Missouri Drug Co. v. Wyman

Citations

• 129 F. 623
• 1904 U.S. App. LEXIS 4767

Syllabus

<p>1. Mails — Fraudulent Use — Statutes—Constitutional Law.</p> <p>Rev. St. §§ 3929. 4041 [U. S. Comp. St. 1901, pp. 2686, 2749], and Act March 2,1895, c. 191, § 4, 28 Stat. 964 [U. S. Comp. St. 1901, p. 2688], giving the Postmaster General authority to prevent the use of the mails by persons engaged in use thereof to conduct fraudulent schemes or to sell goods by false pretenses, are not unconstitutional, since, as the right to use the mails is a statutory privilege only, its withdrawal is not a deprivation of property without due process of law.</p> <p>2. Same — Postal Regulations.</p> <p>Under the plenary power conferred on Congress to establish and regulate the postal system, it may lawfully confer on the Postmaster General authority to prevent the mails being used as a medium to disseminate printed matter which, on grounds of public policy, has been declared non-mailable.</p> <p>3. Same — Post-Office Department — Jurisdiction.</p> <p>Congress having declared that certain kinds of printed matter shall be nonmailable, and that the mails shall not be used to accomplish fraudulent schemes, whether certain mail matter belongs to the prohibited class, or whether a person is in fact making a fraudulent use of the mails, is within the jurisdiction of the executive branch of the government, thp determination of which is not reviewable by the courts if sustained by any credible evidence.</p> <p>4. Same — Medical Remedies — Fraudulent Advertising — Opinions—Puffing.</p> <p>A drug company advertised “Vitality Pills” by printed matter sent through the mails, representing itself as an expert, and that the pills had been the result of long medical research, made from an animal extract taken from healthy young bulls; that they were a positive cure for all nervous and sexual diseases where epilepsy or insanity had not already set in, would enlarge the sexual organs, etc., and were the only known positive cure for lost manhood, etc. These statements were false, the only medicina