Page:Henry Osborn Taylor, A Treatise on the Law of Private Corporations (5th ed, 1905).djvu/484

 § 474.] THE LAW OF PRIVATE CORPORATIONS. [CHAP. VIII. Thus, in a case where a corporation was chartered with the rig-lit to hold lotteries for twenty-five years, and subsequently the state which had chartered it adopted a new constitution containing a provision forbidding lotteries, it was held that this constitution, operating as it did to annul the right of the corporation to hold lotteries, was not repugnant to the Fed- eral constitution as impairing the obligation of the charter, but was a valid exercise of the police power of the state, which the legislature could not grant away. "No legislature can bargain away the public health or the public morals. The people themselves cannot do it, much less their servants. The supervision of both these subjects of governmental power is continuing in its nature, and they are to be dealt with as the special exigencies of the moment may require. Govern- ment is organized with a view to their preservation, and can- not divest itself of the power to provide for them." x But a legislature may grant a franchise, as for instance the exclu- sive right to supply gas or water to a municipality, and can- not revoke it through the exercise of its police power after the grantee has performed the conditions of the grant : yet by granting such franchises the legislature does not part with its power to regulate them so as to protect the public health and morals. 2 1 Stone v. Mississippi, 101 U. S. 814 ; approved, Douglas v. Kentucky, 168 U. S. 488 ; accord, State «. Morris, 77 N. C. 512 ; see Slaughter House Cases, 16 Wall. 36 ; Crescent City, etc., Co. v. New Orleans. 33 La. Ann. 934: Richmond, etc., R. R. Co. v. Richmond, 26 Gratt. (Va.)83 ; Chi- cago, etc., R. R. Co. p. Haggerty, 67 111. 113. In matters relating to the public health and the public morals the legislature of a state cannot by any contract limit the exercise of its police power to the prejudice of the general welfare. Legislation abro- gating valid exclusive privileges of slaughtering animals held constitu- tional. Butchers' Union Slaughter House, etc., Co. v. Crescent City Co., Ill U. S. 746. The legislation held 464 valid in this case destroyed the ex- clusive nature of the privileges held valid iu Slaughter House Cases, 16 Wall. 36. A law prohibiting the em- ployment of women and persons under eighteen in any manufacturing establishment more than sixty hours a week violates no contract of this commonwealth implied in granting the charter of a manufacturing com- pany. Commonwealth v. Hamilton M'f'g Co., 120 Mass. 383. See Wood- lawn Cemetery v. Everett, 118 Mass. 354. 2 New Orleans Gas Co. v. Louisi- ana Light Co., 115 U. S. 650 ; New Orleans Water Works Co. v. Rivers, 115 U. S. 674 ; Louisville Gas Co. v. Citizens' Gas Co., 115 U. S. 683 ; Tam- many Water Works v. New Orleans,