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railway companies which should fail to pay certain claims within a certain time after presentation. Here the court held that there was no reasonable relation between the burden imposed and the peculiar character of the business done.25

$485. Classifications Must Be Reasonable.

From what has gone before, it is clear that while classification of persons and businesses for purposes of regulation is not prohibited by the requirement of equal protection of the law, these classifications must in every case be reasonable ones. In Gulf, etc., Ry. Co. v. Ellis,26 already cited, it is declared: "It is apparent that the mere fact of classification is not sufficient to relieve a statute from the reach of the equality clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, and that in all cases it must appear not only that a classification has been made, but also that it is one

25 The opinion declares: "A mere statute to compel the payment of indebtedness does not come within the scope of police regulations. The hazardous business of railroading carries with it no special necessity for the prompt payment of debts. That is a duty resting upon all debtors, and while, in certain cases, there may be a peculiar obligation which may be enforced with penalties, yet nothing of that kind springs from the mere work of railroad transportation. Statutes have been sustained giving special protection to the claims of laborers and mechanics, but no such idea underlies this legislation. It does not aim to protect the laborer or mechanic alone, for its benefits are conferred upon every individual in the State, rich or poor, high or low, who has a claim of the character described. It is not a statute for the protec tion of particular classes of individuals supposed to need protection, but for the punishment of certain corporations on account of their delinquency. Neither can it be sustained as a proper means of enforcing the payment of small debts, and preventing any unnecessary litigation in respect to them, because it does not impose the penalty in all cases where the amount in controversy is within the limit named in the statute. Indeed, the statute arbitrarily singles out one class of debtors, and punishes it for a failure to perform certain duties, duties which are equally obligatory upon all debtors; a punishment not visited by reason of the failure to comply with any proper police regulations, or for the protection of the laboring classes, or to prevent litigation about trifling matters, or in consequence of any special corporate privileges bestowed by the State. Unless the legislature may arbitrarily select one corporation or one class of corporations, one individual or one class of individuals, and visit a penalty upon them which is not imposed upon other guilty of like delinquency, this statute cannot be sustained." 26 165 U. S. 150; 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 255; 41 L. ed. 666.

based upon some reasonable ground, some difference which bears a just and proper relation to the attempted classification,— and is not a mere arbitrary selection."

In

Thus in Connolly v. Union Sewer Pipe Co.27 a discrimination made by a state anti-trust law exempting from its operations agricultural products or live stock in the hands of the producer or raiser, was held a denial of the equal protection of the laws. its opinion the earlier decisions in point are carefully reviewed and distinguished. With reference to the specific law in question the court say: "To declare that some of the class engaged in domestic trade or commerce shall be deemed criminals if they violate the regulations prescribed by the State for the purpose of protecting the public against illegal combinations formed to destroy competition and to control prices, and that others of the same class shall not be bound to regard those regulations, but may combine their capital, skill, as acts to destroy competition and to control prices for their special benefit, is so manifestly a denial of the equal protection of the laws that further or extended argument to establish that position would seem to be unneces

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§ 486. State Laws and Judicial Systems Not Required to Be Uniform Throughout the State.

In Missouri v. Lewis29 the important principle was laid down that the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment does not prevent the application by a State of different laws and different systems of judicature to its various local subdivisions..

27 184 U. S. 540; 22 Sup. Ct. Rep. 431; 46 L. ed. 679.

28 Generally upon the subject of classifications, see Barbier v. Connolly, 113 U. S. 27; 5 Sup. Ct. Rep. 357; 28 L. ed. 923; Home Ins. Co. v. New York, 134 U. S. 594; 10 Sup. Ct. Rep. 593: 33 L. ed. 1025; Magoun v. Illinois T. & S. Savings Bank, 170 U. S. 283; 18 Sup. Ct. Rep. 594; 42 L. ed. 1037; Orient v. Daggs, 172 U. S. 557; 19 Sup. Ct. Rep. 281; 43 L. ed. 552; Tinsley v. Anderson, 171 U. S. 101; 18 Sup. Ct. Rep. 805; 43 L. ed. 91.

As to classifications of property for purposes of taxation see Bell's Gap, etc., Ry. Co. v. Pennsylvania, 134 U. S. 232; 10 Sup. Ct. Rep. 533; 33 L. ed. 892; Plumber v. Coler, 178 U. S. 115; 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 829; 44 L. ed. 998. 29 101 U. S. 22; 25 L. ed. 989.

In this case was questioned the constitutionality of a law providing a special court of appeals with conclusive jurisdiction for the City of St. Louis and a few specified counties. To the claim. that this law denied to the people of these districts the equal protection of the laws in that they were denied access to the general court of appeals of the State the Supreme Court replied: "There is nothing in the Constitution to prevent any State from adopting any system of laws or judicature it sees fit for all or any part of its territory. . The Fourteenth Amendment does not profess to secure to all persons in the United States the benefit of the same laws and the same remedies. . . . Diversities which are allowable in different States are allowable in different parts of the same State."

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§ 487. Equal Protection Requires Similar but not the Same Privileges.

Where similar or substantially similar conveniences and comforts are offered, transportation companies, inns, theaters, and other public service companies may by law be permitted or required to provide separate accommodations to the different races, colored, Mongolian, or white.30

In Plessy v. Ferguson the court say: "The object of the Amendment was undoubtedly to enforce the absolute equality of the two races before the law; and in the nature of things it could not have been intended to abolish distinction based on color, or to enforce social, as distinguished from political equality, or a commingling of the two races upon terms unsatisfactory to either. Laws permitting, or even requiring, their separation in places where they are liable to be brought into contact, do not necessarily imply the inferiority of either race to the other, and have been generally, if not universally, recognized as within the competency

30 Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U. S. 537; 16 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1138; 41 L. ed. 256; C. & O. Ry. Co. v. Kentucky, 179 U. S. 388; 21 Sup. Ct. Rep. 101; 45 L. ed. 244. The States may not, however, thus attempt the regulation of interstate transportation. See ante, section 312.

31 163 U. S. 537; 16 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1138; 41 L. ed. 256.

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of state legislatures in the exercise of their police power. most common instance of this is connected with the establishment of separate schools for white and colored children, which has been held to be a valid exercise of the legislative power, even by courts of States where the political rights of the colored race have been longest and most earnestly enforced."

CHAPTER XLVIII.

THE OBLIGATION OF CONTRACTS.

$488. The Obligation of Contracts Clause.

In addition to being prohibited by the Fourteenth Amendment from depriving any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law, the States are, by Section X, Article I of the Constitution, expressly denied the power to pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts. This provision, the general intent of which is sufficiently plain, has, in its application given rise to a multitude of cases requiring adjudication in the courts. The purposes of this treatise will not require us, however, to examine these cases in detail. Elsewhere in this treatise, certain specific applications of the prohibition are considered. In this chapter the aim will be, as it was the aim in the chapter dealing with due process of law, to ascertain the broad and underlying principles which have governed the federal courts in the enforcement of the prohibition.

As has been already seen, the due process of law clause of the Fourteenth Amendment protects the individual in his right to enter into contracts not contrary to public policy. The provision under consideration protects from impairment the obligation of the contract when entered into.

So far as this provision is concerned, a state law divesting vested rights is not invalid, unless these rights are founded upon contracts, and the effect of the law is thus to impair or nullify their force.2

1 See especially the discussion of suits against the States, and the enforcement of state law by the federal courts.

2 Satterlee v. Matthewson, 2 Pet. 380; 7 L. ed. 458; B. & S. R. R. v. Nesbit, 10 How. 395; 13 L. ed. 469; Bronson v. Kinzie et al., 1 How. 311; 11 L. ed. 143.

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