U. S. DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE CHEMISTRY LIBRARY །༤ Weights and Measures Case Reference Book (Through July 1952 Court Decisions) Prepared in the Office of Weights and Measures by Kathryn M. Schwarz For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U. S. Government Printing Office PREFACE A need has existed for concise legal information in lay terms regarding court decisions involving weights and measures cases. This publication has been prepared to fill this need and to make available to administrative and enforcement personnel, and to others, an indexed reference to reported decisions of Federal and State courts. The use of the Weights and Measures Case Reference Book will make it possible to locate quickly any particular decision or decisions concerning a given phase of weights and measures law. Presented first are the decisions of the United States Supreme Court and other Federal courts. The cases of State courts are grouped by States in alphabetical order. The cases of each State are listed chronologically. Each case is cited precisely and is presented in a simplified form. In certain instances, the recorded case titles have been somewhat abbreviated. The heading and subheadings of each decision give individual designations to the principal information expounded by the court. The decisions have been briefed to the extent that only material particularly meaningful to weights and measures officials and other interested lay readers is included. The index will guide the reader to the cases covering legal principles which he is interested in exploring. The cases have been numbered, in order of their appearance in the publication, and indexed according to these identifying numbers. The present publication was prepared by the staff of the Bureau's Office of Weights and Measures. Work in this field stems from the Bureau's development, custody, and maintenance of the national standards of measurement and the calibration services rendered to the Nation in connection with these standards. The program also includes cooperative activities with the States in securing uniformity in weights and measures laws and methods of inspection as well as the compilation and issuance of useful information, as authorized by the Congress. The Weights and Measures Case Reference Book is intended as an index to and digest of weights and measures decisions of record, through July 1952. The decisions have been digested and considerably condensed. The material presented is designed as a guide to the lay reader; it gives in lay language condensed legal principles as expounded by the courts. Weights and measures officials may find the Weights and Measures Case Reference Book useful as a "field" manual. The book should be consulted through its index to information on a specific item. This information must not be accepted out of context, but must be expanded through study of the law bearing upon the particular case as correlated with the facts upon which that decision was predicated. The actual wording of the various weights and measures laws is contained in National Bureau of Standards Circular 501, Federal and State Weights and Measures Laws (through 1949 enactments), which may be purchased from the Superintendent of Documents, U. S. Government Printing Office, Washington 25, D. C. (price: $5.75). This compilation of laws should prove very helpful as an adjunct to this case reference book. After locating a case herein, the reader should, through the identity of the citation, obtain and study the full decision. All cases included in this publication are reported and should be available at various law libraries. Reference is given to the official report in all cases. Since, occasionally, reports of the National Reporter System will be more readily available, references to these reports are given whenever possible. It must be remembered that weights and measures laws do not remain static. Consideration must be given to possible amendments and revisions which would influence any later decision. This publication is not a text book. A mere study of the material contained herein will not afford a broad knowledge of legal principles. It must be kept in mind that this case reference book was designed and composed as a ready guide to decisions cognate to certain definite and specific situations in weights and measures administration and enforcement. No attempt has been made to describe the facts or to interpret the law. The subject index has been carefully cross-indexed to enable the reader to locate desired information under the principal or associated words. In the index, the abbreviation appearing before the case number identifies the jurisdiction in which the case was heard; the number refers to the identification of the case in this publication. Thus, "Minn 145" denotes that the material in question will be found in case number 145 and that the case was heard in the State of Minnesota. All included cases of a given State can be located in the table of contents. The States are listed alphabetically; the number refers to the page on which cases of that State first appear. The table of cases lists in alphabetical order all cases either digested or cited herein. Those which have been digested are given in roman type; those cited in the footnotes are in italics. The references in the table of cases, like the index, are to the jurisdiction and to the number of the case as it appears in this publication. IV |