STATE REGULATION OF CUTTINGS 711 



"The rules by which this contention must be tested, as is shown by 

 repeated decisions of this court, are these: 1. The equal protection 

 clause of the Fourteenth Amendment does not take from the State the 

 power to classify in the adoption of police laws, but admits of the exer- 

 cise of a wide scope of discretion in that regard, and avoids what is 

 done only when it is without any reasonable basis and therefore is 

 purely arbitrary. 2. A classification having some reasonable basis does 

 not offend against that clause merely because it is not made with math- 

 ematical nicety or because in practice it results in some inequality. 

 3. When the classification in such a law is called in question, if any 

 state of facts reasonably can be conceived that would sustain it. the 

 existence of that state of facts at the time the law was enacted must be 

 assumed. 4. One who assails the classification in such a law must 

 carry the burden of showing that it does not rest upon any reasonable 

 basis, but is essentially arbitrary. Bachtel v. Wilson, 204 U. S., 36, 41 ; 

 Louisville & Nashville R. R. Co. v. Melton, 218 U. S., 30; Ozan Lum- 

 ber Co. v. Union County Bank, 207 U. S., 251, 256 ; Munn v. Illinois, 

 94 U. S., 113, 132; Henderson Bridge Co. v. Henderson City, 173 

 U. S., 592, 615." 



The State of Massachusetts in 1845 adopted a law forbidding any 

 person to "take, carry away or remove . . . any stones, sand or 

 gravel from any of the beaches in the town of Chelsea." and pre- 

 scribing a penalty for its violation. The defendant indicted for vio- 

 lating such statute did not deny the commission of the inhibited acts. 

 but insisted that he was owner of the land from which such material 

 was taken and that the act could not therefore apply to him, and that, 

 if it did, it was unconstitutional and void. The object of the law was 

 obvious, to protect the harbor of the city of Boston by preserving the 

 integrity of its beaches and natural embankments. The position of 

 defendant was condemned, and the validity of the act sustained (Com- 

 monwealth V. Tewksbury, 11 Met., 55). the court saying: 



"The court are of opinion that such a law is not a taking of the prop- 

 erty for public use, within the meaning of the constitution, but is a 

 just and legitimate exercise of the power of the legislature to regulate 

 and restrain such particular use of property as would be inconsistent 

 with, or injurious to, the rights of the public." 



It then refers to the disastrous effects upon Plymouth harbor of the 

 cutting away of wood upon its beaches and the great consequent 

 expense to both State and Federal governments of the artificial res- 

 toration of such beaches, and concludes : 



"Without hazarding an opinion upon any other question, we think 

 that a law prohibiting an owner from removing the soil composing 



