Jacobs Pharmacy Co. v. City of Atlanta
| Decision Date | 16 September 1898 |
| Citation | 89 F. 244 |
| Parties | JACOBS PHARMACY CO. v. CITY OF ATLANTA. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Northern District of Georgia |
King & Spalding, for complainant.
James A. Anderson and J. T. Pendleton, for defendant.
Complainant alleges that it is a wholesale and retail dealer in drugs in the city of Atlanta; that, in connection with its said business, it has carried on for many years a traffic, both within and without the state of Georgia, in wines and liquors, selling the same in quantities of not less than one quart; that it has always complied with the laws of the city and state in connection with such traffic; that it has always taken out and paid the licenses required of it that it has on hand at present a large stock of wines and liquors; that a large part of its business has been to sell wines and liquors to parties outside of the state of Georgia that it conducts a large interstate business in Georgia and other states of the United States in wines and spirituous liquors; that there is no law of the state of Georgia prohibiting the carrying on the business of trading in wines and spirituous liquors between parties located in the county of Fulton, said state, and others of the United States, nor has the state of Georgia, so far as the county of Fulton and city of Atlanta is concerned, undertaken to prohibit the carrying on of interstate commerce in wines and spirituous liquors. It shows that recently the city of Atlanta has passed an ordinance, one section of which is as follows:
Complainant then proceeds by his bill to attack this ordinance as being a violation o= the fourteenth amendment of the constitution of the United States, in that it abridges its privileges and immunities as a citizen of the United States, and denies to it the equal protection of the laws, and that said ordinance is void, in that it operates as a regulation and restriction upon interstate commerce. Considerable attention is given in the b ill to the methods by which the adoption of this ordinance was brought about. It is claimed that it was enacted at the instance of the Liquor Dealers' Association and in its interests. The city, in its answer, denies that the mayor and general council were actuated by any improper motive in passing this ordinance, and says that the same was done in the exercise of its police powers and in the public interests. The city especially sets up the fact that as druggists are allowed to keep their places of business open on Sundays, election days, holidays, and late at night, when regular liquor dealers are closed, it gives them opportunities for furnishing intoxicants and of violating the law which regular liquor dealers do not have. It further sets up the fact that evil has resulted from allowing liquor to be sold in connection with drugs, and that many prosecutions have followed.
The real question for determination is as to whether or not the section of the ordinance above quoted is a proper exercise of the police power vested by law in the mayor and general council of the city of Atlanta. The general power to regulate the sale of intoxicating liquors, and to fix the time, place, and manner of such sale, is not questioned. The city of Atlanta has this power given it by its charter, both as to the retail and wholesale handling of liquor. By the act of 1874 (section 27, City Code, 1891) legislative authority is given as follows:
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State v. Osmers
... ... Durein, 70 Kan. 13, 80 P. 991, 15 L ... R. A., N. S., 908; Jacobs Pharmacy Co. v. Atlanta, ... 89 F. 244; Kansas v. Bradley, 26 F. 289; ... ...
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United Cigar-Whelan Stores Corporation v. Delaware Liquor Commission
... ... Street in the City of Wilmington. The appellant made ... application to the Delaware Liquor ... In ... Jacobs Pharmacy Co. v. City of Atlanta, (C ... C.) 89 F. 244, 245, the court ... ...