Incidental Transportation

Masquerading as ink, paint, olive oil and other prosaic commodities, shipments of high-grade liquor used to proceed to one Alfred E. Norris, Manhattan broker, from one Joel D. Kerper, Philadelphia 'legger. When the U. S. penetrated the shipments' disguises, Broker Norris and 'Legger Kerper were tried in Philadelphia. District, Judge William Huntington Kirkpatrick sentenced the 'Legger to 15 months at Atlanta and a $20,000 fine. Broker Norris was fined $200 on the ground that, though the act of purchasing liquor is not prohibited, yet the act of purchasing aids and abets the prohibited transportation of liquor (TIME, Jan, 7).

Last week, in the U. S. Circuit Court of Appeals at Philadelphia, the Kirkpatrick decision was reversed and Broker Norris exonerated. More, the U. S. was flayed in a decision which said: "It appears that while the legislative department of the Government has deliberately and intentionally made the purchaser of liquor guiltless of any offense under the Prohibition law, the executive department of the government seeks here, by indirection, to make the same fact, namely the purchase, a crime subjecting the purchasers to a maximum fine of $10,000 and imprisonment for a term of two years.

"Such a condition is scarcely conceivable and yet it is the position of the Government."

Judges Victor Raynard Woolley and W. H. Seward Thompson (with Judge Joseph Buffington dissenting) went on to explain that "Transportation by the seller is a mere incident in the sale and necessary to its completion."

The Treasury Department declared it would carry the case of Broker Norris to the Supreme Court of the U. S. to determine finally whether liquor-selling guilt does end at the customer's front door.