"--97 U. S. 32. Thus the legislature
of any state can confiscate property by wholesale if necessary for
the protection of the community. Powder mills, slaughter houses and
pest houses, necessary institutions, are frequently so condemned and
rendered absolutely worthless.
The Federal Supreme Court gives ample power to all states to enforce
this great fundamental principle. It says: "The state cannot by any
contract limit the exercise of her power to the prejudice of the public
health and the public morals."--111 U. S. 751.
Speaking specifically, a sweeping decision of the highest tribunal of
the land, is as follows: "There is no inherent right in a citizen to thus
sell intoxicating liquors by retail; it is not a privilege of a citizen of a
state or a citizen of the United States."--137 U. S. 86.
No state or citizen of the United States then has any power, authority
or right to vend intoxicating liquors at all.
That there may be no misconception or misconstruction, in a case
from Kansas, this final court of appeal in American jurisprudence, said:
"For we cannot shut out of view the fact, within the knowledge of all,
that the public health, the public morals, and the public safety may be
endangered by the general use of intoxicating drinks; nor the fact,
established by statistics accessible to everyone, that the idleness,
disorder, pauperism, and crime existing in the country are, in some
degree at least, traceable to the evil,"--Mugler vs.
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