JUDICIARY: Complete Non Sequitur

High ran the hopes of the Wets last December when U. S. District Court Judge William Clark, at Newark, N. J., handed down a decision that the 18th Amendment was invalid. Judge Clark, in quashing an indictment brought against one William Sprague for transporting a truck load of beer, had contended that the 18th Amendment should have been ratified by State conventions (representing the People) rather than by State legislatures (TIME, Dec. 29). Last week it was the Drys’ turn for jubilance. Acting for the U. S. Supreme Court, speaking before a courtroom crowded but orderly, tall, bespectacled Associate Justice Owen Josephus Roberts reversed the decision of Judge Clark. The decision of the Supreme Court to uphold the 18th Amendment wasunanimous.* It observed that Judge Clark based his conclusions on two articles of the Constitution: 1) Article V, which provides that amendments, to be valid, must be ratified by the legislatures ofthree-fourths of the States or by conventions in three-fourths of the States as proposed by Congress; (2) Article X, which gives the States or the people those powers not definitely delegated to the U. S. by the Constitution nor “prohibited by it to the States.” Having thus reviewed the Clark opinion, the Supreme Court concluded: “Appellees assert . . . that the People reserved to themselves powers over their personal liberty and that the legislatures are not competent to enlarge the powers of the Federal Government in thatbehalf. . . . “But the argument is a complete non sequitur. . . . [Article V] is a grant of authority by the People to Congress, and not to the U. S. . . . Unless and until the article be changed by amendment. Congress must function as the delegated agent of the People in the choice of the method of ratification.”

*Chief Justice Hughes had withdrawn from the case, holding that his having filed a brief in a previous Prohibition case disqualified him from participating.