protecting power of each State, therefore, may rightfully be exerted against their introduction. Such an exercise of power cannot be considered a regulation of commerce prohibited by the Constitution. Congress has power to divest subjects of interstate commerce of that character and leave them subject to State legislation. Intoxicating liquors transported into the State of Kansas and there sold after the passage of the act of Congress of August 8, 1890, are subject to the existing laws of the State as to the sale of such liquors. In this act Congress has not attempted to delegate power to regulate commerce nor to exercise any power reserved to the States.' The subjects of legislation, therefore, arising from necessity and for the welfare of the people will be found in laws of Congress, in laws of the States and in municipal laws and ordinances.

A municipal ordinance prohibiting washing and ironing in public laundries and wash-houses within defined territorial limits, from ten o'clock at night until six o'clock in the morning, is a purely police regulation, within the competency of a municipality, possessed of the ordinary powers. Powers of such legislation have been frequently granted in charters of cities and sustained.

Laws are general or special, and this division distinguishes them in every jurisdiction. They may be for the protection of the whole country, or for certain classes, or be confined to State or municipal limits, and affect all, or only classes within such limits. Any nation may regulate commerce and immigration to protect its people, and the courts have not to decide upon treaty obligations in such legislation. In any conflict between an act of Congress and a treaty with a foreign power, the act of Congress must prevail, and the courts have not to inquire into the motives of the legislators in an enactment, except as they may be disclosed on the face of the acts, or inferable from their operation, considered with reference to the condition of the country, and existing legislation. They will always be presumed' to accomplish that which follows as the natural and reasonable effect of their enactment.

1 Wilkerson v. Rahrer, 140 U. S. 545.

2 Barbier v. Connolly, 113 U. S. 27; Soon Hing v. Crowley, 113 U. S. 703; and Polinsky v. People, 73 N. Y. 65.

3 Cherokee Tobacco, 11 Wall. 616; United States v. McBratney, 104 U. S. 621623; Taylor v. Morton, 2 Curtis, 454; Ah Lung, 18 Fed. R. 28.

4 Soon Hing v. Crowley, 113 U. S. 710-11; Transportation Co. v. Parkersburg, 107 U. S. 698.

The general government may prohibit entry into the land, of improper, dangerous diseased animals or men, paupers, convicts, vagrants, and persons under unlawful or immoral contracts. Certain classes of laborers, and Chinese and Cooley laborers may be excluded.'

Several nations, among them the United States, have taken special precautions, both in the importation and exportation of articles of food, and particularly to prohibit trichina pork. So also vines exposed to danger from phyloxera, or wheat smitten with the Hessian fly, may be condemned.

The United States government has extended its police legislation in a number of instances, as in the law against trusts and monopolies, entitled "An act to protect trade and commerce against unlawful restraints and monopolies," and in the acts in regard to lotteries, refusing the facilities of the mails to the distribution of circulars and advertisements deemed injurious to the public morals. In interstate commerce the government exercises this inherent power for protection, through the Department of Agriculture, and the Bureau of Animal Industry. Agents and methods are employed to examine, quarantine and destroy animals, and to extirpate pleuro-pneumonia."

In such efforts the aid of the States and Territories is invited, but the general government proceeds to original action. Further acts regulate the safe and humane treatment of animals in transportation.*

"It is conceded," says Mr. Justice Woodbury in the License cases" decided by the United States Supreme Court in 1846, "that the States may exclude pestilence, either to the body or mind, shut out the plague or cholera, and no less, obscene paintings, lottery tickets and convicts. The list of interdicted articles and persons is a long one in most European governments, and though in some cases not very judicious or

1 Act of March 3, 1875, chap. 141; 18 Stat. L. 477; U. S. R. S., §§ 2158, 2163, 4272; 125 U. S. 489; Act of May 5, 1892; 56 Fed. R. 81; Act of May 6, 1888, chap. 126; 22 Stat. L. 58; Act of July 5, 1884; 23 Stat. L. 115; Act of May 6, 1882, chap. 126; 25 Stat. L. 504.

Act of Aug 30, 1890, chap. 839; 26 Stat. L. 414.

$25 U. S. Stat., chap. 647, p. 209; U. S. Rev. Stat., § 3894; Act of Sept. 19, 1890; Ex parte Rapier, 143 U. S. 110; Horner v. United States, 143 U. S. 126, 266; Act of May 29, 1884, chap. 60; 23 Stat. L. 31.

4 Act of March 3, 1891; 26 Stat. L. 833, 1089.

5 How. 628; see 125 U. S. 492; Waterbury v. Newton, 50 N. J. L. 534; Patterson v. Kentucky, 97 U. S. 501; Jordan v. Overseers of Dayton, 4 Ohio, 295; Vannini v. Paine, 1 Harr. 65; Crutcher v. Kentucky, 141 U. S. 47. Opinion of Marshall, Ch. J., in Brown v. State of Maryland, 12 Wheat. 444.

liberal, is in others most commendable, and the exclusion of opium from China is an instance well known in Asia and kindred in its policy. The introduction and storage of gunpowder is one of those articles long regulated and forbidden here. Lottery tickets and indecent prints are also a common subject of prohibition almost everywhere. And why not cards, dice and other instruments of gaming, when thought necessary to suppress that vice. In short, upon what principle but this rests the justification of the States to prohibit gaming itself, wagers, champerty, forestalling, not to speak of the debatable cases of usury, marriage brokage bonds, and many other matters deemed either impolitic or criminal."

Local administrations may take preventive measures against dangers from persons, animals and things so far as their own territory is concerned. The limitations upon the exercise of this power, where interests in the exclusive charge of the general government are concerned, speedily reach a point where, as was very forcibly said by Mr. Justice Grier in Pierce v. New Hampshire, "the powers which relate to merely municipal regulations or what may more properly be called internal police, are not surrendered by the States or restrained by the Constitution of the United States, and that consequently, in relation to these, the authority of the State is complete, unqualified and conclusive. As subjects of legislation they are, from their very nature, of primary importance; they lie at the foundation of social existence. The exigencies of the social compact require that such laws be executed before and above all others. There is no conflict of power or of legislation as between the States and the United States. Each is acting within its sphere and for the public good."

These powers resident in the States have descended by express enactments to municipal governments, and to separate departments thereof, as to the health department of the city of New York, and the highest court of the State has said that an ordinance enacted by the board of health, to prevent the bringing into the city and the sale of adulterated milk, which is additional' to and embraces an offense not provided for

15 How. 632; 127 U. S. 678; 125 U. S. 465; 97 U. S. 501; Com. v. Waite, 11 Allen, 264; Com. v. Holt, 145 Mass. 38; see id. 159, 512; State v. Campbell, 64 N. H. 402; State v. Smith, 14 R. I. 100; People v. West, 106 N. Y. 293; see, also, Leisy v. Hardin, opinion of Mr. Justice Gray, 135 U. S. 100.

2 Polinsky v. People, 73 N. Y. 65; Com. v. Cutter, 156 Mass. 52; Com. v. Abrahams, 156 Mass. 57; Alliance v. Joyce, 49 Ohio, 7; City of Vincennes v. Citizens' Co., 132 Ind. 114; see, also, 95 Mich. 169, 551; 62 Conn. 112.

in the State laws, is valid, and within the scope of sanitary legislation. Nor are the powers of municipal governments limited to the exact terms of express laws. A certain inherent power of protection must still remain. It is within the ordinary powers of a city government, says the court in Mr. Justice Field's opinion in Barbier v. Connolly and Soon Hing v. Crowley,' to make and enforce an ordinance such as that of the city of San Francisco, regulating laundries and wash-houses within certain territorial limits. If within the sphere of its operation it affects alike all persons similarly situated, it is not within the constitutional objection. It is no objection to a municipal ordinance prohibiting one kind of business within certain hours that it permits other and different kinds of business to be done within those hours." It is not even discriminating legislation in any invidious sense if branches of the same business from which danger is apprehended are prohibited during certain hours of the night, and other branches, involving no such dangers, are permitted. The same authority which directs the cessation of labor, must necessarily prescribe the limits within which it shall be enforced, as it does the limits in a city where wooden buildings cannot be constructed.”

In like manner a statute of Alabama, declaring it unlawful within certain counties to transport or move after sunset, and before sunrise of the succeeding day, any cotton seed, but permitting the owner or purchaser to remove it from the field to a place of storage, was held, by the courts of that State, constitutional, and the decision' is cited with approval by the U. S. Supreme Court. It was held to be" a mere police regulation to regulate traffic in the staple agricultural product of the State so as to prevent a prevalent evil, which, in the opinion of the law-making power, might do much to demoralize agricultural labor, and destroy the legitimate profits of agricultural pursuits to the public detriment, at least within the specific territory."

All rights have been held subject to the police power of a State, and if the public safety or public morals require the discontinuance of any

1 113 U. S. R. 703; Barbier v. Connolly, 113 U. S. 27, 32; Powell v. Penn, 127 U. S. 678; Minn. & St. Louis R. R. v. Beckwith, 129 U. S. 26.

2 Soon Hing v. Crowley, 113 U. S. 703.

2 Davis v. State, 68 Ala. 58; Budd v. The People, etc., 143 U. S. 517; see Statute of New York State prohibiting every person in charge of any vessel "to transport into the city of New York any Indian meal upon the deck of the vessel;" 1 R. S. 539, pt. I, tit. 2, § 23.

4 Beer Company v. Massachusetts, 97 U. S. 25; Mugler v. Kansas, 128 U. S. 623; Powell v. Pennsylvania, 123 U. S. 623; People v. Budd, 117 N. Y. 1.

manufacture or traffic, the legislature may provide for its discontinuance, notwithstanding individuals or corporations may, thereby, suffer inconvenience. The State cannot divest itself of the power to provide for the lives, health, morals and public interests of the citizens. So also all property is held' subject to the general police power of the State, to regulate or control its use to secure the general safety and the public welfare.

In whatever administration, the more general or local, whenever public regulation becomes necessary of any matter, business, use, employment, traffic or thing, because a public interest is affected, or a common charge or burden created or a duty is imposed, and the private character or relations are so lost or modified as no longer to be juris privati only, but pro utilitate communi, of common and general concern, then a permanent and fixed rule is established, which may, however, be from time to time changed in the same manner as it was formed.

Many of these laws may be classed together, and of some it may be said, they have been so long recognized as a part of the law of the land, that they hardly require enumeration. In England and in this country, ferries, common carriers, hackmen, brokers, wharfingers, millers, innkeepers, auctioneers, even chimney sweeps have been under such recognized control, that precedents are at hand for every question of their conduct or reciprocal rights with the public administration, which may arise. In this class, to which constantly are being added other subjects, as for instance the relations of telephone and electriclight companies and elevators, the law or rule commands, restrains,

1 Bertholf v. O'Reilly, 74 N. Y. 509; People v. B. & A. R. R. Co., 70 N. Y. 569; People v. West, 106 N. Y. 293; People v. King, 110 N. Y. 418; People ads. Budd, U. S. Supreme Court, opinion of Blatchford, J., 143 U. S. 517.

23 W. and M., chap. 12, § 24; 3 Stat. at L. Great Britain, 481; N. J. Navigation Co. v. Merchants' Bank, 6 How. 382; Mobile v. Yuille, 3 Ala. (N. S.) 140; Bolt v. Stennet, 8 T. R. 606; Allnutt v. Inglis, 12 East, 527; People v. B. & A. R. R., 70 N. Y. 569; People v. King, 110 N. Y. 418; Buffalo E. S. R. R. v. Buffalo S. R. R. Co., 111 N. Y. 132; Munn v. Illinois, 94 U. S. 113; Powell v. Pennsylvania, 127 U. S. 678; People v. Budd, 117 N. Y. 1; 143 U. S. 517; Spring Valley Water-Works v. Schottler, 110 U. S. 347, 354; Railway v. R. R., 30 Ohio St. 604; State v. Gas Company, 34 Ohio St. 572; Ruggles v. People, 91 Ill. 256; Nash v. Page, 80 Ky. 539; Sawyer v. Davis, 136 Mass. 239; Brechbill v. Randall, 102 Ind. 528; Webster Telephone case, 17 Neb. 126; Hackett v. State, 105 Ind. 250; Delaware, etc., R. R. Co. v. Central Stock Yard Co., 45 N. J. Eq. 50; Davis v. State, 68 Ala. 58; Beer Company v. Massachusetts, 97 U. S. 25; Mugler v. Kansas, 123 U. S. 623; Kidd v. Pearson, 128 U. S. 1; Nashville, C. & St. L. R. R. v. State of Alabama, 128 U. S. 96.