check him, but if his shouting is done where people are disturbed by it the police power may be interposed to silence him. A maker of dangerous explosives may ply his trade in an isolated building and government may not interfere, but if he undertakes to make such explosives where the lives and property of others are thereby put in jeopardy, the police power will be invoked to prevent the manufacture. From its nature "the police power will always have a wider field of action in a city than in a village, and in a village than in a farming neighborhood."

The Police Power Exercised by the State. In the division of the powers between the States and the federal government the police power was left entirely to the States. The federal government may exercise this power whenever in the discharge of its regular functions it seems necessary, but it is rare that it does this. The spirit of our government is to leave the police power in its integrity to the States. Several attempts have been made to amend the Constitution by bestowing upon it powers of this nature, but all such movements have failed.

The Public Health. The State avails itself of the police power to preserve and protect the public health. In most of the States there is a State Board of Health which exercises a general supervision over sanitary affairs, and coöperates with and gives suggestions to the health officers of the county. One of the most important duties of the State Board is to prevent the spread of contagious diseases. In order to accomplish this it provides for the compulsory vaccination of citizens, and for the disinfection and destruction of places exposed to infectious and contagious diseases. It also may isolate those stricken with contagious maladies, and assist in the enforcement of quarantine laws.

In a few States the State Board of Health is clothed with substantial powers, and exercises a real control over

local sanitation, but in most of the States the actual care of the public health rests with the local government. In cities, where proper sanitary conditions are of the highest importance, a municipal board of health wages constant warfare against conditions which produce disease. In the discharge of their duties health officers are often compelled to intrude upon the private rights of the citizen. If some one in a house is suffering with a contagious disease the house may be quarantined; if there is an epidemic of smallpox in a community, the citizens, willing or unwilling, may be compelled to be vaccinated; if the water in a private well contains disease-bearing germs the well may be condemned and filled up by command of the health officers; if wearing apparel has been exposed to contagious disease it may be destroyed by officers of the law. In the name of the public health and by virtue of the police power which it possesses, the State makes these invasions upon private rights.

The Public Safety. The State, or the local government acting for it, uses the police power freely to protect the public from unusual dangers. It compels railroad companies to fence their tracks and build them above or below grade at public crossings; it requires engineers to ring the bell and blow the whistle at all places on the railroad where the approach of the train may be dangerous to travel; it regulates the speed of trains; it limits the number of passengers a steamboat may carry; it compels the construction of fire-escapes for tall buildings; it permits the destruction of property to prevent the spread of fire; it throws safeguards around the sale of explosives and poisonous drugs; it commands the muzzling of dangerous dogs; it orders the demolition of buildings that threaten to fall and destroy life or property; it abates nuisances which interfere with the comfort and convenience of society. In a hundred ways the citizen is reminded that the interests and desires of the individual are brushed aside when these happen to be hostile to the safety of society.

The Public Morality. For centuries governments sought by legislation to mold the character of individuals. They subjected the private conduct of the citizen to official regulations and restraints with the view of making him a better man. Experience slowly taught the truth that a man cannot be legislated into morality, and governments gradually changed their attitude. Instead of seeking to improve the morals of the individual they framed their laws with the view of preserving the morals of the state. In America the State uses the police power to protect the public morality, but in doing this it does not enter into the conscience and intention of the individual and pronounce certain acts immoral; it simply declares that certain external acts come under the police power for regulation or suppression because they corrupt the morals of the public and thus strike a blow at the general welfare. Among these acts are excessive drinking of intoxicating liquors, gambling and inflicting cruelty upon animals. The first of these requires particular notice.

Intemperance is as old as history and efforts to suppress it by governmental action are almost as old. A thousand years before the Christian era an emperor in China, in order to put an end to drunkenness, ordered all the vines in the kingdom to be uprooted, a reform which was imitated later (800 B.C.) by Lycurgus of Greece. During the middle ages the church struggled with intemperance, but at the end of the period Bacon was compelled to say that all the crimes on earth did not destroy so many lives or alienate so much property as drunkenness. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the English government undertook to deal with the liquor traffic, but it did not go about the matter in the right way. The consumption of liquor increased and drunkenness continued to be the prevailing vice in all classes of society. In the American colonies the evil was widespread.

In the early years of the nineteenth century temperance societies in England and the United States began a crusade in favor of total abstinence from intoxicating liquors,

and about the middle of the century the influence of these societies began to be felt in legislation. In 1851 Maine passed a law prohibiting the sale and manufacture of intoxicating liquors except for medicinal and mechanical purposes, and in that State the prohibition law has been retained and enforced. Other States have passed the famous "Maine law," but not all have retained it. At present the prohibition policy prevails in Maine, Kansas, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Georgia and North Carolina.

In a number of States a policy of local option prevails in reference to the matter of selling liquor. The voters of a city or county or town vote upon the question whether the saloons shall be licensed or not. If the vote is in favor of no license the prohibition law is applied to the particular civil division. The plan of local prohibition is followed in about three fourths of the States.

Are prohibition laws effective? They are where there is a strong public sentiment behind them. Where judges and juries and law officers and the best citizenship of a community are in earnest, and are determined that intoxicating liquors shall not be sold, a prohibition law, whether local or general, is as successful in that community as other laws. As a matter of fact, prohibition laws affecting the whole State have not often accomplished their purpose in all parts of the State, but the plan of local option has usually given satisfaction to the friends of prohibition.

A great many advocates of temperance reform believe that absolute prohibition is impossible and are content that the liquor traffic should be regulated. One form of regulation is to require of those who sell liquors an unusually high license. In the States where the high license policy has been adopted the license varies from three hundred dollars to twelve hundred dollars. Thus in some States every saloon supports a school. The advocates of high license claim that it does away with objectionable saloons; that it confines the traffic to responsible dealers; that it dimin

ishes the number of saloons and thereby decreases the power which the saloon may have in politics.

Do prohibition laws and dispensary laws interfere with interstate commerce? The Supreme Court in 1890 decided that the State law could not prevent the sale in original packages or kegs unbroken and unopened of liquors manufactured and brought from any other State. This decision made it impossible for a State to execute a prohibition law. Congress, however, came to the relief of the State and passed a law giving the State the right to exercise the police power over liquors brought within its borders from another State, whether in original packages or otherwise. In other words, Congress concluded that it would not use its power to regulate commerce in such a way as to deprive the State of its police power.

QUESTIONS ON THE TEXT

1. What is meant by "police power" as the term is used in this chapter? To what matters does the police power extend? On what fundamental principle does the police power rest?

2. By which of the governments is the police power usually exercised? When does the federal government exercise this power?

3. What are the duties of the State Board of Health. Give illus

trations of the way health officers exercise the police power.

4. What are some of the uses made of the police power to protect the public safety?

5. What actions are regulated or suppressed because they corrupt public morality?

6. What measures have governments taken in reference to temperance? What has been the history of temperance legislation in the United States?

7. Describe two forms of prohibition. When are prohibition laws effective?

8. Describe two methods of regulating the liquor traffic.

9. What has been the history of prohibition laws in reference to interstate commerce?

SUGGESTIVE QUESTIONS AND EXERCISES

1. Give reasons why the police power should not be exercised by the federal government.