CURBING THE EAILROADS 57 



The first of the "Granger cases," as they were 

 termed by Justice Field in a dissenting opinion, was 

 not a railroad case primarily but grew out of ware- 

 house legislation which the farmers of Illinois se- 

 cured in 1871. This act established maximum 

 charges for grain storage and required all ware- 

 housemen to publish their rates for each year dur- 

 ing the first week in January and to refrain from 

 increasing these rates during the year and from dis- 

 criminating between customers. In an endeavor 

 to enforce this law the railroad and warehouse 

 commission brought suit against Munn and Scott, a 

 warehouse firm in Chicago, for failure to take out 

 the license required by the act. The suit, known 

 as Mumi vs. Illinois, finally came to the United 

 States Supreme Court and was decided in favor of 

 the State, two of the justices dissenting. 1 The 

 opinion of the court in this case, delivered by Chief 

 Justice Waite, laid down the principles which were 

 followed in the railroad cases. The attorneys for 

 the warehousemen had argued that the act in ques- 

 tion, by assuming to limit charges, amounted to a 

 deprivation of property without due process of law 

 and was thus repugnant to the Fourteenth Amend- 

 ment to the Constitution of the United States. 



1 94 United States Reports, 113. 



