1900. ] HASTINGS—POLICE POWER OF THE STATE. 471 
Citing the cases of * Henderson vs. Mayor and ? Chy Lung vs. 
Freeman, he says that in the first a statute which was sought to be 
justified as a measure to prevent the introduction of paupers and in 
the second one that pretended to exclude lewd women were each 
held bad, because they were applied to all passengers indiscrimin- 
ately and were manifestly intended to be a tax on such commerce 
and their police character was a mere pretext. He cites the cases 
holding that such a statute is a police regulation and which refused 
to inquire whether it does not go beyond legitimate police action, 
but declares that question is not one for the legislature only: 
“The police power of the state cannot obstruct foreign commerce, or 
interstate commerce, beyond the necessity of its exercise.” 
Under color of it, objects not within its scope cannot be secured at 
the expense of the protection afforded by the federal constitution. 
The trouble with this determination was eventually found to con- 
sist in the fact that the law was a genuine application of the police 
power. The cattle in question, it has now long been known, even 
if themselves healthy, are liable during the warm months to com- 
municate the fever to native cattle. The statute was not, in fact, as 
Judge Strong wrongly concludes, the result of commercial jealousy 
and an effort to give an advantage to the Missouri cattle raiser. It 
is noteworthy in this case, which had ultimately to be practically 
abandoned, though not formally overruled, that the relation between 
the powers of the state and the federal constitutions are much more 
accurately set forth thanin the Granger cases. An examination of 
the decision makes the reason clear. The police power and the 
commerce clause had been disputing for half a century. The 
fourteenth amendment was a new antagonist. Chief Justice Waite 
in deciding the Granger cases could not pick out his principles 
from preceding ones, as Judge Strong, in passing upon this one of 
Railroad Company vs. Husen, could take his from all the long line 
of precedents in the federal court. 
' The police power and the commerce clause of the federal consti- 
tution collided again in *Hall vs. DeCuir in this year of 1877. 
The legislature of Louisiana had enacted that no one be refused ad- 
mission to public conveyances or expelled from them by reason of 
discriminations on account of race or color, or for any reason ex- 
cept failure to pay fare, bad character or bad conduct in certain 
192 U.. S., 259. 2705275: 895 U. S., 485 (1877). 
PROC. AMER. PHILOS. SOC. XXXIX. 163, EE. PRINTED SEPT. 29, 1900. 
