American Express Co. v. Beer

Citations

• 107 Miss. 528
• 65 So. 575

Syllabus

<p>1. Statutes. Construction. Validity. Commerce. Regulations. Powers-of states. Shipment of liquors. Application of statutes. Power of congress.</p> <p>It is always the court’s duty in passing upon the constitutionality of a statute to separate the valid from the invalid parts thereof, if this can be done, and to permit the valid parts to stand unless the different parts of the statute are so intimately connected with and dependent upon each other as to warrant a belief that the legislature intended them as a whole and that if all could not be-carried into effect it would not have enacted the residue independently.</p> <p>2. Commerce. Regulation. Power of state. Shipment of liquors.. Validity and application of statutes.</p> <p>Laws 1914, chapter 127, sections 2-7 and 11, paragraph 2, known as-the May-Mott-Lewis Act making it unlawful for any person to order and have shipped to him, or for him to receive from without the state intoxicating liquors in excess of one gallon, does impose a direct burden on interstate commerce, but is authorized by the Webb-Kenycn Act. (Act March 1, 1913, chapter 90, 37 Stat. 699) divesting intoxicating liquors of its interstate character, when it is intended by any person interested therein to be-received in violation of the laws of the state into which it is shipped, even as applied to liquor being shipped for personal, use of the consignee and his family and not to be sold or used unlawfully.</p> <p>3. Commerce. Regulations. Shipment of liquors. Validity of statute..</p> <p>The provisions in Laws 1914, chapter 127, section 5, known as the May-Mott-Laws Act, that those transporting liquors into the state shall keep a record of the same and file statements thereof with the clerk of the circuit court, not invalid as imposing a direct burden on interstate commerce, regardless of whether or not it is within the Webb-Kenyon Act (Act March 1, 1913, chapter 90,. 37 Stat. 699) which prohibits the transportation of liquor from one state into a