Crane v. Campbell

Decision Date10 December 1917
Docket NumberNo. 53,53
Citation62 L.Ed. 304,38 S.Ct. 98,245 U.S. 304
PartiesCRANE v. CAMPBELL, Sheriff
CourtU.S. Supreme Court

Messrs. T. A. Walters, of Boise, Idaho, and Frank L. Moore, of Moscow, Idaho, for defendant in error.

Mr. J. H. Forney, of Moscow, Idaho, for plaintiff in error.

Mr. Justice McREYNOLDS delivered the opinion of the Court.

An act of the Legislature of Idaho, approved February 18, 1915, 'defining prohibition districts and regulating and prohibiting the manufacture, sale, * * * transportation for sale or gift, and traffic in intoxicating liquors,' etc. (Session Laws of Idaho 1915, c. 11), provides:

'Sec. 2. It shall be unlawful for any person, firm, company or corporation, its officers or agents, to sell, manufacture or dispose of any intoxicating liquor or alcohol of any kind within a prohibition district or have in his or its possession or to transport any intoxicating liquor or alcohol within a prohibition district unless the same was procured and is so possessed and transported under a permit as hereinafter provided: Provided, that so long as the manufacture of intoxicating liquors for beverage purposes shall not be prohibited within the state by the Constitution or by general law applicable by its terms to the state as a whole, it shall not be unlawful for any person, company or corporation to manufacture intoxicating liquors for beverage purposes in a prohibition district for transportation to and sale outside of the prohibition district: Provided, that nothing in this act shall be construed to apply to the manufacture, transportation or sale of wood or denatured alcohol.'

'Sec. 15. It shall be unlawful for any person to import, ship, sell, transport, deliver, receive or have in his possession any intoxicating liquors except as in this act provided.'

'Sec. 22. It shall be unlawful for any person, firm, company, corporation or agent to have in his or its possession any intoxicating liquors of any kind for any use or purpose except the same shall have been obtained and is so possessed under a permit authorized by this act.'

Plaintiff in error was arrested and held in custody by the sheriff, in default of bail, solely because charged with having 'in his possession a bottle of whisky for his own use and benefit and not for the purpose of giving away or selling the same to any person' within Latah county, Idaho—a prohibition district—on May 16, 1915, in violation of the quoted sections. He sued out a writ of habeas corpus from the state Supreme Court and sought discharge upon the ground that those sections were in contravention of the Fourteenth Amendment, federal Constitution, and therefore void. The court held:

'The only means provided by the act for procuring intoxicating liquors in a prohibition district for any purpose relates to wine to be used for sacramental purposes and pure alcohol to be used for scientific or mechanical purposes, or for compounding or preparing medicine, so that the possession of whisky, or of any intoxicating liquor, other than wine and pure alcohol for the uses above mentioned, is prohibited.'

And further:

'We have reached the conclusion that this act is not in contravention of section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States; * * * that it was passed by the Legislature with a view to the protection of the public health, the public morals and the public safety; that it has a real and substantial relation to those objects, and that it is, therefore, a reasonable exercise of the police power of the state.' In re Ed. Crane, 27 Idaho, 671, 151 Pac. 1006.

The writ was accordingly quashed and the petitioner remanded to custody.

The question presented for our determination, is whether the Idaho statute, in so far as it undertakes to render criminal the mere possession of whisky for personal...

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130 cases
  • La Rue v. State of California
    • United States
    • U.S. District Court — Central District of California
    • April 7, 1971
    ...of the states over intoxicating liquors was extremely broad even prior to the Twenty-First Amendment, citing Crane v. Campbell, 245 U.S. 304, 38 S.Ct. 98, 62 L.Ed. 304 (1917). Yet it was stated by all Justices, including those who dissented on the doctrine of abstention, that the interest o......
  • Marasso v. Van Pelt
    • United States
    • Florida Supreme Court
    • April 19, 1919
    ... ... VAN PELT, Sheriff. Florida Supreme Court April 19, 1919 ... Error ... to Circuit Court, Escambia County; A. G. Campbell, Judge ... Application ... of Antonio Marasso for writ of habeas corpus against J. C ... Van Pelt, as Sheriff of Escambia County ... therefore it does not violate any property right secured by ... organic law. In re Crane, 27 Idaho, 671, 151 P ... 1006, L. R. A. 1918A, 942; Crane v. Campbell, 245 ... U.S. 304, 38 S.Ct. 98, 62 L.Ed. 304; Delaney v ... Plunkett, ... ...
  • State v. Moore
    • United States
    • Idaho Supreme Court
    • December 30, 1922
    ...148, 23 S.Ct. 96, 47 L.Ed. 114.) Idaho's statutes are effective independent legislation aiding in the enforcement of prohibition. (Crane v. Campbell, supra.) is no irreconcilable conflict between an act of Congress and the statute under the 18th amendment unless the statute permits what the......
  • 86 Hawai'i 440, State v. Mallan
    • United States
    • Hawaii Supreme Court
    • January 30, 1998
    ...To so approach the issue in this case is to begin with the wrong end of the stick.[ 27] ... ... [A]s stated in Crane v. Campbell, [245 U.S. 304, 38 S.Ct. 98, 62 L.Ed. 304 (1917) ]: ... [T]he right to hold intoxicating liquors for personal use is not one of those fundamental privileges of a ......
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3 books & journal articles
  • REPUGNANT PRECEDENTS AND THE COURT OF HISTORY.
    • United States
    • Michigan Law Review Vol. 121 No. 4, February 2023
    • February 1, 2023
    ...that bowling alleys could be outlawed, given "the known and demoralizing tendency of such places." Id. at 630. (251.) Crane v. Campbell, 245 U.S. 304, 307-08 (1917). These restrictions may even extend to certain non-intoxicating beverages in order to help suppress the trade of alcoholic one......
  • Reflexive Federalism.
    • United States
    • Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy Vol. 44 No. 2, March 2021
    • March 22, 2021
    ...rejecting various claims that federal or state bans on marijuana distribution or possession are unconstitutional); cf. Crane v. Campbell, 245 U.S. 304, 307-08 (1917) (ruling that there is no federal constitutional right to possess or use (24.) 2 CAL. HEALTH & SAFETY CODE [section] 11362......
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    • Columbia Journal of Gender and Law Vol. 18 No. 3, September 2009
    • September 22, 2009
    ...(noting that the legislature can seek to suppress the use of liquor in the interest of public health and morality); Crane v. Campbell, 245 U.S. 304, 307-08 (1917) (upholding a ban on alcohol possession because it was intended to protect public morality and did so); Cosmopolitan Club v. Virg......

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