The statute of Minnesota approved April 16, 1889, entitled
"An act for the protection of the public health by providing for
inspection, before slaughtering, of cattle, sheep and swine
designed for slaughter for human food,"
is unconstitutional and void so far as it requires, as a
condition of sales in Minnesota of fresh beef, veal, mutton, lamb
or pork, for human food, that the animals from which such meats are
taken shall have been inspected in that state before being
slaughtered.
In whatever language a statute may be framed, its purpose must
be determined by its natural and reasonable effect, and the
presumption that it was enacted in good faith for the purpose
expressed in the title cannot control the determination of the
question whether it is or is not repugnant to the Constitution of
the United States.
This statute of Minnesota, by its necessary operation,
practically excludes from the Minnesota market all fresh beef,
veal, mutton, lamb, or pork, in whatever form and although entirely
sound, healthy, and fit for human food, taken from animals
slaughtered in other states, and as it thus directly tends to
restrict the slaughtering of animals whose meat is to be sold in
Minnesota for human food to those engaged in such business in that
state, it makes such discrimination against the products and
business of other states in favor of the products and business of
Minnesota, as interferes with and burdens commerce among the
several states.
A law providing for the inspection of animals whose meats are
designed for human food cannot be regarded as a rightful exertion
of the police power of the state if the inspection prescribed is of
such a character, or is burdened with such conditions, as will
prevent the introduction into the sound meats the product of
animals slaughtered in other states.
A burden imposed upon interstate commerce is not to be sustained
simply because the statute imposing it applies alike to the people
of all the states, including the people of the state enacting
it.
This was a petition for a writ of habeas corpus. The petitioner
had been convicted of a violation of the statute of Minnesota
respecting the inspection of fresh meats which will be found at
length in the opinion of the Court,
post, 136 U. S. 318.
The
Page 136 U. S. 314
State of Indiana having passed a similar statute, counsel
intervened on behalf of that state and took part in the argument of
this case. The Indiana statute will be found in the margin.
* The petitioner
was discharged from custody, the court below holding the act to be
an unconstitutional interference with commerce among the states.
The state took this appeal.
Page 136 U. S. 317
MR. JUSTICE HARLAN delivered the opinion of the Court.
Henry E. Barber, the appellee, was convicted, before a justice
of the peace in Ramsey County, Minnesota, of the offense of having
wrongfully and unlawfully offered and exposed for sale, and of
having sold, for human food, one hundred pounds of fresh, uncured
beef, part of an animal slaughtered in the State of Illinois, but
which had not been inspected in Minnesota, and "certified" before
slaughter by an inspector appointed under the laws of the latter
state. Having been committed to the common jail of the county
pursuant to a judgment of imprisonment for the term of thirty days,
he sued out a writ of habeas corpus from the Circuit Court of the
United States for the District of Minnesota, and prayed to be
discharged from such imprisonment upon the ground that the statute
of that state, approved April 16, 1889, and under which he was
prosecuted, was repugnant to the provision of the Constitution
giving Congress power to regulate commerce among the several
states, as well as to the provision declaring that the citizens of
each state shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of
citizens in the several states. Article I, Section 8; Article IV,
Section 2. The court below, speaking by Judge Nelson, held the
statute to be in violation of both of these provisions, and
discharged the prisoner from custody.
In re Barber, 39 F.
641. A similar conclusion in reference to the same statute had been
previously reached by Judge Blodgett, holding the Circuit Court of
the United States for the Northern District of Illinois.
Swift
v. Sutphin, 391 F. 630.
From the judgment discharging Barber the state has prosecuted
the present appeal. Rev.Stat. ยง 764; 23 Stat. 437, c. 353.
Attorneys representing persons interested in maintaining the
validity of a statute of Indiana alleged to be similar to that of
Minnesota were allowed to participate in the argument in this Court
and to file briefs.
Page 136 U. S. 318
The statute of Minnesota upon the validity of which the decision
of the case depends is as follows (Laws of 1889, c. 8, p. 51):
"
An act for the protection of the public health by providing
for inspection before slaughter of cattle, sheep, and swine
designed for slaughter for human food."
"SECTION 1. The sale of any fresh beef, veal, mutton, lamb, or
pork for human food in this state, except as hereinafter provided,
is hereby prohibited."
"SEC. 2. It shall be the duty of the several local boards of
health of the several cities, villages, boroughs, and townships
within this state to appoint one or more inspectors of cattle,
sheep, and swine, for said city, village, borough, or township, who
shall hold their offices for one year and until their successors
are appointed and qualified, and whose authority and jurisdiction
shall be territorially coextensive with the board so appointing
them, and said several boards shall regulate the form of
certificate to be issued by such inspectors, and the fees to be
paid them by the person applying for such inspection, which fees
shall be no greater than are actually necessary to defray the costs
of the inspection provided for in section three of this act."
"SEC. 3. It shall be the duty of the inspectors appointed
hereunder to inspect all cattle, sheep, and swine slaughtered for
human food within their respective jurisdictions within twenty-four
hours before the slaughter of the same, and if found healthy and in
suitable condition to be slaughtered for human food, to give to the
applicant a certificate in writing to that effect. If found unfit
for food by reason of infectious disease, such inspectors shall
order the immediate removal and destruction of such diseased
animals, and no liability for damages shall accrue by reason of
such action."
"SEC. 4. Any person who shall sell, expose or offer for sale,
for human food in this state, any fresh beef, veal, mutton, lamb,
or pork whatsoever which has not been taken from an animal
inspected and certified before slaughter by the proper local
inspector appointed hereunder shall be deemed guilty of
Page 136 U. S. 319
a misdemeanor, and upon conviction thereof shall be punished by
a fine of not more than one hundred dollars or by imprisonment not
exceeding three months for each offense."
"SEC. 5. Each and every certificate made by inspectors under the
provisions of this act shall contain a statement to the effect that
the animal or animals inspected, describing them as to kind and
sex, were at the date of such inspection free from all indication
of disease, apparently in good health, and in fit condition, when
inspected, to be slaughtered for human food, a duplicate of which
certificate shall be preserved in the office of the inspector."
"SEC. 6. Any inspector making a false certificate shall be
liable to a fine of not less than ten dollars nor more than fifty
dollars for each animal falsely certified to be fit for human food
under the provisions of this act."
"SEC. 7. This act shall take effect and be in force from and
after its passage."
The presumption that this statute was enacted in good faith for
the purpose expressed in the title, namely, to protect the health
of the people of Minnesota, cannot control the final determination
of the question whether it is not repugnant to the Constitution of
the United States. There may be no purpose upon the part of a
legislature to violate the provisions of that instrument, and yet a
statute enacted by it, under the forms of law, may, by its
necessary operation, be destructive of rights granted or secured by
the Constitution. In such cases, the courts must sustain the
supreme law of the land by declaring the statute unconstitutional
and void. This principle of constitutional interpretation has been
often announced by this Court. In
Henderson v. New York,
92 U. S. 259,
92 U. S. 268,
where a statute of New York imposing burdensome and almost
impossible conditions on the landing of passengers from vessels
employed in foreign commerce was held to be unconstitutional and
void as a regulation of such commerce, the Court said that "in
whatever language a statute may be framed, its purpose must be
determined by its natural and reasonable effect." In
People v.
Compagnie Generale Transatlantique, 107 U. S.
59,
107 U. S. 63,
where the question was as to the
Page 136 U. S. 320
validity of a statute of the same state, which was attempted to
be supported as an inspection law authorized by Section 10 of
Article I of the Constitution, and was so designated in its title,
it was said:
"A state cannot make a law designed to raise money to support
paupers, to detect or prevent crime, to guard against disease, and
to cure the sick, an inspection law, within the constitutional
meaning of that word, by calling it so in the title."
So, in
Soon Hing v. Crowley, 113 U.
S. 703,
113 U. S.
710:
"The rule is general with reference to the enactments of all
legislative bodies that the courts cannot inquire into the motives
of the legislators in passing them 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. The motives of the legislators, considered as
to the purposes they had in view, will always be presumed to be to
accomplish that which follows as the natural and reasonable effect
of their enactments."
In
Mugler v. Kansas, 123 U. S. 623,
123 U. S. 661,
the Court, after observing that every possible presumption is to be
indulged in favor of the validity of a statute, said that the
judiciary must obey the Constitution, rather than the lawmaking
department of the government, and must, upon its own
responsibility, determine whether in any particular case the limits
of the Constitution have been passed. It was added:
"If, therefore, a statute purporting to have been enacted to
protect the public health, the public morals, or the public safety
has no real or substantial relation to those objects, or is a
palpable invasion of rights secured by the fundamental law, it is
the duty of the courts to so adjudge, and thereby give effect to
the Constitution."
Upon the authority of those cases and others that could be
cited, it is our duty to inquire in respect to the statute before
us not only whether there is a real or substantial relation between
its avowed objects and the means devised for attaining those
objects, but whether, by its necessary or natural operation, it
impairs or destroys rights secured by the Constitution of the
United States.
Underlying the entire argument in behalf of the state is the
proposition that it is impossible to tell by an inspection of
Page 136 U. S. 321
fresh beef, mutton, lamb, or pork, designed for human food,
whether or not it came from animals that were diseased when
slaughtered; that inspection on the hoof, within a very short time
before animals are slaughtered, is the only mode by which their
condition can be ascertained with certainty. And it is insisted
with great confidence that of this fact the court must take
judicial notice. If a fact alleged to exist and upon which the
rights of parties depend is within common experience and knowledge,
it is one of which the courts will take judicial notice.
Brown
v. Piper, 91 U. S. 37,
91 U. S. 42;
Phillips v. Detroit, 111 U. S. 604,
111 U. S. 606.
But we cannot assent to the suggestion that the fact alleged in
this case to exist is of that class. It may be the opinion of some
that the presence of disease in animals at the time of their being
slaughtered cannot be determined by inspection of the meat taken
from them; but we are not aware that such is the view universally
or even generally entertained. But if, as alleged, the inspection
of fresh beef, veal, mutton, lamb, or pork will not necessarily
show whether the animal from which it was taken was diseased when
slaughtered, it would not follow that a statute like the one before
us is within the constitutional power of the state to enact. On the
contrary, the enactment of a similar statute by each one of the
states composing the union would result in the destruction of
commerce among the several states, so far as such commerce is
involved in the transportation from one part of the country to
another of animal meats designed for human food, and entirely free
from disease. A careful examination of the Minnesota act will place
this construction of it beyond question.
The first section prohibits the sale of any fresh beef, veal,
mutton, lamb, or pork for human food except as provided in that
act. The second and third sections provide that all cattle, sheep,
and swine to be slaughtered for human food within the respective
jurisdictions of the inspectors shall be inspected by the proper
local inspector appointed in Minnesota within twenty-four hours
before the animals are slaughtered, and that a certificate shall be
made by such inspector showing, if such be the fact, that the
animals when slaughtered were
Page 136 U. S. 322
found healthy and in suitable condition to be slaughtered for
human food. The fourth section makes it a misdemeanor, punishable
by fine or imprisonment, for anyone to sell, expose or offer for
sale for human food in the state any fresh beef, veal, mutton,
lamb, or pork not taken from an animal inspected and "certified
before slaughter by the proper local inspector" appointed under
that act. As the inspection must take place within the twenty-four
hours immediately before the slaughtering, the act, by its
necessary operation, excludes from the Minnesota market practically
all fresh beef, veal, mutton, lamb, or pork -- in whatever form,
and although entirely sound, healthy, and fit for human food --
taken from animals slaughtered in other states, and directly tends
to restrict the slaughtering of animals whose meat is to be sold in
Minnesota for human food to those engaged in such business in that
state. This must be so because the time, expense, and labor of
sending animals from points outside of Minnesota to points in that
state, to be there inspected, and bringing them back after
inspection to be slaughtered at the place from which they were sent
(the slaughtering to take place within 24 hours after inspection,
else the certificate of inspection becomes of no value) will be so
great as to amount to an absolute prohibition upon sales in
Minnesota of meat from animals not slaughtered within its limits.
When to this is added the fact that the statute, by its necessary
operation, prohibits the sale in the State of fresh beef, veal,
mutton, lamb, or pork from animals that may have been inspected
carefully and thoroughly in the state where they were slaughtered,
and before they were slaughtered, no doubt can remain as to its
effect upon commerce among the several states. It will not do to
say -- certainly no judicial tribunal can with propriety assume --
that the people of Minnesota may not, with due regard to their
health, rely upon inspections in other states of animals there
slaughtered for purposes of human food. If the object of the
statute had been to deny altogether the citizens of other states
the privilege of selling, within the limits of Minnesota, for human
food, any fresh beef, veal, mutton, lamb, or pork from animals
slaughtered
Page 136 U. S. 323
outside of that state, and to compel the people of Minnesota
wishing to buy such meats either to purchase those taken from
animals inspected and slaughtered in the state or to incur the cost
of purchasing them, when desired for their own domestic use, at
points beyond the state, that object is attained by the act in
question. Our duty to maintain the Constitution will not permit us
to shut our eyes to these obvious and necessary results of the
Minnesota statute. If this legislation does not make such
discrimination against the products and business of other states in
favor of the products and business of Minnesota as interferes with
and burdens commerce among the several states, it would be
difficult to enact legislation that would have that result.
The principles we have announced are fully supported by the
decisions of this Court. In
Woodruff v.
Parham, 8 Wall. 123,
75 U. S. 140,
which involved the validity of an ordinance of the City of Mobile,
Alabama, relating to sales at auction, MR. JUSTICE MILLER, speaking
for this Court, said:
"There is no attempt to discriminate injuriously against the
products of other states or the rights of their citizens, and the
case is not, therefore, an attempt to fetter commerce among the
states or to deprive the citizens of other states of any privilege
or immunity possessed by citizens of Alabama. But a law having such
operation would, in our opinion, be an infringement of the
provisions of the Constitution which relate to those subjects, and
therefore void."
So, in
Hinson v.
Lott, 8 Wall. 148,
75 U. S. 151,
decided at the same time, upon a writ of error from the Supreme
Court of Alabama, it was said, in reference to the opinion of that
court:
"And it is also true, as conceded in that opinion, that Congress
has the same right to regulate commerce among the states that it
has to regulate commerce with foreign nations, and that whenever it
exercises that power, all conflicting state laws must give way, and
that if Congress had made any regulation covering the matter in
question, we need inquire no further. That court seems to have
relieved itself of the objection by holding that the tax imposed by
the State of Alabama was an exercise of the concurrent right of
regulating commerce remaining with the
Page 136 U. S. 324
states until some regulation on the subject had been made by
Congress. But, assuming the tax to be, as we have supposed, a
discriminating tax, levied exclusively upon the products of sister
states, and looking to the consequences which the exercise of this
power may produce if it be once conceded, amounting, as we have
seen, to a total abolition of all commercial intercourse between
the states under the cloak of the taxing power, we are not prepared
to admit that a state can exercise such a power, though Congress
may have failed to act on the subject in any manner whatever."
In
Welton v. Missouri, 91 U. S.
275,
91 U. S. 281,
the Court, speaking by MR. JUSTICE FIELD, declared to be
unconstitutional a statute of Missouri imposing a license tax upon
the sale by peddlers of certain kinds of personal property "not the
growth, produce, or manufacture" of that state, but which did not
impose a like tax upon similar articles grown, produced, or
manufactured in Missouri. After observing that if the tax there in
question could be imposed at all, the power of the state could not
be controlled, however unreasonable and oppressive its action, the
Court said:
"Imposts operating as an absolute exclusion of the goods would
be possible, and all the evils of discriminating state legislation
favorable to the interests of one state, and injurious to the
interests of other states and countries, which existed previous to
the adoption of the Constitution, might follow, and the experience
of the last fifteen years shows would follow, from the action of
some of the states."
In
Railroad Co. v. Husen, 95 U. S.
465, the Court examined a statute of Missouri
prohibiting, under penalties, any Texas, Mexican, or Indian cattle
from being driven or otherwise conveyed into, or remaining in, any
county of the state between the first day of March and the first
day of November in each year by any person or persons whatsoever.
While admitting in the broadest terms the power of a state to pass
sanitary laws and laws for the protection of life, liberty, health,
or property within its borders, to prevent convicts or persons and
animals suffering under contagious or infectious diseases from
entering the state, and, for purposes
Page 136 U. S. 325
of protection, to establish quarantine and inspections, the
Court, Mr. Justice Strong delivering its opinion, said that a state
may not, "under the cover of exerting its police powers,
substantially prohibit or burden either foreign or interstate
commerce." The general ground upon which it held the Missouri
statute to be unconstitutional was that its effect was "to obstruct
interstate commerce, and to discriminate between the property of
citizens of one state and that of citizens of other states."
In
Guy v. Baltimore, 100 U. S. 434,
100 U. S. 443,
the Court adjudged to be void an ordinance of the City of Baltimore
exacting from vessels using the public wharves of that city and
laden with the products of other states, higher rates of wharfage
than from vessels using the same wharves, and laden with the
products of Maryland. "Such exactions," the court said,
"in the name of wharfage must be regarded as taxation upon
interstate commerce. Municipal corporations, owning wharves upon
the public navigable waters of the United States and
quasi-public corporations transporting the products of the
country cannot be permitted, by discriminations of that character,
to impede commercial intercourse and traffic among the several
states and with foreign nations."
The latest case in this Court upon the subject of interstate
commerce as affected by local enactments discriminating against the
products and citizens of other states is
Walling v.
Michigan, 116 U. S. 446,
116 U. S. 445.
We there held to be unconstitutional a statute of Michigan imposing
a license tax upon persons not residing or having their principal
place of business in that state, but whose business was that of
selling or soliciting the sale of intoxicating liquors to be
shipped into the state from places without, a similar tax not being
imposed in respect to the sale and soliciting for sale of liquors
manufactured in Michigan. MR. JUSTICE BRADLEY, delivering the
opinion of the Court, said:
"A discriminating tax imposed by a state operating to the
disadvantage of the products of other states when introduced into
the first-mentioned state is, in effect, a regulation in restraint
of commerce among the states, and as such is a usurpation of the
power conferred by the Constitution upon the Congress of the United
States. "
Page 136 U. S. 326
It is, however, contended in behalf of the state that there is
in fact no interference by this statute with the bringing of
cattle, sheep, and swine into Minnesota from other states, nor any
discrimination against the products or business of other states,
for the reason -- such is the argument -- that the statute
requiring an inspection of animals on the hoof as a condition of
the privilege of selling or offering for sale in the state the
meats taken from them is applicable alike to all owners of such
animals, whether citizens of Minnesota or citizens of other states.
To this we answer that a statute may upon its face apply equally to
the people of all the states and yet be a regulation of interstate
commerce which a state may not establish. A burden imposed by a
state upon interstate commerce is not to be sustained simply
because the statute imposing it applies alike to the people of all
the states, including the people of the state enacting such
statute.
Robbins v. Shelby Taxing District, 120 U.
S. 489,
120 U. S. 497;
Case of the State Freight
Tax, 15 Wall. 232. The people of Minnesota have as
much right to protection against the enactments of that state
interfering with the freedom of commerce among the states as have
the people of other states. Although this statute is not avowedly
or in terms directed against the bringing into Minnesota of the
products of other states, its necessary effect is to burden or
obstruct commerce with other states, as involved in the
transportation into that state, for purposes of sale there, of all
fresh beef, veal, mutton, lamb, or pork, however free from disease
may have been the animals from which it was taken.
The learned counsel for the state relies with confidence upon
Patterson v. Kentucky, 97 U. S. 501, as
supporting the principles for which he contends. In that case, we
sustained the constitutionality of a statute of Kentucky forbidding
the sale within that commonwealth of oils or fluids used for
illuminating purposes, and the product of coal, petroleum, or other
bituminous substances that would ignite at less than a certain
temperature. Having a patent from the United States for an improved
burning oil, Patterson claimed the right, by virtue of his patent,
to sell anywhere in the United States
Page 136 U. S. 327
the oil described in it, without regard to the inspection laws
of any state enacted to protect the public safety. It was held that
the statute of Kentucky was a mere police regulation embodying the
deliberate judgment of that commonwealth that burning fluids, the
product of coal, petroleum, or other bituminous substances, which
would ignite or permanently burn at less than a prescribed
temperature are unsafe for illuminating purposes. We said that the
patent was not a regulation of commerce, nor a license to sell the
patented article, but a grant that no one else should manufacture
or sell that article, and therefore a grant simply of an exclusive
right in the discovery, which the national authority could protect
against all interference; that it was not to be supposed
"that Congress intended to authorize or regulate the sale within
a state of tangible personal property which that state declares to
be unfit and unsafe for use, and by statute has prohibited from
being sold, or offered for sale, within her limits;"
also that
"the right which the patentee or his assignee possesses in the
property created by the application of a patented discovery must be
enjoyed subject to the complete and salutary power, with which the
states have never parted, of so defining and regulating the sale
and use of property within their respective limits as to afford
protection to the many against the injurious conduct of the
few."
Now the counsel of the state asks:
"If the state may, by the exercise of its police power,
determine for itself what test shall be made of the safety
illuminating oils and prohibit the sale of all oils not subjected
to and sustaining such test, although such oils are manufactured by
a process patented under the Constitution and laws of the United
States, why may it not determine for itself what test shall be made
of the wholesomeness and safety of food, and prohibit the sale of
all such food not submitted to and sustaining the test, although it
may chance that articles otherwise subject to the Constitution and
laws of the United States cannot sustain the test?"
The analogy, the learned counsel observes, seems close. But it
is only seemingly close. There is no real analogy between that case
and the one before us. The
Page 136 U. S. 328
Kentucky statute prescribed no test of inspection which, in view
of the nature of the property, was either unusual or unreasonable,
or which by its necessary operation discriminated against any
particular oil because of the locality of its production. If it had
prescribed a mode of inspection to which citizens of other states,
having oils designed for illuminating purposes, and which they
desired to sell in the Kentucky market, could not have reasonably
conformed, it would undoubtedly have been held to be an
unauthorized burden upon interstate commerce. Looking at the nature
of the property to which the Kentucky statute had reference, there
was no difficulty in the way of the patentee of the particular oil
there in question submitting to the required local inspection.
But a law providing for the inspection of animals whose meats
are designed for human food cannot be regarded as a rightful
exertion of the police powers of the state if the inspection
prescribed is of such a character, or is burdened with such
conditions, as will prevent altogether the introduction into the
state of sound meats the product of animals slaughtered in other
states. It is one thing for a state to exclude from its limits
cattle, sheep, or swine actually diseased, or meats that, by reason
of their condition or the condition of the animals from which they
are taken, are unfit for human food, and punish all sales of such
animals or of such meats within its limits. It is quite a different
thing for a state to declare, as does Minnesota, by the necessary
operation of its statute, that fresh beef, veal, mutton, lamb, or
pork -- articles that are used in every part of this country to
support human life -- shall not be sold at all for human food
within its limits unless the animal from which such meats are taken
is inspected in that state, or, as is practically said, unless the
animal is slaughtered in that state.
One other suggestion by the counsel for the state deserves to be
examined. It is that, so far as this statute is concerned, the
people of Minnesota can purchase in other states fresh beef, veal,
mutton, lamb, and pork, and bring such meats into Minnesota for
their own personal use. We do not perceive
Page 136 U. S. 329
that this view strengthens the case of the state, for it ignores
the right which the people of other states have in commerce between
those states and the State of Minnesota, and it ignores the right
of the people of Minnesota to bring into that state, for purposes
of sale, sound and healthy meat, wherever such meat may have come
into existence. But there is a consideration arising out of the
suggestion just alluded to which militates somewhat against the
theory that the statute in question is a legitimate exertion of the
police powers of the state for the protection of the public health.
If every hotel keeper, railroad, or mining corporation, or
contractor in Minnesota furnishing subsistence to large numbers of
persons, and every private family in that state that is so
disposed, can, without violating the statute, bring into the state
from other states, and use for their own purposes, fresh beef,
veal, mutton, lamb, and pork taken from animals slaughtered outside
of Minnesota which may not have been inspected at all, or not
within twenty-four hours before being slaughtered, what becomes of
the argument, pressed with so much earnestness, that the health of
the people of that state requires that they be protected against
the use of meats from animals not inspected in Minnesota within
twenty-four hours before being slaughtered? If the statute, while
permitting the sale of meats from animals slaughtered, inspected,
and "certified" in that state, had expressly forbidden the
introduction from other states, and their sale in Minnesota, of all
fresh meats of every kind, without making any distinction between
those that were from animals inspected on the hoof and those that
were not so inspected, its unconstitutionality could not have been
doubted. And yet it is so framed that this precise result is
attained as to all sales in Minnesota for human food of meats from
animals slaughtered in other states.
In the opinion of this Court, the statute in question, so far as
its provisions require, as a condition of sales in Minnesota of
fresh beef, veal, mutton, lamb, or pork, for human food, that the
animals from which such meats are taken shall have been
Page 136 U. S. 330
inspected in Minnesota before being slaughtered, is in violation
of the Constitution of the United States, and void.
The judgment discharging the appellee from custody is
Affirmed.
*
"
I
NDIANA STATUTE, ACTS 1889, c. 84."
"An act for the protection of the public health by promoting the
growth and sale of healthy cattle and sheep, making it a
misdemeanor to sell the same without inspection before the
slaughtering with this state, and to authorize cities to appoint
inspectors.
Approved March 2, 1889."
"SECTION 1.
Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the
State of Indiana that it shall be unlawful to sell, or offer,
or expose for sale in any incorporated city within this state beef,
mutton, veal, lamb, or pork for human food, except as hereinafter
provided, which has not been inspected alive within the county by
an inspector or his deputy duly appointed by the authorities of
said county in which such beef, mutton, veal, lamb, or pork is
intended for consumption and found by such inspector to be pure,
healthy and merchantable, and for every such offense the accused,
after conviction, shall be fined not more than two hundred dollars
nor less than ten dollars."
"SEC. 2. That the city council is hereby empowered and required
to appoint in each incorporated city within the county one or more
inspectors and deputies, furnish the necessary blanks and decree
the fees for such inspection,
provided that where farmers
slaughter cattle, sheep, or swine of their own raising or feeding
for human food, no other inspection shall be required, or penalty
imposed, than such as are already provided by law to prevent the
sale and consumption of diseased meat."
"SEC. 3. Nothing herein contained shall prevent or obstruct the
sale of cured beef or pork known as dried, corned, or canned beef,
or smoked or salted pork, or other cured or salted meats."