tion is commonly believed to be a safe and valuable means of preventing the spread of smallpox, and that this belief is supported by high medical authority. porting to be for the protection of local communities against the spread of smallpox, is entitled to choose between the theory of those of the medical profession who think vaccination worthless for this purpose, and believe its effect to be injurious and dangerous, and the opposite theory, which is in accord with common belief, and is maintained by high medical authority; and is not compelled to commit a matter of this character, involving the public health and safety, to the final decision of a court or jury. The case at bar is brought within the doctrine of those cases by the allegations of the bill. The defendant corporations are alleged to be under the control of John J. 6. A state legislature, in enacting a statute purand Dennis A. Harrington, and that complainants are unable to secure any corporate action on the part of the defendant, the Sol Sayles Company, to redress the wrongs complained of. It is also alleged that the Harringtons control the action of the stockholders, and have declined to redress the wrongs complained of or give complainants any opportunity to lay before the board of directors or the stockholders of the Sol Sayles Company the facts alleged. It is also alleged the suit is not collusive. It is manifest that if the matter alleged be true, complainants will suffer irremediable loss if not permitted to sue, and as they had a cause of action they rightly brought it in the circuit court of the United States. Decree reversed. (197 U. S. 11) HENNING JACOBSON, Piff. in Err., v. COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHU. SETTS. Constitutional law-compulsory vaccination -personal liberty-equal protection of the laws-evidence-judicial notice. 1. The spirit of the Federal Constitution or its preamble cannot be invoked, apart from the words of that instrument, to invalidate a state statute.* 2. The scope and meaning of a state statute, as indicated by the exclusion of evidence on the ground of its incompetency or immateriality under that statute, are conclusive on the Federal Supreme Court in determining, on writ of error to the state court, the question of the validity of the statute under the Federal Constitution. 8. The personal liberty secured by U. S. Const., 14th Amend., against state deprivation, is not infringed by Mass. Rev. Laws, chap. 75, § 137, authorizing compulsory vaccination by local boards of health when deemed necessary for 7. An adult cannot claim to have been deprived of the liberty secured by U. S. Const., 14th Amend., against state deprivation, by the enforcement against him of a compulsory vaccination law,-at least, where he does not show, with reasonable certainty, that he is not at the time a fit subject of vaccination, or that vaccination, by reason of his then condition, will seriously impair his health, or possibly cause his death. N ERROR to the Superior Court of the I' State of Massachusetts for the County of Middlesex to review a judgment entered on a verdict of guilty in a prosecution under the compulsory vaccination law of that State, after defendant's exceptions were overruled by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. Affirmed. See same case below, 183 Mass. 242, 66 N. E. 719. The facts are stated in the opinion. Messrs. George Fred Williams and James A. Halloran for plaintiff in error. Messrs. Frederick H. Nash and Herbert Parker for defendant in error. Mr. Justice Harlan delivered the opinion of the court: This case involves the validity, under the the public health or safety, under which, as Constitution of the United States, of certain construed by the highest state court, vaccina-provisions in the statutes of Massachusetts tion may be required of all the inhabitants of relating to vaccination. a city where smallpox is prevalent and increasing. 4. Lack of any exception in favor of adults certified by a registered physician to be unfit subjects for vaccination does not render invalid Mass. Rev. Laws, chap. 75, § 137, authorizing compulsory vaccination by local boards of health, as denying the equal protection of the laws, although an exception in favor of children in like condition is made by § 139 of that act, since the statute is equally applicable to all adults. 5. Judicial notice will be taken that vaccina *Ed. Note.-For cases in point, see vol. 10, Cent. Dig. Constitutional Law, § 38. The Revised Laws of that commonwealth, chap. 75, § 137, provide that "the board of health of a city or town, if, in its opinion, it is necessary for the public health or safety, shall require and enforce the vaccination and revaccination of all the inhabitants thereof, and shall provide them with the means of free vaccination. Whoever, being over twenty-one years of age and not under guardianship, refuses or neglects to comply with such requirement shall forfeit $5." An exception is made in favor of "children who present a certificate, signed by a registered physician, that they are unfit of the rights secured to the defendant by the subjects for vaccination." § 139. Proceeding under the above statutes, the board of health of the city of Cambridge, Massachusetts, on the 27th day of February, 1902, adopted the following regulation: "Whereas, smallpox has been prevalent to some extent in the city of Cambridge, and still continues to increase; and whereas, it is necessary for the speedy extermination of the disease that all persons not protected by vaccination should be should be vaccinated; vaccinated; and whereas, in the opinion of the board, the public health and safety require the vaccination or revaccination of all the inhabitants of Cambridge; be it ordered, that all the inhabitants of the city who have not been successfully vaccinated since March 1st, 1897, be vaccinated or revaccinated." Subsequently, the board adopted an additional regulation empowering a named physician to enforce the vaccination of persons as directed by the board at its special meeting of February 27th. The above regulations being in force, the plaintiff in error, Jacobson, was proceeded against by a criminal complaint in one of the inferior courts of Massachusetts. The complaint charged that on the 17th day of July, 1902, the board of health of Cambridge, being of the opinion that it was necessary for the public health and safety, required the vaccination and revaccination of all the inhabitants thereof who had not been successfully vaccinated since the 1st day of March, 1897, and provided them with the means of free vaccination; and that the defendant, being over twenty-one years of age and not under guardianship, refused and neglected to comply with such requirement. The defendant, having been arraigned, pleaded not guilty. The government put in evidence the above regulations adopted by the board of health, and made proof tending to show that its chairman informed the defendant that, by refusing to be vaccinated, he would incur the penalty provided by the statute, and would be prosecuted therefor; that he offered to vaccinate the defendant without expense to him; and that the offer was declined, and defendant refused to be vaccinated. preamble to the Constitution of the United States, and tended to subvert and defeat the purposes of the Constitution as declared in its preamble; That the section referred to was in derogation of the rights secured to the defendant by the 14th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States, and especially of the clauses of that amendment providing that no state shall make or enforce any law abridging the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States, nor deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law, nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws; and That said section was opposed to the spirit of the Constitution. Each of defendant's prayers for instructions was rejected, and he duly excepted. The defendant requested the court, but the court refused, to instruct the jury to return a verdict of not guilty. And the court instructed the jury, in substance, that, if they believed the evidence introduced by the commonwealth, and were satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was guilty of the offense charged in the complaint, they would be warranted in finding a verdict of guilty. A verdict of guilty was thereupon returned. The case was then continued for the opinion of the supreme judicial court of Massachusetts. That court overruled all the defendant's exceptions, sustained the action of the trial court, and thereafter, pursuant to the verdict of the jury, he was sentenced by the court to pay a fine of $5. And the court ordered that he stand committed until the fine was paid. We pass without extended discussion the suggestion that the particular section of the statute of Massachusetts now in question (§ 137, chap. 75) is in derogation of rights secured by the preamble of the Constitution of the United States. Although that preamble indicates the general purposes for which the people ordained and established the Constitution, it has never been regarded as the source of any substantive power conferred on the government of the United States, or on any of its departments. Such powers embrace only those expressly granted in the body of the Constitution, and such as may be implied from those so granted. The prosecution having introduced no other evidence, the defendant made numerous offers of proof. But the trial court ruled that each and all of the facts offered to be proved by the defendant were imma-Although, therefore, one of the declared obterial, and excluded all proof of them. The defendant, standing upon his offers of proof, and introducing no evidence, asked numerous instructions to the jury, among which were the following: That § 137 of chapter 75 of the Revised Laws of Massachusetts was in derogation jects of the Constitution was to secure the blessings of liberty to all under the sovereign jurisdiction and authority of the United States, no power can be exerted to that end by the United States, unless, apart from the preamble, it be found in some express delegation of power, or in some power to be properly implied therefrom. 1 Story, | facts of common knowledge, which the court Const. § 462. We also pass without discussion the suggestion that the above section of the statute is opposed to the spirit of the Constitution. Undoubtedly, as observed by Chief Justice Marshall, speaking for the court in Sturges v. Crowninshield, 4 Wheat. 122, 202, 4 L. ed. 529, 550, "the spirit of an instrument, especially of a constitution, is to be respected not less than its letter; yet the spirit is to be collected chiefly from its words." We have no need in this case to go beyond the plain, obvious meaning of the words in those provisions of the Constitution which, it is contended, must control our decision. What, according to the judgment of the state court, are the scope and effect of the statute? What results were intended to be accomplished by it? These questions must be answered. The supreme judicial court of Massachusetts said in the present case: "Let us consider the offer of evidence which was made by the defendant Jacobson. The ninth of the propositions which he offered to prove, as to what vaccination consists of, is nothing more than a fact of common knowledge, upon which the statute is founded, and proof of it was unnecessary and immaterial. The thirteenth and fourteenth involved matters depending upon his personal opinion, which could not be taken as correct, or given effect, merely because he made it a ground of refusal to comply with the requirement. Moreover, his views could not affect the validity of the statute, nor entitle him to be excepted from its provisions. Com. v. Connolly, 163 Mass. 539, 40 N. E. 862; Com. v. Has, 122 Mass. 40; Reynolds v. United States, 98 U. S. 145, 25 L. ed. 244; Reg. v. Downes, 13 Cox, C. C. 111. The other eleven propositions all relate to alleged injurious or dangerous effects of vaccination. The defendant 'offered to prove and show by competent evidence' these socalled facts. Each of them, in its nature, is such that it cannot be stated as a truth, otherwise than as a matter of opinion. The only 'competent evidence' that could be presented to the court to prove these propositions was the testimony of experts, giving their opinions. It would not have been competent to introduce the medical history of individual cases. Assuming that medical experts could have been found who would have testified in support of these propositions, and that it had become the duty of the judge, in accordance with the law as stated in Com. v. Anthes, 5 Gray, 185, to instruct the jury as to whether or not the statute is constitutional, he would have been obliged to consider the evidence in connection with will always regard in passing upon the constitutionality of a statute. He would have considered this testimony of experts in connection with the facts that for nearly a century most of the members of the medical profession have regarded vaccination, repeated after intervals, as a preventive of smallpox; that, while they have recognized the possibility of injury to an individual from carelessness in the performance of it, or even in a conceivable case without carelessness, they generally have considered the risk of such an injury too small to be seriously weighed as against the benefits coming from the discreet and proper use of the preventive; and that not only the medical profession and the people generally have for a long time entertained these opinions, but legislatures and courts have acted upon them with general unanimity. If the defendant had been permitted to introduce such expert testimony as he had in support of these several propositions, it could not have changed the result. It would not have justified the court in holding that the legislature had transcended its power in enacting this statute on their judgment of what the welfare of the people demands." Com. v. Jacobson, 183 Mass. 242, 66 N. E. 719. While the mere rejection of defendant's offers of proof does not strictly present a Federal question, we may properly regard the exclusion of evidence upon the ground of its incompetency or immateriality under the statute as showing what, in the opinion of the state court, are the scope and meaning of the statute. of the statute. Taking the above observations of the state court as indicating the scope of the statute,--and such is our duty. Leffingwell v. Warren, 2 Black, 599, 603, 17 L. ed. 261, 262; Morley v. Lake Shore & M. S. R. Co. 146 U. S. 162, 167, 36 L. ed. 925, 928, 13 Sup. Ct. Rep. 54; Tullis v. Lake Erie & W. R. Co. 175 U. S. 348, 44 L. ed. 192, 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 136; W. W. Cargill Co. v. Minnesota, 180 U. S. 452, 466, 45 L. ed. 619, 625, 21 Sup. Ct. Rep. 423,-we assume, for the purposes of the present inquiry, that its provisions require, at least as a general rule, that adults not under the guardianship and remaining within the limits of the city of Cambridge must submit to the regulation adopted by the board of health. Is the statute, so construed, therefore, inconsistent with the liberty which the Constitution of the United States secures to every person against deprivation by the state? The authority of the state to enact this statute is to be referred to what is commonly called the police power,--a power which the state did not surrender when becoming a member of the Union under the Constitution. Although this court has re States to every person within its jurisdiction does not import an absolute right in each person to be, at all times and in all circumstances, wholly freed from restraint. There are manifold restraints to which every person is necessarily subject for the common good. On any other basis organized society could not exist with safety to its members. Society based on the rule that each one is a law unto himself would soon be confronted with disorder and anarchy. Real liberty for all could not exist under the operation of a principle which recognizes the right of each individual person to use his own, whether in respect of his person or his property, regardless of the injury that may be done to others. This court has more than once recognized it as a fundamental princi frained from any attempt to define the lim- | secured by the Constitution of the United its of that power, yet it has distinctly recognized the authority of a state to enact quarantine laws and "health laws of every description;" indeed, all laws that relate to matters completely within its territory and which do not by their necessary operation affect the people of other states. According to settled principles, the police power of a state must be held to embrace, at least, such reasonable regulations established directly by legislative enactment as will protect the public health and the public safety. Gibbons v. Ogden, 9 Wheat. 1, 203, 6 L. ed. 23, 71; Hannibal & St. J. R. Co. v. Husen, 95 U. S. 465, 470, 24 L. ed. 527, 530; Boston Beer Co. v. Massachusetts, 97 U. S. 25, 24 L. ed. 989; New Orleans Gaslight Co. v. Louisiana Light & H. P. & Mfg. Co. 115 U. S. 650, 661, 29 L. ed. 516, 520, 6 Sup. Ct. Rep. 252; Law-ple that "persons and property are subjected son v. Stecle, 152 U. S. 133, 38 L. ed. 385, 14 Sup. Ct. Rep. 499. It is equally true that the state may invest local bodies called into existence for purposes of local administration with authority in some appropriate way to safeguard the public health and the public safety. The mode or manner in which those results are to be accomplished is within the discretion of the state, subject, of course, so far as Federal power is concerned, only to the condition that no rule prescribed by a state, nor any regulation adopted by a local governmental agency acting under the sanction of state legislation, shall contravene the Constitution of the United States, nor infringe any right granted or secured by that instrument. A local enactment or regulation, even if based on the acknowledged police powers of a state, must always yield in case of conflict with the exercise by the general government of any power it possesses under the Constitution, or with any right which that instrument gives or secures. Gibbons v. Ogden, 9 Wheat. 1, 210, 6 L. ed. 23, 73; Sinnot v. Davenport, 22 How. 227, 243, 16 L. ed. 243, 247; Missouri, K. & T. R. Co. v. Haber, 169 U. S. 613, 626, 42 L. ed. 878, 882, 18 Sup. Ct. Rep. 488. We come, then, to inquire whether any right given or secured by the Constitution is invaded by the statute as interpreted by the state court. The defendant insists that his liberty is invaded when the state subjects him to fine or imprisonment for neglecting or refusing to submit to vaccination; that a compulsory vaccination law is unreasonable, arbitrary, and oppressive, and, therefore, hostile to the inherent right of every freeman to care for his own body and health in such way as to him seems best; and that the execution of such a law against one who objects to vaccination, no matter for what reason, is nothing short of an assault upon his person. But the liberty to all kinds of restraints and burdens in order to secure the general comfort, health, and prosperity of the state; of the perfect right of the legislature to do which no question ever was, or upon acknowledged general principles ever can be, made, so far as natural persons are concerned." Hannibal & St. J. R. Co. v. Husen, 95 U. S. 465, 471, 24 L. ed. 527, 530; Missouri, K. & T. R. Co. v. Haber, 169 U. S. 613, 628, 629, 42 L. ed. 878-883, 18 Sup. Ct. Rep. 488; Thorpe v. Rutland & B. R. Co. 27 Vt. 148, 62 Am. Dec. 625. In Crowley v. Christensen, 137 U. S. 86, 89, 34 L. ed. 620, 621, 11 Sup. Ct. Rep. 13, we said: "The possession and enjoyment of all rights are subject to such reasonable conditions as may be deemed by the governing authority of the country essential to the safety, health, peace, good order, and morals of the community. Even liberty itself, the greatest of all rights, is not unrestricted license to act according to one's own will. It is only freedom from restraint under conditions essential to the equal enjoyment of the same right by others. It is, then, liberty regulated by law." In the Constitution of Massachusetts adopted in 1780 it was laid down as a fundamental principle of the social compact that the whole people covenants with each citizen, and each citizen with the whole people, that all shall be governed by certain laws for "the common good," and that government is instituted "for the common good, for the protection, safety, prosperity, and happiness of the people, and not for the profit, honor, or private interests of any one man, family, or class of men." The good and welfare of the commonwealth, of which the legislature is primarily the judge, is the basis on which the police power rests in Massachusetts. Com. v. Alger, 7 Cush. 84. Applying these principles to the present case, it is to be observed that the legislature limits, laws to prevent persons and animals suffering under contagious or infectious diseases, or convicts, from coming within its borders. But, as the laws there involved went beyond the necessity of the case, and, under the guise of exerting a police power, invaded the domain of Federal authority, and violated rights secured by the Constitution, this court deemed it to be its duty to hold such laws invalid. If the mode adopted by the commonwealth of Massachusetts for the protection of its local communities against smallpox proved to be distressing, inconvenient, or objectionable to some,-if nothing more could be reasonably affirmed of the statute in question, the answer is that it was the duty of the constituted authorities primarily to keep in view the welfare, comfort, and safety of the many, and not permit the interests of the many to be subordinated to the wishes or convenience of the few. There is, of course, a sphere within which the individual may assert the supremacy of his own will, and rightfully dispute the authority of any human government,especially of any free government existing under a written constitution, to interfere with the exercise of that will. But it is equally true that in every well-ordered society charged with the duty of conserving the safety of its members the rights of the individual in respect of his liberty may at times, under the pressure of great dangers, be subjected to such restraint, to be enforced by reasonable regulations, as the safety of the general public may demand. An American citizen arriving at an American port on a vessel in which, during the voyage, there had been cases of yellow fever or Asiatic cholera, he, although apparently free from disease himself, may yet, in some circumstances, be held in quarantine against his will on board of such vessel or in a quarantine station, until it be ascertained by inspection, conducted with due diligence, that the danger of the spread of the disease among the community at large has disap of Massachusetts required the inhabitants | life, liberty, health, or property within its of a city or town to be vaccinated only when, in the opinion of the board of health, that was necessary for the public health or the public safety. The authority to determine for all what ought to be done in such an emergency must have been lodged somewhere or in some body; and surely it was appropriate for the legislature to refer that question, in the first instance, to a board of health composed of persons residing in the locality affected, and appointed, presumably, because of their fitness to determine such questions. To invest such a body with authority over such matters was not an unusual, nor an unreasonable or arbitrary, requirement. Upon the principle of self-defense, of paramount necessity, a community has the right to protect itself against an epidemic of disease which threatens the safety of its members. It is to be observed that when the regulation in question was adopted smallpox, according to the recitals in the regulation adopted by the board of health, was prevalent to some extent in the city of Cambridge, and the disease was in creasing. If such was the situation,--and nothing is asserted or appears in the record to the contrary, if we are to attach any value whatever to the knowledge which, it is safe to affirm, is common to all civilized peoples touching smallpox and the methods most usually employed to eradicate that disease, it cannot be adjudged that the present regulation of the board of health was not necessary in order to protect the public health and secure the public safety. Smallpox being prevalent and increasing at Cambridge, the court would usurp the functions of another branch of government if it adjudged, as matter of law, that the mode adopted under the sanction of the state, to protect the people at large was arbitrary, and not justified by the necessities of the case. We say necessities of the case, because it might be that an acknowledged power of a local community to protect itself against an epidemic threatening the safety of all might be exercised in particular circum-peared. The liberty secured by the 14th stances and in reference to particular persons in such an arbitrary, unreasonable manner, or might go so far beyond what was reasonably required for the safety of the public, as to authorize or compel the courts to interfere for the protection of such persons. Wisconsin, M. & P. R. Co. v. Jacob-gard to his personal wishes or his pecuniary son, 179 U. S. 287, 301, 45 L. ed. 194, 201, 21 Sup. Ct. Rep. 115; 1 Dill. Mun. Corp. 4th ed. §§ 319-325, and authorities in notes; Freurid, Police Power, §§ 63 et seq. In Hannibal & St. J. R. Co. v. Husen, 95 U. S. 465, 471-473, 24 L. ed. 527, 530, 531, this court recognized the right of a state to pass sanitary laws, laws for the protection of Amendment, this court has said, consists, in part, in the right of a person "to live and work where he will" (Allgeyer v. Louisiana, 165 U. S. 578, 41 L. ed. 832, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 427); and yet he may be compelled, by force if need be, against his will and without re interests, or even his religious or political convictions, to take his place in the ranks of the army of his country, and risk the chance of being shot down in its defense. It is not, therefore, true that the power of the public to guard itself against imminent danger depends in every case involving the control of one's body upon his willingness |