398 HASTINGS—POLICE POWER OF THE STATE. [June 19 
of 1 Leisy vs. Hardin, decided in 1890, was converted into the form ° 
that the power of Congress is exclusive except in cases that do not 
admit of a uniform rule applicable to the entire country. Justice 
Woodbury defends the laws as police measures : 
2««A police measure, in common parlance, often relates to something 
connected with the public morals, and in that limited view would still 
embrace the subject of pauperism as this court has held in 76 Peters, 
625. But in law the word police is much broader and includes all legis- 
lation for the internal policy of the state (¢ Black, chap. xiii). The 
police of the ocean belongs to Congress and the admiralty powers of 
the general government, but not the police of the land or of harbors.” 
And he proceeds to argue it is only in form a tax, and is merely 
to obtain the expenses of policing the vessels and persons who are 
required to pay it. 
The bearing of these cases upon the slave controversy fully 
appeared in this opinion on page 526: 
‘Tt having been then, both in Europe and America, a matter of muni- 
cipal regulation whether aliens shall or shall not reside in any particu- 
lar state or even across its borders, it follows that if a sovereign state 
pleases it may, as a matter of clear right, exclude them entirely, or 
only when paupers or convicts, or only when slaves, or what is still 
more common in America, in free states as well as slave states, exclude 
colored immigrants though free. As further proof and illustration that 
this power exists in the states and has never been parted with, it was 
early exercised in Virginia as to other than paupers, and it is now exer- 
cised in one form or another in more than half of the states of the 
Union.” 
He concludes that the matter under consideration 
$“is not one of those incidents to our foreign commerce which, like 
duties on imports or taxes or tonnage, require a universal, uniform rule 
to be applied by the general government. A uniform rule by Congress 
not being needed on this particular point nor being just is a strong 
proof that it was not intended Congress should exercise power over it.” 
‘The silence of Congress, which some seem to regard as more for- 
midable than its action, is whether in full or in part to be respected and 
obeyed only where its power is exclusive and the states are deprived of 
all authority over the matter.” . . . . “In other cases, when the power 
of Congress is not excluded and that of the states is concurrent, the 
silence of Congress to legislate on any mere local or subordinate matter 
1735 U. S., 100. 27 How., 523. 3 Page 546. 
