Latest Important Cases "In effect, all the contentions pressed in argument concerning the repugnancy of the statute to the due process clause really dis regarded the complete and absolute power of Congress over the subject with which the statute deals. They mistakenly assume that mere form, and not substance, may be made by the courts the conclusive test as to the constitutional power of Congress to enact a statute. These conclusions are apparent, we think, since the plenary power of Congress as to the admission of aliens leaves no room for doubt as to its authority to impose the penalty, and its complete administrative con trol over the granting or refusal of a clearance also leaves no doubt of the right to endow administrative officers with discretion to re fuse to perform the administrative act of granting a clearance, as a means of enforcing the penalty which there was lawful authority to impose." See Bill of Rights. Employer's Liability. Federal Act Uncon stitutional with Reference to Intra-State Com merce— Federal Law Not for State Courts to Administer. Conn. The Connecticut Supreme Court of Errors declared the Employer's Liability Act passed by the National Congress in 1908 to be un constitutional, with slight qualification, in a decision rendered in New Haven July 20, Chief Justice Simeon E. Baldwin writing the opinion. It was furthermore stated that if the act was not unconstitutional, action under it should be instituted in the federal and not in the state courts. The opinion was in the cases of William H. Hoxie and Oscar Mondow, brakeman, against the New Haven road for injuries received in an acci dent resulting from the negligence of a fellow employee, the decision upholding the ruling of the Superior Court, which was favorable to the defendant corporation. The Court summed up as follows:— 1. "Congress did not intend by the act of April 22, 1908, to authorize the institution of an action in the courts of the states. 2. "It had no power to make it incum bent upon the state courts to assume juris diction of such an action. 3. "The issue before the Superior Court involved the consideration of these points, which justified, of themselves, the dismissal of the plaintiff's actions; but further— 4. "The act, so far as it concerns this case, is wholly void, by reason of certain of its
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provisions which cannot be separated from the rest." On the question of constitutionality the court said:— "Except so far as the act is a regulation of commerce between the states, its enactment was beyond the power of Congress. That it remotely affects such commerce is not suffi cient if that result is only secured by invad ing the settled limits of the sovereignty of the states with respect to their own internal police. "The act cannot be interpreted as referring only to negligence of employees while engaged in interstate commerce. It substantially reenacts in this particular the words of the previous Employer's Liability Act of 1906, and must be presumed to have been drafted with the knowledge of the construction which those words had received." Evidence. See Procedure. Federal and State Jurisdiction. State Statute Governing Delivery of Telegram In operative in Navy Yard. U. S. Virginia makes it the duty of telegraph companies, upon the arrival of a dispatch or message at the point to which it is to be trans mitted, to cause it to be forwarded by a mes senger to the addressee, and imposes a penalty for the violation of this law. The addressee was a marine on the U. S. S. Abarenda, stationed at the navy yard at Portsmouth. The message was received at Portsmouth, intrusted to a messenger for delivery on board ship, where it was taken from him at the gangway, receipted for, but was never re ceived by the plaintiff. In Western Union Telegraph Co. v. Chiles, 29 Sup. Ct. Rep. 613, plaintiff sought to recover the statutory penalty. The federal Supreme Court held that this was not a contract within the laws of Virginia and was not within the jurisdiction of its courts. The exclusive legislative power which Congress has over the Norfolk Navy Yard excludes the operation, within it, of the state statute allowing a penalty for its violation. Denial of Recourse to Federal Courts Be yond Power of State Legislature. U. S. Alabama enacted a law in 1907 providing that if any foreign corporation procured the removal of a cause from a state to a federal court its franchise would be canceled and any contract in intra-state business thereafter made by it would be void. At the time of the entrance into the state by the telegraph com
