Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

“ Each is a prohibition to the extent of the payment required. The Arkansas tax manifests no less plainly than the Louisiana fine a purpose to discourage insuring in companies that do not pay tribute to the State. This case is stronger than that of Allgeyer in that here no act was done within the State, whereas there a letter constituting a step in the contract was posted within the jurisdiction. It is true that the State may regulate the activities of foreign corporations within the State but it cannot regulate or interfere with what they do outside. ”

“ Ct. 99, 59 L. Ed. 265. The short question is whether this so-called tax is saved because of the name given to it by the statute when it has been decided in Allgeyer v. Louisiana, 165 U.S. 578, 17 Sup. Ct. 427, 41 L. Ed. 832, that the imposition of a round sum, called a fine, for doing the same thing, called an offence, is invalid under the Fourteenth Amendment. It is argued that there is a distinction because the Louisiana statute prohibits (by implication) what this statute permits. ”