Swift V. United States

Swift V. United States

Swift & Co. v. United States, 196 U.S. 375 (1905), was a case in which the United States Supreme Court ruled that the Commerce Clause allowed the government to regulate monopolies if it has a direct effect on commerce. This case established a 'stream of commerce' or 'current of commerce' argument that allows Congress to regulate things that fall into either category. In the case at bar it let Congress to regulate the Chicago slaughterhouse industry. Even though the slaughterhouse supposedly only dealt with intrastate matters, the butchering of meat was merely a "station" along the way between cow and meat. Thus as it was part of the greater meat industry that was between the several states Congress can regulate it. The Court's decision halted price fixing by Swift & Company.

Read more about Swift V. United States:  See Also, Further Reading

Famous quotes containing the words united states, swift, united and/or states:

    It is said that the British Empire is very large and respectable, and that the United States are a first-rate power. We do not believe that a tide rises and falls behind every man which can float the British Empire like a chip, if he should ever harbor it in his mind.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    Silent rushes the swift Lord
    Through ruined systems still restored,
    Broadsowing, bleak and void to bless,
    Plants with worlds the wilderness;
    Waters with tears of ancient sorrow
    Apples of Eden ripe to-morrow.
    House and tenant go to ground,
    Lost in God, in Godhead found.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)

    In one notable instance, where the United States Army and a hundred years of persuasion failed, a highway has succeeded. The Seminole Indians surrendered to the Tamiami Trail. From the Everglades the remnants of this race emerged, soon after the trail was built, to set up their palm-thatched villages along the road and to hoist tribal flags as a lure to passing motorists.
    —For the State of Florida, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)

    I cannot say what poetry is; I know that our sufferings and our concentrated joy, our states of plunging far and dark and turning to come back to the world—so that the moment of intense turning seems still and universal—all are here, in a music like the music of our time, like the hero and like the anonymous forgotten; and there is an exchange here in which our lives are met, and created.
    Muriel Rukeyser (1913–1980)