Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 1.djvu/507

IN BB TIBUfiCIO PARBOTT. 499 �the duty of the courts to maintain, and of the government to enforce. �The declaration that "the Chinese mnat go, peaceably or forcibly, " is an insolent contempt of national obligations aid an audaeious defiance of national authority. Before it cs-.n be carried into effect by force the authority. of the TJnited States must first be not only defied, but resisted and over- come. The attempt to effect this object by violence will be crushed by the power of the government. The attempt to attain the same object indirectly by legislation 'will be met ■with equal firmness by the courts ; no matter whether it as- sumes the guise of an exercise of the police power, or of the power to regulate corporations, or of any other power reserved by the state ; and no matter whether it takes the form of a constitutional provision, legislative enactment, or municipal ordinance. �I have considered this case at much greater length than the difficulty of the questions involved required. But I have thought that their great importance, and the temper of the public with regard to them, demanded that no pains should be apared to demonstrate the utter invalidity of this law. �Sawter, J. The constitution of Caiifornia, adopted in 1879, provides that "no corporation now existing, or hereaf- ter f ormed, under the laws of this state, shall, after the adop- tion of this constitution, employ, directly or indirectly, in any capaeity, any Chinese or Mongolian. The legislature shall pass Buch laws as may be necesary to enforce this provision," Article 19, § 2. �In obedience to this mandate of the constitution the legis- lature, on February 13, 1880, passed an act entitled "An act to amend the penal code by adding two new sections thereto, to be known as sections 178 and 179, prohibiting the employ- ment of Chinese by corporations," the first section of which etatute reads as foUows : �"Section 1. A new section is hereby added to the penal code, to be numbered section 178 : �"Sec. 178. Any officer, director, manager, member, stock- ��� �