and proper subjects of punishment, as aiding and abetting crime are in all other cases.

provides that no person is entitled to register or | vote at any election who is "a member of any order, organization, or association which teaches, The term "religion" has reference to one's advises, counsels, or encourages its members, de- views of his relations to his Creator, and to the votees, or any other person to commit the crime obligations they impose of reverence for his of bigamy or polygamy, or any other crime de- being and character, and of obedience to his will. fined by law, as a duty arising or resulting from It is often confounded with the cultus or form of membership in such order, organization, or asso-worship of a particular sect, but is distinguishciation, or which practices bigamy or polygamy, able from the latter. The first amendment or plural or celestial marriage as a doctrinal rite to the Constitution, in declaring that Congress of such organization" is a "law respecting an shall make no law respecting the establishment establishment of religion," in violation of the first of religion, or forbidding the free exercise amendment of the Constitution and void. On thereof, was intended to allow every one under the return of the writ the sheriff produced the the jurisdiction of the United States to entertain body of the defendant and also the warrant of such notions respecting his relations to his commitment under which he was held, and the Maker and the duties they impose as may be record of the case showing his conviction for the approved by his judgment and conscience, and conspiracy mentioned and the judgment thereon. to exhibit his sentiments in such form of worship To this return, the defendant, admitting the facts as he may think proper, not injurious to the stated therein, excepted to their sufficiency to equal rights of others, and to prohibit legislation justify his detention. The court holding that for the support of any religious tenets, or the sufficient cause was not shown for the discharge modes of worship of any sect. The oppressive of the defendant, ordered him to be remanded to measures adopted, and the cruelties and punishthe custody of the sheriff. From this judgment ments inflicted by the governments of Europe the defendant appealed to this court. (R. S., for many ages, to compel parties to conform, in Sec. 1909.) their religious beliefs and modes of worship, to the views of the most numerous sect, and the folly of attempting in that way to control the mental operations of persons, and enforce an outward conformity to a prescribed standard, led to the adoption of the amendment in question. It was never intended or supposed that the amendment could be invoked as a protection against legislation for the punishment of acts inimical to the peace, good order and morals of society. With man's relations to his Maker and the obligations he may think they impose, and the manner in which an expression shall be made by him of his belief on those subjects, no interference can be permitted, provided always the laws of society, designed to secure its peace and prosperity, and the morals of its people, are not interfered with.

Mr. Justice FIELD, after stating the case, delivered the opinion of the Court.

On this appeal our only inquiry is whether the district court of the Territory had jurisdiction of the offense charged in the indictment of which the defendant was found guilty. If it had jurisdiction, we can go no further. We can not look into any alleged errors in its rulings on the trial of the defendant. The writ of habeas corpus can not be turned into a writ of error to review the action of that court; nor can we inquire whether the evidence established the fact alleged, that the defendant was a member of an order or organization known as the Mormon Church, called the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or the fact that the order or organization taught and counseled its members and devotees to commit the crimes of bigamy and polygamy as duties arising from membership therein.

However free the exercise of religion may be, it must be subordinate to the criminal laws of the country, passed with reference to actions regarded by general consent as properly the On this hearing we can only consider subjects of punitive legislation. There have whether, these allegations being taken as true, been sects which denied as a part of their an offense was committed of which the Ter-religious tenets that there should be any marritorial court had jurisdiction to try the defend-riage tie, and advocated promiscuous intercourse ant. And on this point there can be no serious of the sexes as prompted by the passions of its discussion or difference of opinion. Bigamy members. And history discloses the fact that and polygamy are crimes by the laws of all civilized and Christian countries. They are crimes by the laws of the United States, and they are crimes by the laws of Idaho. They tend to destroy the purity of the marriage relation, to disturb the peace of families, to degrade woman, and to debase man. Few crimes are more pernicious to the best interests of society and receive more general or more deserved punishment. To extend exemption from punishment for such crimes would be to shock the moral judgment of the community. To call their advocacy a tenet of religion is to offend the common sense of mankind. If they are crimes, then to teach, advise and counsel their practice is to aid in their commission, and such teaching and counseling are themselves criminal

the necessity of human sacrifices, on special occasions, has been a tenet of many sects. Should a sect of either of these kinds ever find its way into this country, swift punishment would follow the carrying into effect of its doctrines, and no heed would be given to the pretence that, as religious beliefs, their supporters could be protected in their exercise by the Constitution of the United States. Probably never before in the history of this country has it been seriously contended that the whole punitive power of the government for acts, recognized by the general consent of the Christian world in modern times as proper matters for prohibitory legislation, must be suspended in order that the tenets of a religious sect encouraging crime may be carried out without hindrance.

Suppose one believed that human sacrifices were a necessary part of religious worship, would Under this general authority it would seem it be seriously contended that the civil govern- that the Territorial legislature was authorized to ment under which he lived could not interfere to prescribe any qualifications for voters calculated prevent a sacrifice? Or, if a wife religiously be- to secure obedience to its laws. But, in addilieved it was her duty to burn herself upon the tion to the above law, section 1859 of the funeral pile of her dead husband, would it be be- Revised Statutes provides that "every male yond the power of the civil government to pre- citizen above the age of twenty-one, including vent her carrying her belief into practice? So persons who have legally declared their intenhere, as a law of the organization of society untion to become citizens in any Territory hereder the exclusive dominion of the United States, after organized, and who are actual residents of it is provided that plural marriages shall not be such Territory at the time of the organization allowed. Can a man excuse his practices to the thereof, shall be entitled to vote at the first contrary because of his religious belief? To election in such Territory, and to hold any permit this would be to make the professed doc-office therein, subject, nevertheless, to the limitatrines of religious belief superior to the law of the land, and in effect to permit every citizen to become a law unto himself. Government could exist only in name under such circumstances." And in Murphy v. Ramsey (114 U. S., 15, 45), referring to the act of Congress excluding polyg

assembly of each Territory, subject, neverthe- | statute of Congress of March 22, 1882, amendless, to the following restrictions: ing a previous section of the Revised Statutes First. That the right of suffrage and of hold-in reference to bigamy, declares "that no ing office shall be exercised only by citizens of the United States above the age of twenty-one, or persons above that age who have declared their intention to become such citizens;

Second. That the elective franchise or the right of holding office shall not be denied to any citizen on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude;

Third. That no soldier or sailor or other person in the army or navy, or attached to troops in the service of the United States, shall be allowed to vote unless he has made his permanent domicile in the Territory for six months; and

Fourth. That no person belonging to the Army or Navy shall be elected to hold a civil office or appointment in the Territory.

polygamist, bigamist, or any person cohabiting with more than one woman, and no woman cohabiting with any of the persons described as aforesaid in this section, in any Territory or other place over which the United States have exclusive jurisdiction, shall be entitled to vote at any election held in any such Territory or other place, or be eligible for election or appointment to or be entitled to hold any office or place of public trust, honor, or emolument in, under, or for any such Territory or place, or under the United States." (22 Stat., 31.)

This is a general law, applicable to all Territories and other places under the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States. It does not purport to restrict the legislation of the Territories over kindred offenses or over the means for their ascertainment and prevention. The cases in which the legislation of Congress will supersede the legislation of a State or Territory, without specific provisions to that effect, are those in which the same matter is the subject of legislation by both. There the action of Congress may well be considered as covering the entire ground. But here there is nothing of this kind. The act of Congress does not touch upon teaching, advising and counseling the practice of bigamy and polygamy, that is, upon aiding and abetting in the commission of those crimes, nor upon the mode adopted, by means of the oath required for registration, to prevent persons from being enabled by their votes to defeat the criminal laws of the country.

The judgment of the court below is therefore affirmed.

These limitations are the only ones placed upon the authority of Territorial legislatures against granting the right of suffrage or of holding office. They have the power, therefore, to prescribe any reasonable qualifications of voters and for holding office, not inconsistent with the above limitations. In our judgment, section 509 of the Revised Statutes of Idaho Territory, which provides that "no person under guardianship, non compos mentis, or insane, nor any person convicted of treason, felony, or bribery in this Territory, or in any other State or Territory in the Union, unless restored to civil rights; nor any person who is a bigamist or polygamist, or who teaches, advises, counsels, or encourages any person or persons to become bigamists or polygamists, or to commit any other crime defined by law, or to enter into what is known as plural or celestial marriage, or who is a member NOTE. The constitutions of several States, of any order, organization, or association which in providing for religious freedom, have declared teaches, advises, counsels, or encourages its expressly that such freedom shall not be conmembers or devotees, or any other persons, to strued to excuse acts of licentiousness, or to commit the crime of bigamy or polygamy, or justify practices inconsistent with the peace and any other crime defined by law, either as a rite safety of the State. Thus, the constitution of or ceremony of such order, organization, asso- New York of 1777 provided as follows: "The ciation, or otherwise, is permitted to vote at any free exercise and enjoyment of religious proelection, or to hold any position or office of fession and worship, without discrimination or honor, trust, or profit within this Territory," is preference, shall forever hereafter be allowed, not open to any constitutional or legal objection. within this State, to all mankind: Provided, With the exception of persons under guardian- That the liberty of conscience, hereby granted, ship or of unsound mind, it simply excludes shall not be so construed as to excuse acts of from the privilege of voting or of holding any licentiousness, or justify practices inconsistent office of honor, trust, or profit, those who have with the peace or safety of this State." (Art. been convicted of certain offenses, and those XXXVIII.) The same declaration is repeated who advocate a practical resistance to the laws in the constitution of 1821 (Art. VII, sec. 3) of the Territory and justify and approve the and in that of 1846 (Art. I, sec. 3), except that commission of crimes forbidden by it. The for the words "hereby granted," the words second subdivision of section 504 of the Revised" hereby secured" are substituted. The conStatutes of Idaho, requiring every person desiring to have his name registered as a voter to take an oath that he does not belong to an order that advises a disregard of the criminal law of the Territory, is not open to any valid legal objection to which our attention has been called.

The position that Congress has, by its statute, covered the whole subject of punitive legislation against bigamy and polygamy, leaving nothing for Territorial action on the subject, does not impress us as entitled to much weight. The

stitutions of California, Colorado, Connecticut,
Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, Minnesota,
Mississippi, Missouri, Nevada, and South
Carolina, contain a similar declaration.

[From the Newspapers.]
Decisions in the Minnesota Granger Cases.

1890, March 24-The Supreme Court of the United States to-day rendered an opinion in the case of the Minneapolis Eastern Railway

Company against the Railroad and Warehouse | Virginia, granting a writ of habeas corpus to Commission of Minnesota, and in the case of the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway Company against the same. These are what are known as "the granger cases."

In the first case the Commission, without a hearing, made an order fixing $1 per car, whether loaded or unloaded, as a maximum amount which the railroad company would be allowed to charge for handling and switching cars in Minneapolis, the railroad's rate being $1.25 for empty and $1.50 for loaded cars. The railroad maintained that its rates were not unequal or unreasonable and that the price fixed by the Commission was an unreasonable compensation, and set forth the facts in regard to its property, earnings and expenses, in support of its statements. The action of the Commissioners, it contends, would deprive the company of its property without due process of law, and was therefore in violation of the fourteenth article of the constitution.

Wilson Loney, convicted in one of the State courts of perjury. Loney, it was alleged, swore falsely in giving, before a notary public, testimony to be used in the Virginia contested election case of Waddill vs. Wise, from the Richmond District. The Court says that though notaries public are State officers, yet the testimony given in Congressional contested election cases is given in obedience to the laws of the United States and not of the State. The accused should therefore have been tried before a Federal court, and not before a State court.

Justice GRAY reversed the judgment of the same court granting a writ of habeas corpus to Charles Green, convicted of fraudulent voting in 1888 for Presidential electors. His application was granted by the lower court on the ground that he should have been tried in the Federal and not in the State Courts. The Court holds that Green's offence is a State matter, and the case is sent back to the lower court.

annulled.

WASHINGTON, May 19-An opinion was rendered by the Supreme Court to day in the "dressed-beef" case of the State of Minnesota, appellant, against Henry E. Barber, brought here on appeal from the decision of the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Minnesota. Barber was convicted of selling fresh beef slaughtered in Illinois and which had not been inspected before slaughter, as required by the law of Minnesota. He alleged that the law was an unconstitutional interference with interstate commerce.

In the second case, the Commission fixed 21⁄2 cents per gallon in ten-gallon cans as a reason- The Minnesota Law on "Dressed-beef" able compensation for the transportation of milk from Owatonna or Faribault to St. Paul or Minneapolis, the former being seventy-one and the latter fifty-six miles away from Minneapolis. The railroad refused to comply with the Commission's orders, and contended that the same rate for both distances was unreasonable and contrary to the statutes of Minnesota forbidding the giving of an unequal or unreasonable preference or advantage to any particular locality; that the power to fix and establish rates belonged to that Legislature and could not be delegated to the Commission; and furthermore, that the Commission's action was unconstitutional in that it deprives the company of its property without due process of law. The decision of the Supreme Court of Minnesota was against the railroads, and the case comes here on appeal.

This court reverses that judgment. The ground taken by the Court is that the statute of Minnesota as construed by its Supreme Court, conflicts with the Constitution of the United States in the particulars complained of by the railroad company, as it deprives the company of its right to a judicial investigation, by due process of law, under the forms and with the machinery provided by the wisdom of successive ages for the investigation judicially of the truth of a matter in controversy, and substitutes therefor, as an absolute finality, the action of a railroad commission which, in view of the powers conceded to it by the State court, cannot be regarded as clothed with judicial functions or possessing the machinery of a court of justice. Justice BLATCHFORD delivered the opinion of the court. Justice BRADLEY delivered a dissenting opinion in behalf of himself and Justices GRAY and LAMAR. Justice MILLER concurred in the conclusion reached by the court, but did not fully concur in the reasons given.

The Election Cases from Virginia. Same day-The Court affirmed the judgment of the Circuit Court for the Eastern District of

The court, in an opinion by Justice HARLAN, says:

"This act provides that all cattle, sheep and swine shall be inspected within twenty-four hours before the animals are slaughtered and that (if such be the fact) the inspectors shall certify that the slaughtered animals were found to be healthy and fit for human food. The sale of meat not taken from an inspected and certified animal is forbidden under penalty of fine or imprisonment. As the inspection must take place within the twenty-four hours immediately preceding the slaughtering, the act excludes from the Minnesota market practically all fresh beef, veal, mutton, lamb or pork taken from animals slaughtered in other States; and directly tends to restrict the slaughtering of animals whose meat is to be sold in Minnesota for human food to those engaged in such business in that State. This must be so, because the time, expense and labor of sending animals from points outside of Minnesota to points in that State to be there inspected and bringing them back, after inspection, to be slaughtered at the place from which they were sent-the slaughtering to take place within twenty-four hours after inspection-will be so great as to amount to an absolute prohibition upon sales made in Minnesota of meat from animals not slaughtered within its limits.

"It is one thing for a State to exclude al

together from its limits cattle, sheep or swine actually diseased, or meats that are unfit for human food, and punish all sales of such animals or of such meat within its limits. It is quite another thing for a State to declare, as does Minnesota by the necessary operation of its statute, that fresh beef, veal, mutton, lamb or pork shall not be sold at all for human food within its limits unless the animal is inspected in that State, or unless the animal is slaughtered in that State.

or burial. When the United States under the terms of this act began proceedings to confiscate about $750,000 worth of property belonging to the Church, the Mormons immediately entered suit to have the Edmunds law declared unconstitutional. It was argued before the Supreme Court in their behalf that Congress by the dissolution of the church corporation had assumed judicial powers, and that the act of the Legislative Assembly of Utah incorporating the Church constituted a contract which could not "Underlying the entire arguments in behalf be impaired by Congress under its authority to of the State is the proposition that it is im- repeal Territorial enactments. It was also held possible to tell with certainty whether or not that the doctrine of escheat was alien to the fresh beef, veal, mutton, lamb, or pork designed spirit of free institutions, and that it had never for human food came from animals on the hoof been applied in this country to a church or within a very short time before they were charitable corporation. On the part of the slaughtered, and it is insisted with great confi- United States it was contended that Congress dence that of this fact the court must take had authority to repeal all Territorial enactments; judicial notice. If a fact alleged to exist and that the act incorporating the Church was upon which the rights of parties depend is invalid, as an attempt to establish a religion conwithin common experience and knowledge, it is trary to the provisions of the Constitution; and one of which the courts will take judicial notice. that, moreover, the charter should be annulled But we cannot assent to the suggestion that the for abuse of the granted rights. As, when the fact alleged in this case to exist is of that class. Church corporation was dissolved, there was no It may be the opinion of some that the presence one to whom to turn over the property, it was of disease in animals at the time of their being properly escheated to the United States. slaughtered cannot be determined by inspection Two questions, the court says, are involved of the meat taken from them, but we are not in this case. The first is, had Congress the aware that such is the view generally enter-power to repeal the charter of the Church of tained.

"But if, as alleged, the inspection of fresh beef, veal, mutton, lamb, or pork will not necessarily show whether the animal from which it was taken was diseased when slaughtered, it would not follow that a statute like the one before us is within the constitutional power of the State to enact. On the contrary, the enact ment of a similar statute by each one of the States composing the Union would result in the destruction of commerce among the several States, so far as such commerce is involved in the transportation from one part of the country to another of meat designed for human food and entirely free from disease."

The judgment of the lower court discharging Barber from custody is affirmed.

Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints? This question it answers in the affirmative. Congress had supreme power over the Territories it acquired by purchase or otherwise, and generally reserved," as it did in the case of Utah, the right to revoke all acts of the Territorial Legislature. It follows, therefore, that it had the right to revoke the Church charter. A distinguishing feature of Mormonism is well-known to be polygamy and an absolute ecclesiastical control of its church members. Notwithstanding all the efforts made to suppress this barbarous practice of polygamy, the sect perseveres in defiance of law in propagating and promoting this nefarious doctrine. Since the Church persists in claiming the right to use the funds with which it has been endowed for the purpose of promoting those unlawful practices, the question arises, has the

The Edmunds Anti-Polygamy Act of the Government the right to seize these funds?

XLIXth Congress Affirmed.

WASHINGTON, May 19-The Supreme Court to-day rendered an opinion of vital interest to the Mormon Church, in the suit of the Church of Latter-Day Saints against the United States, which comes here on appeal from the decision of the Supreme Court of Utah in favor of the United States. This court affirms that judgment. The case grows out of the passage of the Edmunds Anti-Polygamy law by the XLIXth Congress. This law dissolved the Mormon Church corporation, annulled its charter, directed the appointment of a receiver to wind up its affairs, and escheated to the United States all the real estate owned by the Church in excess of $50,000 which was not on the date of the passage of the act held for purposes of worship

The court concludes that Congress had the right to seize the property.

The decree of the lower court is affirmed. Chief Justice Fuller said that he and Justices Field and Lamar were constrained to dissent from this decision. Congress unquestionably has power to suppress polygamy, and it is immaterial whether the crime was committed in the name of religion. But Congress has not power to seize and confiscate the property of corporations because they have been guilty of crime. In the judgment of the minority, the diversion of the fund contemplated by Congress is in contravention of the specific limitations of the Constitution.

[At a subsequent date, on application, the decree was opened, and the form of it is to be argued at October Term, 1890-EDITOR.]