State v. Pratt

• Decision Date: 28 May 1887
• Citation: 9 A. 556,59 Vt. 590
• Parties: STATE v. BAXTER PRATT
• Court: Vermont Supreme Court

9 A. 556

59 Vt. 590

STATE v. BAXTER PRATT

Supreme Court of Vermont, Orleans County

May 28, 1887

INFORMATION filed against the respondent for peddling without a license. Heard on agreed statement, September Term, 1885 Ross, J., presiding. The respondent was adjudged guilty.

Judgment of the County Court reversed, and judgment rendered that the respondent discharged.

C. A Prouty, State's Attorney, for the State.

Geo. W. Cahoon, for the respondent.

The statute in question is unconstitutional; because, 1. It assumes the power to "regulate commerce among the states;" 2. Because it absolutely prohibits aliens from being licensed as peddlers. "No person shall be licensed as a peddler who is not a citizen of some one of the United States," sec. 3954; and sec. 3951, imposes a heavy penalty upon every person who becomes a peddler without a license,--denying to one class of persons absolutely, privileges of "acquiring property," by their vocation or trade, granted to another class of persons, citizens by birth or naturalization.

"A state statute providing that no person shall be deemed a peddler by selling articles which are the manufacture of the state, and that no person shall be licensed as a peddler who has not resided one year in the state, and providing penalties for peddling without a license, held unconstitutional, as discriminating against non residents, and assuming the power to regulate commerce among the states." WHEELER, J., in Matter of Watson, U. S.D. Ct. Vt. 1882, 28 Alb. L. Jour. 12; Ex parte Commonwealth Virginia, 100 U.S. 676; Welton v. Missouri, 91 U.S. 275; Brown v. Maryland, 12 Wheat. 419; WAIT, C. J., in Hall v. DeCuir, 95 id. 548-9; State Tonnage Tax, 79 U.S. 376; Sherlock v. Alling, 93 U.S. 820; Railroad v. Pennsylvania, 82 U.S. 146; Cook v. Pennsylvania, 97 U.S. 1016; Guy v. Baltimore, 100 U.S. 744; Sewing Mach. Co. v. Clark, 100 U.S. 754; Tiernan v. Rinker, 102 U.S. 103; Mobile v. Kimball, Ib. 240; Webber v. Virginia, 103 U.S. 565-7; Walling v. People, U.S. Sup. Ct., Jan. 1886, cited in 33 Alb. L. J. 254; State v. Furbish, 72 Me. 493; Brown v. Houston, 114 U.S. 631.

OPINION

POWERS, J.

Sec. 3951 R. L. imposes a penalty upon persons who become peddlers without a license.

Sec. 3952 provides that "a person going from town to town, or from place to place in the same town, on foot or otherwise, carrying to sell, or exposing for sale, goods, wares or merchandize the growth or manufacture of a foreign county * * * shall be deemed a peddler."

The respondent among other things carried from town to town and exposed for sale tea; and he is here prosecuted for peddling without a license. It is answered that so much of section 3952, supra, as requires a license from persons peddling tea, an article of foreign growth, is in conflict with the Federal Constitution, and therefore void.

The Constitution in section 8, Art. 1, declares that Congress shall have power "to regulate commerce with foreign nations and among the several states"; and in s. 10, that "no state shall without the consent of Congress lay any imports or duties on imports or exports."

In Art. 6, it is declared that: "This Constitution and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof * * * shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, any thing in the constitution or laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding"; and in Art. 3, s. 2: "The judicial power" (of the United States) "shall extend to all cases in law and equity arising under this Constitution." * * *

The construction therefore given to the clauses of the Constitution above referred to, by the Supreme Court of the United States is conclusive upon this court.

In Brown v. The State of Maryland, 25 U.S 419, 12 Wheat. 419, 6 L.Ed. 678, it was held that a tax upon the sale of an article was in legal effect a tax upon the article itself, and that the law of the state of Maryland requiring persons to take out a license for selling imported goods in the original package was in conflict with the Constitution in that it purported to tax an import and sought to regulate commerce with foreign nations. The opinion of Ch. J. MARSHALL in that case is exhaustive and it has...