Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

“ The plaintiff in error was convicted and sentenced to a fine on a complaint for breach of an Alabama statute of March 7, 1907. By § 17 of that act a license tax was imposed on persons who did not have a permanent place of business in the state, and also keep picture frames as a part of their stock in trade, if they solicited orders for the enlargement of photographs or pictures of any character, or for picture frames, whether they made charge for such frames or not, or if they sold or disposed of picture frames. ”

“ No doubt it is true that the customer was not bound to take the frame unless he saw fit, and that the sale of it took place wholly within the state of Alabama, if a sale was made. But, as was hinted in Rearick v. Pennsylvania, 203 U.S. 507, 512, 51 L. ed. 295, 297, 27 Sup. Ct. Rep. 159, what is commerce among the states is a question depending upon broader considerations than the existence of a technically binding contract, or the time and place where the title passed. It was agreed that the frame should be offered along with the picture. ”