Page:United States Reports, Volume 209.djvu/150

 124 OCTOBER TERM, 1907. Syllabus. 0 U.S. Although the determination of whether a railway rate preset/bed by a crate statute is so low as to be confiscatory involves a question of fact, its solu- tion ralsas a Federal question, and the sufficiency of rate is a iudieial question over which the proper Circuit Court has ju.edictien, as one  ing under the Constitution of the United States. Whether a state statute is unconstitutional because the penaitie for its violation are so enormous that persons affected thereby are prevented from resorting to the courts for the purpo of deteoninln the validity of the statute and are thereby denied the equal protection of the law and their property rendered liable to be taken without due proce of law, is & Federal question and gives the Circuit Court jurisdiction. Whether the stae railroad rate statute involved in thie c, although on its face relating only to intrastate rates, was an interference with interstate commerce hdd to raise a Federal question which could not be enusidered frivolous. A state railroad rate statute which impeecs such exeesve penalties that parties affected are deterred from tting its validity in the court deuie the carrier the equal protection of the law without regard to the quest/on of insufficiency of the rate preecrlbed; it is within the judediction, and i the duty, of the Circuit Court to inquire whether such rates are so low as to be confiscatory, and if so to permanently enjoin the railroad company, at the suit of one of its stockholders, from putting them in force, and it has power pending such inquiry to grant a temporary injunction to the same effect. While there is no rule permitting a parson to disobey n tatute with impunity at leszt once for the purpose of testing its validity, where such validity can only be determined by judicial investigation and coustructinn, a pro- vision in the statute which imposes such severe penaltim for disobedience of its provisions as to intimidate the parties affected thereby from resurtiug to the courts to te its val/dity practically prohibits thceo part/e from seeking such judic/al construction and denies tlmm the equal protection of the law. The attempt of a stae officer to enforce an unconstitutional statute is a pro- eceding without authority of, and dus not affect, the State in its sovereign or governmental calmOity, and is an iilel act and the offruer is stripped of his official character and is subjected in his person to the cousequene of his individual conduct. The State has no power to impart to its officer immunity from reOo/hi!!ty to the supreme authority of the U/ted State. When the quetien of the validity of a state statute with referco to the Federal Constitution has been first raiecd in a Fedend conrt that enurt has the right to decide it to the exclusion Of all other enurta It is not nceesmu'y that the duty of a state officer to enforce a etatuta be dealaced in that statut itself in order to permit his being joined saa party defendant from enforcing it; if by virtue of his office he has some connec-. tion with the entoreement of the art it is immaterial whether it  by' common general law or by statute.

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