Page:United States Reports, Volume 209.djvu/255

 09 U.S. Opinion of the Court. fined in Coe v. Errol, 116 U.S. 517, to be the point of time that an article is committed to a carrier for transportation to the State of its destination, or started on its ultimate passage. The latter is defined to be in Brown v. Houston, 114 U.S. 622, the point of time at which it arrives at its destination. But inter- mediate between these points questions may arise. State v. Engel, 5 Vroom (N.J.), 435; State v. Cardgan, 10 Vroom (N.J.), 35; The Daniel Ball, 10 Wall. 557. In Pittsburg Coal Company v. Bates, 156 U.S. 577, coal in barges shipped from Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, was stopped about nine miles above destination. It was held that it had ceased to be interstate commerce, and was subject to taxation by the State of Louisiana. In LKamond Match Company v. Oraonoon, 188 U.S. 82, logs in transit to a point without the State were held subject to taxation under a statute of the State where they would "natraily leave the State in the ordinary course of transit." In Kdley v. Rhoads, 188 U.S. 1, a flock of sheep driven from a point in Utah across Wyoming to a.point in Nebraska for the purpose of shipment by rail from the latter point was held to be property engaged in interstate commerce and exempt from taxation by Wyoming under the statute taxing all live stock brought into the State "for the purpose of being grazed." There was no difficulty in the case except that which arose from the contention that the manner of transit was adopted as an evasion of the statute. Otherwise the grazing of the sheep was as incidental as feeding them would be if transported by rail. The pertinence of the case to the present controversy is in its summary of the principles of prior cases expressed in the following passage: "The substances of these cases is that, while property is at rest for an indefinite time awaiting trans- portation, or awaiting a sale at its place of destination, or at an intermediate point, it is subiect to taxation. But if it be actu- ally in transit to another State, it becomes the subject of inter- state commerce and is exempt from local assessment." Prop- erty, therefore, at an'intermediate point between the place of

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