Joseph P. Bradley

“ But this concession does not in the slightest degree affect the proposition, (which I deem a fundamental one,) that the ordinary pursuits of life, forming the large mass of industrial avocations, are and ought to be free and open to all, subject only to such general regulations, applying equally to all, as the general good may demand; and the grant to a favored few of a monopoly in any of these common callings is necessarily an outrage upon the liberty of the citizen as exhibited in one of its most important aspects,-the liberty of pursuit. ”

“ In my opinion, therefore, the law which created the monopoly in question did abridge the privileges of all other citizens, when it gave to the appellees the sole power to have and maintain stock landings and slaughter-houses within the territory named, because these are among those ordinary pursuits and callings which every citizen has a right to follow if he will, subject, of course, to regulations equally open to all. ”

“ They exhibit themselves in corners in the stock market and produce market, and in many other ways. If by legislative enactment they can be carried into the common avocations and callings of life, so as to cut off the right of the citizen to choose his avocation, the right to earn his bread by the trade which he has learned,-and if there is no constitutional means of putting a check to such enormity, I can only say that it is time the constitution was still further amended. ”

“ It abridges the privileges of citizens of the United States; it deprives them of a portion of their liberty and property without due process of law; and it denies to them the equal protection of the laws. ”

“ And if a man's right to his calling is property, as many maintain, then those who had already adopted the prohibited pursuits in New Orleans were deprived by the law in question of their property as well as their liberty without due process of law. ”

“ Society gives to the inventor or author the exclusive benefit for a time of that which, but for him, would not, or might not, have existed; and thus not only repays him, but encourages others to apply their powers for the public utility. ”

“ The profession or avocation is open to all alike who will prepare themselves with the requisite qualifications, or give the requisite security for preserving public order; except in certain cases, such as the sale of intoxicating drinks, where the interests of society require regulation as to the mumber of establishments, as well as the character of those who carry them on. ”

“ These rights are different from the concrete rights which a man may have to a specific chattel or a piece of land, or to the performance by another of a particular contract, or to damages for a particular wrong, all which may be invaded by individuals; they are the capacity, power, or privilege of having and enjoying those concrete rights, and of maintaining them in the courts, which capacity, power, or privilege can only be invaded by the state. ”

“ That part of the act which regulated the position on the river, relatively to the city of New Orleans, in which slaughter-houses and stock landings should be built, was a police regulation, proper and necessary to prevent the offal of such establishments from floating on the water in front of the city. But such a regulation could be complied with by any butcher erecting a slaughter-house, or by any wharfinger erecting a stock landing; and so could every other real police regulation contained in the act. ”