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THE GREEN BAG

servants, nullified the defense of contributory negligence when comparatively slight, and pro vided that no contract of employment, insurance or relief benefit, should bar an action against the employer. The entire act was held invalid on the ground that it assumed to regulate, not only acts done in furtherance of interstate commerce, but acts and relations which might in no sense be of an inter state character, simply because a part of the busi ness of a carrier might extend beyond the limits of a single state. The portions which might have been valid if standing alone were held so interblended with the unconstitutional portions as to fall with them. Mr. Justice Moody rendered a vigorous dissent ing opinion. Justices Harlan, McKenna and Holmes also dissented.

seizure and holding were paid, the cows of Stump because they were abandoned, neglected and cruelly treated by Stump was the question for determination by the Colorado Supreme Court in Jenks v. Stump, 93 Pac. 17. The Colorado Legislature by Mills Ann. St. §§ in—112—114 authorized any officer of the humane society to take charge of any abandoned or cruelly treated animal, provide it with food, and detain it until the expenses so incurred were paid etc.. but failed to provide for any hearing to determine the facts. The court declared that the statute authorized a taking of property without due process of law in violation of the i4th Amend ment to the Federal Constitution and the Consti tution of Colorado Art. 2 § 25 since it did not restrict the power to cases of emergency in which property may be taken without notice.

Decisions such as this are responsible for no little of the lack of confidence in the law which is unfortu nately so common in America to-day. It is unfortu nate that they so often appear in what may be termed labor cases. Their result has been and will in the future be bring about the entry of "organized labor" into the political field for the purpose of dominating the bench of the country, an action which ia to be regretted no matter by what party or faction taken. The case is but another of those of recent years in which the social ideas have clashed and the old fashioned individualism of the majority of the Supreme Court has been opposed to modern collectiv ism. Justices Peckham and Brewer have in all of their decisions been deeply rooted individualists of the old laissez faire, laissez passer type, absolutely unable to see any necessity for governmental inter ference for the protection of the laboring man and the employee. In almost any other case there can be no doubt that the old rule would have been applied "that if the section admits of two interpretations one of which brings it within and the other presses it beyond the constitutional authority of congress, it becomes the duty of the courts to adopt the former construction; because a presumption never ought to be indulged that congress meant to exercise or usurp any unconstitutional authority, unless that conclusion is forced upon the court by language altogether unambiguous." There can be no doubt that the defendant in the particular case was engaged in interstate commerce, nor can there be any doubt that the intention of congress was to confine the scope of the act to interstate matters and relations. ANDREW A. BRUCE.

CONTEMPT. (Misstatement of Opinion of Court.) R. I. A misstatement by a newspaper, of the law as laid down by the Supreme Court of Rhode Island, was the basis of contempt pro ceedings, report of which is found in In re Provi dence Journal Co., 68 Atl. Rep. 428. The offend ing paper acknowledged that it had a correct copy of the opinion, and that the published statement of it was incorrect but alleged that the mistake was wholly unintentional. The court held its good intentions to be no excuse in view of the fact that its act in attempting to state the law to its readers was purely voluntary, but allowed it to purge itself by publishing the opinion in the contempt case on its editorial page where the former article appeared.

CONSTITUTIONAL LAW. (Seizure of Aban doned Animals.) Colo. Sup. Ct. — Could Jenks as an officer and agent of the Colorado Humane Society seize and hold until the expenses of such

CRIMINAL LAW. (Arrest Without Warrant.) Cal. — In people v. Craig, 91 Pac. Rep. 997, vagrancy, as denned in Penal Code, § 607, subd. 6, is held to be a misdeameanor that can be com mitted in the presence of an officer, so as to justify him in making an arrest without a warrant. The interesting portion of the decision turns upon the discussion of the question of the right of the officers to arrest the defendant on the charge of vagrancy. The court states that a doubtful question was raised by the evidence of the officers themselves that the real motive of the arrest was not the fact that defendant was a vagrant, but was a report brought to their knowledge that at an earlier hour in the night that defendant with another had assaulted and beaten a man passing along the street. This offense they had not seen, and on consultation they concluded that as they could not arrest the defendant and his companion for the battery without a warrant, they would arrest them as vagrants known to them to be such. The court points out that it was generally