142 Ind. 695 | Ind. | 1895
The appellee was charged and found guilty, before the appellant’s mayor, of violating an ordinance of the city prohibiting -peddling within said city without a license, as prescribed by said ordinance. On appeal to the circuit court there was a special answer by the appellee, a demurrer to which was overruled, and a special reply by the appellant, a demurrer to which was sustained, and upon a trial by the court the appellee was acquitted. The questions arising upon the rulings as to the special answer and special reply more fairly and fully arise upon the motion for a new trial which assigned, as causes therefor, that the finding was contrary .to law and was contrary to the evidence. Without conflict the evidence established the following facts: During and prior to September and October, 1894, P. F. Collier & Co. were a firm of book publishers, located in and conducting their business, throughout various States, from the city of New York, in the State of New York.
The theory upon which the appellee was discharged by the lower court and that upon which the judgment of that court is here supported is that the appellee was engaged in interstate commerce, the regulation of which is reserved, by the federal constitution, to the Congress of
In the recent case of City of South Bend v. Martin, 142 Ind. 31 (29 L. R. A. 531), the question here presented was fully considered and many of the Federal and State decisions were reviewed. The rule there recognized was that if the goods, prior to their sale, had come into this State and had become here permanently fixed and mingled with the mass of property within this State, and, as such, were subjected to sale by present exposure and delivery their sale was not a transaction of interstate commerce, while, if they had not, at the time of their sale, come into this State, had not become mingled with the mass of property within this State, were not subject to inspection and delivery at the time of the sale, the soliciting of orders and the subsequent shipment and delivery from another State were transactions of interstate commerce. Upon this recognized rule there can be no doubt, under the facts here presented, that this case falls within the limits where State and municipal authorities have no control. In addition to the numerous cases cited in City of South Bend v. Martin, supra, see In re Spain, 47 Fed. Rep. 208; In re Nichols, 48 Fed. Rep. 164; In re Tyerman, 48 Fed. Rep. 167; McLaughlin v. City of South Bend, 126 Ind. 471; Martin v. Town of Rosedale, 130 Ind. 109.
The right of Congress to regulate interstate commerce “is co-extensive with the subject on which it acts and cannot be stopped at the external boundary of the State, but must enter its interior, and must be capable of authorizing the disposition of those articles which it introduces, so that they may become mingled with the common mass of property within the territory entered.” Brennan v. Titusville, 153 U. S. 289; Leisy v. Hardin,
We conclude, therefore, that the record discloses no error, and the judgment of the circuit court is affirmed.
The effect of the interstate commerce law upon State regulations as to peddlers is the subject of a note to Re Spain, 14 L. R. A. 97; see also South Bend v. Martin (Ind.), 29 L. R. A. 531.