COMPAGNIE FRANCAISE DE NAVIGATION A VAPEUR v. LOUISIANA STATE BOARD OF HEALTH.
No. 4
Supreme Court of the United States
June 2, 1902
186 U.S. 380
ERROR TO THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF LOUISIANA.
MR. JUSTICE HARLAN and MR. JUSTICE GRAY did not hear the argument and took no part in the decision of this case.
ERROR TO THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF LOUISIANA.
No. 4. Argued October 29, 30, 1900.—Affirmed June 2, 1902.
The law of Louisiana under which the Board of Health exerted the authority complained of in this case, is found in section 8 of Act 192 of 1898. The Supreme Court of Louisiana, interpreting this statute held that it empowered the board to exclude healthy persons from a locality infested with a contagious or infectious disease, and that this power was intended to apply as well to persons seeking to enter the infected place, whether they came from without or within the State. Held: That this empowered the board to exclude healthy persons from a locality infested with a contagious or infectious disease, and that the power was intended to apply as well to persons seeking to enter the infected place, whether they came from without or within the State.
This action was commenced in the state court against the Board of Health of the State of Louisiana and three persons who were members of said board, and whom it was sought to hold individually responsible for damages alleged to have been suffered from the enforcement of a resolution adopted by the board upon the theory that the resolution referred to was ultra vires and hence the members of the board who voted for it
That the defendant The State Board of Health was a body created by Act No. 192 of the General Assembly of the State of Louisiana of the year 1898, with power to sue and be sued, domiciled in this city, (the city of New Orleans,) and composed of seven members, whose duty it was, by the provisions of said act, to protect and preserve the public health by preparing and promulgating a sanitary code for the State of Louisiana, by providing for the general sanitation of the State, and with authority to regulate infectious and contagious diseases and to prescribe a maritime and land quarantine against places infected with such diseases.
It was asserted that the plaintiff, a corporation created by and existing under the laws of the Republic of France and a citizen of said republic, on or about September 2, 1898, caused its steamship Britannia to be cleared from the ports of Marseilles, France, and Palermo, Italy, for New Orleans with a cargo of merchandise and with about 408 passengers, some of whom were citizens of the United States returning home, and others who were seeking homes in the United States, and who intended to settle in the State of Louisiana or adjoining States, and that all the passengers referred to at the time of their sailing were free from infectious or contagious diseases. It was further averred that on September 29, 1898, the vessel arrived at the quarantine station some distance below the city of New Orleans, was there regularly inspected, and was found both as to the passengers and cargo to be free from any infectious or contagious disease, and accordingly was given a clean bill of health, whereby the ship became entitled to proceed to New Orleans and land her passengers and discharge her cargo. This, however, it was asserted she was not permitted to do, because, on the date last mentioned, at a meeting held by the Board of Health, the following resolution was adopted:
Resolved, That hereafter in the case of any town, city or parish of Louisiana being declared in quarantine, no body or bodies of people, immigrants, soldiers or others shall be allowed
to enter said town, city or parish so long as said quarantine shall exist, and that the president of the board shall enforce this resolution.
It was charged that in order to enforce this resolution the president of the Board of Health, who was one of the individual defendants, instructed the quarantine officer to detain the Britannia at the quarantine station, and the president of the board addressed to the agent of the steamship the following communication explanatory of the detention of the vessel:
Referring to the detention of the SS. Britannia at the Mississippi River quarantine station, with 408 Italian immigrants on board, I have to inform you that under the provisions of the new state Board of Health law, section 8, of which I enclose a marked copy, this board has adopted a resolution forbidding the landing of any body of people in any town, city or parish in quarantine. Under this resolution the immigrants now on board the Britannia cannot be landed in any of the following parishes of Louisiana, namely: Orleans, St. Bernard, Jefferson (right bank), St. Tammany, Plaquemines, St. Charles or St. John. You will therefore govern yourselves accordingly.
The president of the Board of Health, it was alleged, moreover notified the agent of the ship that if an attempt was made to land the passengers at any place contiguous to New Orleans, such place not being in quarantine, a quarantine against such place would be declared, and thus the landing be prevented.
It was averred that whilst the resolution of the Board of Health purported on its face to be general in its operation, in truth it was passed with the sole object of preventing the landing of the passengers from the Britannia, and this was demonstrated because no attempt was made by the Board of Health to enforce the provisions of the resolution against immigrants from Italy coming into the United States via the port of New York and thence reaching New Orleans by rail, and that after the promulgation of said resolution more than 200 such persons, varying in groups of 30 to 100 in number, have from time to time been permitted to enter said city. It was averred that the action of the board was not authorized by the state
The court declined to allow a preliminary restraining order, and upon a hearing on a rule to show cause, the injunction was refused. The order of the Board of Health, which was complained of, continued, therefore, to be enforced against the ship. Subsequently the plaintiff filed a supplemental and amended petition. It was reiterated that the immigrant passengers on board the Britannia were free from disease when they shipped and at the time of their arrival, and, in addition, it was alleged that the steamer with the immigrants on board had sailed from her port of departure prior to the declaration by said Board of Health of the existence of any infectious disease in the city of New Orleans. It was alleged that, in consequence of the insistence of the Board of Health and its members, in enforcing the illegal order refusing to allow the landing of the immigrant passengers, the steamer had been obliged to proceed to Pensacola, Florida, where they were landed, and then the steamer returned to New Orleans for the purpose of discharging cargo. The damage resulting was averred to be $8500, besides the $2500 previously claimed, and a judgment for this amount, in addition to the previous sum, was also asked in solido against the board and the members thereof, who were individually made defendants. It was, moreover, averred that the action of the board was in violation of the laws of the United States, and the rules and regulations made in pursuance thereof, relating to quarantine and immigration from foreign countries into ports of the United States, and especially acts of Congress ap-
The defendants filed a peremptory exception of no cause of action, which was sustained by the trial court, and the suit was therefore dismissed. On appeal to the Supreme Court of the State of Louisiana the judgment of the trial court was affirmed. 51 La. Ann. 645.
Mr. W. B. Spencer for plaintiff in error. Mr. W. W. Howe was on his brief.
Mr. F. C. Zacharie for defendant in error.
MR. JUSTICE WHITE, after making the foregoing statement, delivered the opinion of the court.
The law of Louisiana, under which the Board of Health exerted the authority which is complained of, is found in section 8 of Act No. 192, enacted in 1898. The portion of the section which is essential is as follows, the provision which is more directly pertinent to the case in hand being italicized:
In case that any parish, town or city, or any portion thereof, shall become infected with any contagious or infectious disease, to such an extent as to threaten the spread of such disease to the other portions of the State, the state Board of Health shall issue its proclamation declaring the facts and ordering it in quarantine, and shall order the local boards of health in other parishes, towns and cities to quarantine against said locality, and shall establish and promulgate the rules and regulations, terms and conditions on which intercourse with said infected locality shall be permitted, and shall issue to the other local sanitary authorities instructions as to the measures adopted in quarantining against, persons, goods or other property coming from said infected localities, and these rules and regulations,
The Supreme Court of the State of Louisiana, interpreting this statute, held that it empowered the board to exclude healthy persons from a locality infested with a contagious or infectious disease, and that this power was intended to apply as well to persons seeking to enter the infected place, whether they came from without or from within the State. The court said:
The law does not limit the board to prohibiting the introduction of persons from one portion of the State to another and an infected portion of the State, but evidently looked as well to the prohibition of the introduction of persons from points outside of the State into any infected portion of the State. As the object in view would be to accomplish the subsidence and suppression of the infectious and contagious diseases and to prevent the spread of the same, it would be difficult to see why parties from outside of the State should be permitted to enter into infected places, while those from different parishes should be prevented from holding intercourse with each other.
The object in view was to keep down, as far as possible, the number of persons to be brought within danger of contagion or infection, and by means of this reduction to accomplish the subsidence and suppression of the disease and the spread of the same.
The particular places from which the parties, who were to be prohibited from entering the infected district or districts, came could have no possible influence upon the attainment of the result sought to be attained.
Referring to past conditions and the public dangers which had arisen from them, the evil which the statute of 1898 was intended to remedy was pointed out as follows:
During the fall of 1897, and during the existence of an epidemic, a vessel arrived in the Mississippi River with emigrants aboard under conditions similar to those under which the Britannia reached the same stream in 1898.
The excited public discussions at the time as to the right of the state board, under the then existing law, to prevent the landing of the emigrants and as to its duty in the premises, were so extended as to authorize us to take judicial notice of the fact, and in our opinion the clause in the present act which covers that precise matter was inserted therein for the express purpose of placing the particular question outside of the range of controversy.
For a number of years past emigrants have been coming into New Orleans in the autumn from Italy.
There was a probability when the general assembly met in 1898 that the epidemic of 1897 might be repeated, and a great probability that emigrants would seek to enter, as they had done the year before, to the great danger, not only of the people of Louisiana, but of the emigrants themselves.
Independently of this, there was great danger to be apprehended from the increasing intercourse between New Orleans and the West India Islands in consequence of a war with Spain.
It was to ward off these dangers that this particular provision was inserted in the act of 1898.
And by implication from the reasoning just referred to the existence of the conditions rendering it necessary to call the power into play in the case before it was recognized. Thus construing the statute, the state court held that it was not repugnant to the Constitution of the United States and was not in conflict with any law or treaty of the United States. These latter considerations present the questions which arise for our decision. All the assignments of error relied upon to show the
First. The statute drawn in question, on its face and as construed and applied, is void for the reason that it is in violation of
Second. The statute is void inasmuch as it is in conflict with
That from an early day the power of the States to enact and enforce quarantine laws for the safety and the protection of the health of their inhabitants has been recognized by Congress, is beyond question. That until Congress has exercised its power on the subject, such state quarantine laws and state laws for the purpose of preventing, eradicating or controlling the spread of contagious or infectious diseases, are not repugnant to the Constitution of the United States, although their operation affects interstate or foreign commerce, is not an open question. The doctrine was elaborately examined and stated in Morgan Steamship Company v. Louisiana Board of Health, 118 U. S. 455. That case involved determining whether a quarantine law enacted by the State of Louisiana was repugnant to the commerce clause of the Constitution because of its necessary effect upon interstate and foreign commerce. The court said:
Is the law under consideration void as a regulation of commerce? Undoubtedly it is in some sense a regulation of commerce. It arrests a vessel on a voyage which may have been a long one. It may affect commerce among the States when
But it may be conceded that whenever Congress shall undertake to provide for the commercial cities of the United States a general system of quarantine, or shall confide the execution of the details of such a system to a National Board of Health, or to local boards, as may be found expedient, all state laws on the subject will be abrogated, at least so far as the two are inconsistent. But, until this is done, the laws of the State on the subject are valid. This follows from two reasons:
1. The act of 1799, the main features of which are embodied in Title LVIII of the Revised Statutes, clearly recognizes the quarantine laws of the States, and required of the officers of the Treasury a conformity to their provisions in dealing with vessels affected by the quarantine system. And this very clearly has relation to laws created after the passage of that statute, as well as to those then in existence; and when, by the act of April 29, 1878, 20 Stat. 37, certain powers in this direction were conferred on the Surgeon General of the Marine Hospital Service, and consuls and revenue officers were required to contrib-
2. But, aside from this, quarantine laws belong to that class of state legislation which, whether passed with intent to regulate commerce or not, must be admitted to have that effect, and which are valid until displaced or contravened by some legislation of Congress.
Again, in Louisiana v. Texas, 176 U. S. 1, 21, the court was called upon to consider a quarantine law of the State of Texas which by its terms was applicable to and was enforced as to both interstate and foreign commerce. After referring approvingly to the case which we have above cited, the court, speaking through Mr. Chief Justice Fuller, said:
It is not charged that this statute is invalid nor could it be if tested by its terms. While it is true that the power vested in Congress to regulate commerce among the States is a power complete in itself, acknowledging no limitations other than those prescribed in the Constitution, and that where the action of the States in the exercise of their reserve powers comes into collision with it, the latter must give way; yet it is also true that quarantine laws belong to that class of state legislation which is valid until displaced by Congress, and that such legislation has been expressly recognized by the laws of the United States almost from the beginning of the government.
Further, in calling attention to the fact, as remarked by the court in Morgan Steamship Company v. Louisiana Board of Health, supra, that in the nature of things quarantine laws and laws relating to public health must necessarily vary with the different localities of the country, it was said:
Hence even if Congress had remained silent on the subject it would not have followed that the exercise of the police power of the State in this regard, although necessarily operating on interstate commerce, would be therefore invalid. Although from the nature and subjects of the power of regulating com-
Despite these conclusive adjudications, it is earnestly insisted in the argument at bar that by a correct appreciation of all the decisions of this court on the subject, the rule will be discovered to be that the States may enact quarantine or other health laws for the protection of their inhabitants, but that such laws, if they operate upon or directly affect interstate or foreign commerce, are repugnant to the Constitution of the United States independently of whether Congress has legislated on such subjects. To sustain this contention a most copious reference is made to many cases decided by this court, where the nature and extent of the power of Congress to regulate commerce was considered and the validity of state legislation asserted to be repugnant to such power was passed upon. To analyze and review the numerous cases referred to in order to point out their want of relation to the question in hand, would involve in effect a review of the whole subject of the power of Congress to regulate commerce in every possible aspect, and an analysis of practically the greater body of cases which have in this court involved that serious and difficult subject from the beginning. We shall not undertake to do so, but content ourselves with saying, after duly considering the cases relied upon, that we find them inapposite to the doctrine they are cited to sustain, and hence, when they are correctly appreciated, none of them conflict with the settled rule announced by this court in the cases to which we have referred.
The confusion of thought which has given rise to the misconception of the authorities relied upon in the argument, and which has caused it to be supposed that they are apposite to the case in hand, is well illustrated by the premise upon which the proposition that the cited authorities are applicable rests. That proposition is thus stated in the printed argument (italics in the original):
Turning now to the decisions of this court, it will be found that the basis upon which it has upheld the exclusion, inspection and quarantine laws of various States, is that criminals, diseased persons and things, and paupers, are not legitimate subjects of commerce. They may be attendant evils, but they are not legitimate subjects of traffic and transportation, and therefore, in their exclusion or detention, the State is not interfering with legitimate commerce, which is the only kind entitled to the protection of the Constitution.
But it must be at once observed that this erroneously states the doctrine as concluded by the decisions of this court previously referred to, since the proposition ignores the fact that those cases expressly and unequivocally hold that the health and quarantine laws of the several States are not repugnant to the Constitution of the United States, although they affect foreign and domestic commerce, as in many cases they necessarily must do in order to be efficacious, because until Congress has acted under the authority conferred upon it by the Constitution, such state health and quarantine laws producing such effect on legitimate interstate commerce are not in conflict with the Constitution. True is it that, in some of the cases relied on in the argument, it was held that a state law absolutely prohibiting the introduction, under all circumstances, of objects actually affected with disease, was valid because such objects were not legitimate commerce. But this implies no limitation on the power to regulate by health laws the subjects of legitimate commerce. In other words, the power exists until Congress has acted, to incidentally regulate by health and quarantine laws, even although interstate and foreign commerce is affected, and the power to absolutely prohibit additionally obtains where the thing prohibited is not commerce, and hence not embraced in either interstate or foreign commerce. True, also, it was held in some of the cases referred to by counsel, that where the introduction of a given article was absolutely prohibited by a state law upon the asserted theory that the health of the inhabitants would be aided by the enforcement of the prohibition, it was decided that, as the article which it was thus sought to prohibit, was a well-known article of commerce, and there-
In all cases of this kind it has been repeatedly held that, when the question is raised whether the state statute is a just exercise of state power or is intended by roundabout means to invade the domain of Federal authority, this court will look into the operation and effect of the statute to discern its purpose. See Henderson v. Mayor of New York, 92 U. S. 259; Chy Lung v. Freeman, 92 U. S. 275; Cannon v. New Orleans, 20 Wall. 587.
But this implies that we are to consider the statute as enacted and the natural results flowing from it. It does not import that we are to hold a state statute unconstitutional by indulging in
Third. The statute as applied and construed is void, for the reason that it is in conflict with treaties between the United States on the one part and the Republic of France and the Kingdom of Italy on the other part, guaranteeing certain rights, privileges and immunities to the citizens and subjects of said countries.
Reliance is placed to sustain this proposition, on the provisions of a treaty concluded with the Kingdom of Italy on February 26, 1871; on the terms of a treaty with Great Britain of July 3, 1815, as also a treaty between the United States and the Kingdom of Greece, concluded December 22, 1837, and one con-
Conceding, arguendo, this latter proposition, and therefore assuming that all the treaties relied on are applicable, we think it clearly results from their context that they were not intended to and did not deprive the government of the United States of those powers necessarily inhering in it and essential to the health and safety of its people. We say the United States, because if the treaties relied on have the effect claimed for them that effect would be equally as operative and conclusive against a quarantine established by the government of the United States as it would be against a state quarantine operating upon and affecting foreign commerce by virtue of the inaction of Congress. Without reviewing the text of all the treaties, we advert to the provisions of the one made with Greece, which is principally relied upon. The text of article XV of this treaty is the provision to which our attention is directed, and it is reproduced in the margin.1
Fourth. The statute as applied is void for the reason that it is in conflict with the laws of the United States relating to foreign immigration into the United States.
In the argument at bar this proposition embraces also the claim that the statute is void because in conflict with the act of Congress of 1893 entitled An act granting additional quarantine powers and imposing additional duties upon the Marine
The immigration acts to which the proposition relates are those of March 3, 1875, of August 3, 1882, of June 26, 1884, of February 26, 1885, of March 23, 1887, and March 3, 1891, and the regulations to enforce the same. Without undertaking to analyze the provisions of these acts, it suffices to say that, after scrutinizing them, we think they do not purport to abrogate the quarantine laws of the several States, and that the safeguards which they create and the regulations which they impose on the introduction of immigrants are ancillary, and subject to such quarantine laws. So far as the act of 1893 is concerned, it is manifest that it did not contemplate the overthrow of the existing state quarantine systems and the abrogation of the powers on the subject of health and quarantine exercised by the States from the beginning, because the enactment of state laws on these subjects would, in particular instances, affect interstate and foreign commerce. An extract from section 3 of the act, which we think makes these conclusions obvious, is reproduced in the margin.1
Nor do we find anything in the rules and regulations adopted by the Secretary of the Treasury in execution of the power conferred upon him by the act in question giving support to the contention based upon them. It follows from what has been said that the Supreme Court of Louisiana did not err in deciding that the act in question was not repugnant to the Constitution of the United States, and was not in conflict with the acts of Congress or the treaties made by the United States which were relied upon to show to the contrary and its judgment is, therefore,
Affirmed.
MR. JUSTICE BROWN, with whom was MR. JUSTICE HARLAN, dissenting.
The power of the several States, in the absence of legislation by Congress on the subject, to establish quarantine regulations, to prohibit the introduction into the State of persons infected
I have no doubt of the power to quarantine all vessels arriving in the Mississippi from foreign ports for a sufficient length of time to enable the health officers to determine whether there are among her passengers any persons afflicted with a contagious disease. But the State of Louisiana undertakes to do far more than this. It authorizes the state Board of Health at its discretion to prohibit the introduction into any infected portion of the State of persons acclimated, unacclimated or said to be immune, when in its judgment the introduction of said persons would add to or increase the prevalence of the disease; and at its meeting on September 29, 1898, the Board of Health adopted the following resolution:
That hereafter, in the case of any town, city or parish of Louisiana being declared in quarantine, no body or bodies of people, immigrants, soldiers or others shall be allowed to enter said town, city or parish so long as said quarantine shall exist, and that the president of the board shall enforce this resolution.
In other words, the Board of Health is authorized and assumes to prohibit in all portions of the State which it chooses to declare in quarantine, the introduction or immigration of all persons from outside the quarantine district, whether infected or uninfected, sick or well, sound or unsound, feeble or healthy; and that, too, not for the few days necessary to establish the sanitary status of such persons, but for an indefinite and possi-
The only excuse offered for such a wholesale exclusion of immigrants is, as stated by the Supreme Court, to keep down, as far as possible, the number of persons to be brought within danger of contagion or infection, and by means of this reduction to accomplish the subsidence and suppression of the disease, and the spread of the same. In other words, the excuse amounts to this: that the admission, even of healthy persons, adds to the possibility of the contagion being communicated upon the principle of adding fuel to the flame. It does not increase the danger of contagion by adding infected persons to the population, since the bill avers that all the immigrants were healthy and sound. All it could possibly do is to increase the number of persons who might become ill if permitted to be added to the population. This is a danger not to the population, but to the immigrants. It seems to me that this is a possibility too remote to justify the drastic measure of a total exclusion of all classes of immigrants, and that the opinion of the court is directly in the teeth of Railroad Company v. Husen, 95 U. S. 465, wherein a state statute, which prohibited the driving or conveying of any Texas, Mexican or Indian cattle into the State, between March 1 and November 1 in each year, was held to be in conflict with the commerce clause of the Constitution. Such statute was declared to be more than a quarantine regulation, and not a legitimate exercise of the police power of the State. Said Mr. Justice Strong, page 472:
While we unhesitatingly admit that a State may pass sanitary laws, and laws for the protection of life, liberty, health or property within its borders; while it may prevent persons and animals suffering under contagious or infectious diseases, or convicts, etc., from entering the State; while for the purpose of self-protection it may establish quarantine and reasonable inspection laws, it may not interfere with the transportation into or through the State, beyond what is absolutely necessary
for its self-protection. It may not under the cover of exerting its police powers substantially prohibit or burden either foreign or interstate commerce.
The statute was held to be a plain intrusion upon the exclusive domain of Congress; that it was not a quarantine law; not an inspection law, and was objectionable because it prohibited the introduction of cattle, no matter whether they may do an injury to the inhabitants of a State or not; and if you do bring them in, even for the purpose of carrying them through the State without unloading them, you shall be subject to extraordinary liabilities. Cases covering the same principle are those of State v. Steamship Constitution, 42 Cal. 578, and City of Bangor v. Smith, 83 Maine, 422.
I am also unable to concur in the construction given in the opinion of the court to the treaty stipulation with France and other foreign powers. The treaty with France of 1803 provides that the ships of France shall be treated upon the footing of the most favored nation in the ports above mentioned of Louisiana. Article 14 of the treaty with Greece of December 22, 1837, set forth in the opinion, provides that vessels arriving directly from the Kingdom of Greece at any port of the United States of America, and provided with a bill of health granted by an officer having competent power to that effect, at the port whence such vessel shall have sailed, setting forth that no malignant or contagious diseases prevailed in that port, shall be subjected to no other quarantine than such as may be necessary for the visit of the health officer of the port where such vessel shall have arrived, after which said vessels shall be allowed immediately to enter and unload their cargoes: Provided always, That there shall be on board no person who, during the voyage, shall have been attacked with any malignant or contagious disease; that such vessel shall not, during the passage, have communicated with any vessel liable itself to undergo quarantine, and that the country whence they came, shall not at that time be so far infected or suspected that, before their arrival, an ordinance had been issued, in consequence of which, all vessels coming from that country should be considered as suspected, and consequently subject to quarantine.