No doubt, in order to give effect to the constitutional provision that permits the legislature to provide by law for agencies under the supervision of the State for the sale of liquors for the limited purposes specified, it is necessary that the state agencies shall procure these liquors from some source.

The authorization is in the form of a proviso. Whether, by fair construction, it qualifies merely the force of the

clause to which it is subjoined—that is, qualifies merely the prohibition against the manufacture, sale, etc., of intoxicating liquors within the Indian Territory and the Indian reservations, and the prohibition against the shipment of such liquors from other parts of the State into the portions mentioned-or whether, on the other hand, it has the effect of permitting liquors to be introduced from without the State, is a question that need not detain us. Upon the former construction, the State would presumably be obliged to cause the liquors to be manufactured within its own borders for the supply of its distributing agencies. Upon the latter construction, the State would be at liberty to import the necessary liquors from beyond its borders. In the one case, as in the other, the operation would be lawful and innocent when conducted under the authority of the State; otherwise unlawful. It is not to be presumed that the State would conceal or cloak its operations, or leave its agents without evidence of their authority. We can see no more practical difficulty here than there is in determining in any other matter that is subject to public regulation-for instance, the killing or transportation of game, the manufacture or sale of liquor-whether a given act is done with or without a license from the State. The argument ab inconvenienti is without force.

We are reminded that "laws which create crime ought to be so explicit that all men subject to their penalties may know what acts it is their duty to avoid," (United States v. Brewer, 139 U. S. 278, 288) and that ambiguity and uncertainty about the meaning of a criminal statute ought to be resolved by a strict interpretation in favor of the liberty of the citizen.

But there is no uncertainty or ambiguity about the prohibition of the act of 1895 against carrying intoxicating liquors into the Indian Territory. It is not suggested that there is any express repeal of that prohibition. And VOL. CCXXV-44

we are unable to see that a pro tanto repeal by implication leaves anything doubtful or ambiguous in the meaning of that which remains.

It is not our purpose to qualify the doctrine established by repeated decisions of this court that the admission of a new State into the Union on an equal footing with the original States imports an equality of power over internal affairs. The cases cited by counsel for the petitioner under this head are cases that dealt with matters wholly internal. United States v. McBratney, 104 U. S. 621; Draper v. United States, 164 U. S. 240; Matter of Heff, 197 U. S. 488, 505. And see Ward v. Race Horse, 163 U. S. 504; United States v. Celestine, 215 U. S. 278, 288; United States v. Sutton, 215 U. S. 291, 294; Hallowell v. United States, 221 U. S. 317, 323; Dick v. United States, 208 U. S. 340.

The most recent decision of this court upon the subject of the proper construction of acts of Congress passed for the admission of new States into the Union is Coyle v. Smith, 221 U. S. 559; where it was held that the Oklahoma Enabling Act (34 Stat., c. 3335, p. 267), in providing that the capital of the State should temporarily be at the City of Guthrie, and should not be changed therefrom previous to the year 1913, ceased to be a limitation upon the power of the State after its admission. The court, however, was careful to state (221 U. S. 574): “It may well happen that Congress should embrace in an enactment introducing a new State into the Union legislation intended as a regulation of commerce among the States, or with Indian tribes situated within the limits of such new state, or regulations touching the sole care and disposition of the public lands or reservations therein, which might be upheld as legislation within the sphere of the plain power of Congress. But in every such case such legislation would derive its force not from any agreement or compact with the proposed new State, nor by reason of its acceptance of such enactment as a term of admission, but

solely because the power of Congress extended to the subject, and therefore would not operate to restrict the State's legislative power in respect of any matter which was not plainly within the regulating power of Congress."

We are here dealing with one of those matters such as are referred to in this citation. The power of Congress to regulate commerce between the States, and with Indian tribes situate within the limits of a State, justifies Congress when creating a new State out of territory inhabited by Indian tribes, and into which territory the introduction of intoxicating liquors is by existing laws and treaties prohibited, in so legislating as to preserve those laws and treaties in force to the extent of excluding interstate traffic in intoxicating liquors that would be inconsistent with the prohibition. Dick v. United States, 208 U. S. 340, 353.

This being so, and since we find in the Oklahoma Enabling Act no repeal, express or implied, of the act of 1895 so far as pertains to the carrying of liquor from without the new State into that part of it which was the Indian Territory (saving as to liquor brought in by the State for the use of state agencies established under the provisions of the Enabling Act), it follows, upon the admitted facts, that the United States District Court has jurisdiction to punish the petitioner for the offense that he has committed. The petition for a writ of habeas corpus and the accompanying application for certiorari will be

Denied.