State Board of Equalization v. Young’s Market Co., 299 U.S. 59 (1936)

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State Board of Equalization v. Young’s Market Co.

No. 22

Argued October 19, 1936
Decided November 9, 1936
299 U.S. 59

APPEAL FROM THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

Syllabus

1. Under § 2 of the Twenty-first Amendment, which provides:

The transportation or importation into any State, Territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or use therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof, is hereby prohibited,

a State may exact a license fee for the privilege of importing beer from other States. P. 61.

2. There is no ground (1) for the proposition that such a tax violates the commerce clause by discriminating against the wholesaler of imported beer in favor of the wholesaler of beer locally brewed, both paying the same wholesaler’s license tax; or (2) for the proposition that the right conferred by the amendment to prohibit importation is conditional upon prohibition of local manufacture and sale. Pp. 61-62.

3. A California law imposing a fee of $500 per annum for the privilege of importing beer, and $750 per annum for the privilege of manufacturing beer, held consistent with the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, first, because a classification recognized by the Twenty-first Amendment cannot be deemed forbidden by the Fourteenth, and second, because the classification rests on conditions requiring difference of treatment. P. 64.

12 F.Supp. 140 reversed.

Appeal from a decree of a three-judge District Court enjoining officials of the California from enforcing a license fee fr the privilege of importing beer.