Page:Department of Public Utilities v. Arkansas Louisiana Gas Co.pdf/11

 Appellant directs attention to language used by the late Chief Justice TAFT, and applies it to the circumstances we are now dealing with. In ''Atlantic Coast Line Ry. Co. v. Standard Oil Co.'', 275 U.S. 257, 48 S. Ct. 107, 72 L. ed. 270, the Chief Justice said: "Determination of the character of commerce is a matter of weighing the whole group of facts in respect to it." In Swift & Co. v. U.S., 196 U.S. 375, 25 S. Ct. 276, 49 L. ed. 518, it was said: "Commerce among the states is not a technical legal conception, but a practical one drawn from the course of business." See, also, Foster-Fountain Packing Co. v. Haydell, 278 U.S. 1, 49 S. Ct. 1, 73 L. ed. 147; Rearick v. Penn., 203 U.S. 507, 27 S. Ct. 159, 51 L. ed. 295.

It is insisted by appellant that the "original package theory" is applicable to facts of the instant case, and attention is directed to 7 Enc. U.S. Sup. Ct. Rep. 298, where the rule deducible from United States Supreme Court decisions is given, as follows: "The general rule is that as long as an article imported remains in the hands of the importer in the original and unbroken package in which it was imported, it is protected by the commerce clause of the Constitution from interference of state laws, and it is only when the original package has been sold by the importer or has been broken by him, or has otherwise become mixed with the common mass of property in the state, that it becomes subject to state legislation." See F. May & Co. v. New Orleans, 178 U.S. 496, 20 S. Ct. 976, 44 L. ed. 1165; Commonwealth v. Paul, 148 Pa. 559, 24 Atl. 78; Kaster v. Flannelly, 96 Kan. 372, 152 Pac. 22; P.U.R. 1916C, 810; West Va. & Maryland Gas Co. v. Towers, 134 Md. 137, 106 Atl. 265; P.U.R. 1919D, 332; East Ohio Gas Co. v. Tax Commission, 283 U.S. 465, 51 S. Ct. 499, 75 L. ed. 1171.

In each of these cases the court held that the original package of gas transported from one state to another was broken when the commodity was turned into a city distribution plant. Appellee admits this construction, and does not contend that sales made by it to city distributing plants, as such, are protected as interstate commerce, but undertakes to distinguish this class of