ORANGE CULTURE IN CALIFORNIA. 59 



union there is strength,' and that by organization they can pro- 

 tect their rights even against monopolies. The battle fought by 

 the Grangers with railroads, speculators and middle-men, is a 

 conspicuous illustration of this fact. The recent decision of the 

 Supreme Court of the United States, in the Grange cases, is 

 richly worth all it cost. By this decision the duties of corpo- 

 rations and the rights of citizens are made plain. The de- 

 cision itself bears directly upon the right of State Legislatures 

 to control corporations, and all that invest money in a business 

 in which the public are interested. It enunciates principles 

 which bear upon water companies as well as upon railroads. 

 The leading idea is this : That corporations have duties as well 

 as rights, and that all that engage in a business on which others 

 depend, shall discharge the duties incident to that business 

 faithfully, impartially and at reasonable rates. Nor is this any 

 new doctrine. The Chief Justice, in rendering the almost unan- 

 imous decision of the Court, quotes freely from English author- 

 ities two hundred years old, and enunciates principles as old as 

 civilized government principles reiterated, it is true, in the 

 Magna Charta and in our own Constitution, but existing for 

 centuries before either of them. These principles require each 

 citizen so to conduct himself and use his own property as not to 

 injure another unnecessarily. They regulate the conduct of 

 citizens towards one another, and the manner in which each 

 shall use his own property, when such regulation becomes 

 necessary for the public good. 



"On this principle the Chief Justice says : 'It has been cus- 

 tomary in England from time immemorial, and in this country 

 from its colonization, to regulate ferries, hackmen, bakers, mil- 

 lers, wharfingers, inn-keepers,' etc. 



"He further says : 'Looking to the common law, from whence 

 came the rights which the Constitution protects, we find that 

 when private property is affected by a public interest, it ceases 

 to be juris privite only. This was said by Lord Chief Justice 

 Hale, more than two hundred years ago, in his treatise 'De 

 Partibus Moris,' and it has ever since been accepted without 

 objection as an essential element of the law of property. When, 

 therefore, one devotes his property to a use in which the public 



