31 L. R. A. (N. S.) 7], and Baltimore & Ohio R. Co. v. Interstate Commerce Commission, 221 U. S. 612 [31 Sup. Ct. 621], that if congress possesses the power to impose that liability, which we here hold that it does, it also possesses the power to insure its efficacy by prohibiting any contract, rule, regulation, or devise in evasion of it.

"Coming to the question of classification, it is true that the liability which the act creates is imposed only on interstate carriers by railroad, although there are other interstate carriers, and is imposed for the benefit of all employés of such carriers by railroad who are employed in interstate commerce, although some are not subjected to the peculiar hazards incident to the operation of trains or to hazards that differ from those to which other employés in such commerce not within the act are exposed. But it does not follow that this classification is violative of the 'due process of law' clause of the fifth amendment. Even if it be assumed that that clause is equivalent to the 'equal protection of the laws' clause of the fourteenth amendment, which is the most that can be claimed for it here, it does not take from congress the power to classify, nor does it condemn exertions of that power merely because they occasion some inequalities. On the contrary, it admits of the exercise of a wide discretion in classifying according to general, rather than minute, distinctions, and condemns what is done only when it is without any reasonable basie, and therefore is purely arbitrary. Lindsley v. Gas Co., 220 U. S. 61, 78 [31 Sup. Ct. 337, Ann. Cas. 1912C, 160]. Tested by these standards, this classification is not objectionable. Like classifications of railroad carriers and employés for like purposes, when assailed under the equal protection clause, have been sustained by repeated decisions of this court. Missouri Pacific R. Co. v. Mackey, 127 U. S. 205 [8 Sup. Ct. 1161]; Louisville, etc., R. Co. v. Melton, 218 U. S. 36 [30 Sup. Ct. 676]; Mobile, etc., R. Co. v. Turnipseed, 219 U. S. 35 [31 Sup. Ct. 136, 32 L. R. A. (N. S.) 226, Ann. Cas. 1912A, 463].

"It follows that the answer to the second of the questions before stated must be that congress has not exceeded its power by prescribing the regulations embodied in the present act.

In St. Louis, etc., R. Co. v. Conley, 187 Fed. 949, 110 C. C. A. 97, the Federal act of 1908 was considered.

It was urged against its validity that it sought to deprive the defendant railroad company of the liberty and privilege of making contracts with its employés, and to impose upon it liabilities that were unreasonable, and not within the terms of its contracts with its employés, and thereby to deprive it of its liberty to make contracts and of its property without due process of law. This contention was overruled upon the authority of Allgeyer v. Louisiana, 165 U. S. 578 (17 Sup. Ct. 427); Chicago, etc., R. Co. v. McGuire, 219 U. S. 549 (31 Sup. Ct. 259), and other cases, the court saying:

"The primary object of the act was to promote the safety of employés of railroads while actively engaged in the movement of interstate commerce, and is well calculated to subserve the interests of such commerce by af. fording such protection; there being, as it seems to us, a substantial connection between the object sought to be attained by the act and the means provided to accomplish that object."

By way of illustration it is said:

"Thus, if congress may require the use of safety appliances, it may prohibit agreements to dispense with them. If it may restrict employment in any service to eight hours a day, it may make contracts for longer service unlawful. The rule is, where the regulation is valid-that is, not being arbitrary or unrelated to a proper purposecongress may prevent it from being nullified by prohibitive contracts. In all such cases of interference with the right to contract, it has been held to be 'incidental to the main object of the regulation, and, if the power exists to accomplish the latter, the interference is justified as an aid to its exercise""-citing Holden v. Hardy, 169 U. S. 366 (18 Sup. Ct. 383).

The fourteenth amendment to the Federal Constitution is addressed to the States, and not to the Congress. The foregoing cases are not authority precisely sustaining the validity of the act in question, although the reasoning indulged is appropriate to the precise questions presented here. But the precise questions here involved have been

determined by the same court in favor of the validity of the legislation.

In Mobile, etc., R. Co. v. Turnipseed, 219 U. S. 35 (31 Sup. Ct. 136, 32 L. R. A. [N. S.] 226, Ann. Cas. 1912A, 463), there was involved a statute of the State of Mississippi and a portion of the constitution of that State, and it was claimed that, as construed by the supreme court of Mississippi, the statute (section 3559 of the Code) violated the fourteenth amendment, because it denied to railroad corporations the equal protection of the laws. The statute, following the constitution of the State, abrogated the common-law fellow-servant rule as to every employé of a railroad corporation. It was urged that this legislation, applicable only to employés of a railroad company, was arbitrary, and in denial of equal protection of law, unless limited in its effect to employés imperiled by the hazardous business of operating railroad trains or engines, and that the Mississippi supreme court had in prior cases so defined and construed the legislation. Ballard v. Oil Co., 81 Miss. 507 (34 South. 533, 62 L. R. A. 407, 95 Am. St. Rep. 476); Bradford Construction Co. v. Heflin, 88 Miss. 314 (42 South. 174, 12 L. R. A. [N. S.] 1040, 8 Am. & Eng. Ann. Cas. 1077). It was contended that the provision had been construed in the case at bar as applicable to an employé not subject to any danger or peril peculiar to the operation of railway trains and that, therefore, the reason for the classification failed and the provision so construed and applied was a denial of the equal protection of the law. The action was tort for the wrongful killing of a section foreman in the service of the railway company, and he had a judgment which was affirmed by the supreme court of the State. Of this contention the court, by Mr. Justice Lurton, said:

"This contention, shortly stated, comes to this, that, although a classification of railway employes may be justified from general considerations based upon the hazardous character of the occupation, such classification be

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comes arbitrary, and a denial of the equal protection of the law the moment it is found to embrace employés not exposed to hazards peculiar to railway operation.

"But this court has never so construed the limitation imposed by the fourteenth amendment upon the power of the State to legislate with reference to particular employments as to render ineffectual a general classification resting upon obvious principles of public policy, because it may happen that the classification includes persons not subject to a uniform degree of danger. The insistence, therefore, that legislation in respect of railway employés generally is repugnant to the clause of the Constitution guaranteeing the equal protection of the law merely because it is not limited to those engaged in the actual operation of trains, is without merit.

The opinion refers with approval to Louisville, etc., R. Co. v. Melton, 218 U. S. 36 (30 Sup. Ct. 676). In that case the injured person was a carpenter in the employ of the railroad company, and was engaged usually at bridge carpentering. When injured, he was constructing the foundation of a coal tipple at which engines might coal. A timber intended to be a part of the foundation of the tipple was being raised by a block and tackle, and Melton, with the foreman, and under his orders, was standing under the timber and engaged in placing props under it to prevent its lowering when the strain upon the rope passing through the pulley was relaxed. A link of the chain which held the pulley broke, the timber fell, Melton underneath it, inflicting serious injury. The chain which broke was furnished by the foreman, and had been put in position under his direction. Melton was a resident of Kentucky, but the injury occurred in Indiana. He began his action in Kentucky. The employer's liability act of Indiana provides that:

"Every railroad

operating in this State shall be liable in damages for personal injury suffered by any employé while in its service, the employé so injured being in the exercise of due care and diligence, in the following

cases:

"First. When such injury is suffered by reason of any

defect in the condition of ways, works, plants, tools and machinery connected with or in use in the business of such corporation, when such defect was the result of negligence on the part of the corporation, or some person entrusted by it with the duty of keeping such ways, works, plant, tools or machinery in proper condition.

"Second. Where such injury resulted from the negligence of any person in service of such corporation, to whose order or direction the injured employé at the time of the injury was bound to conform, and did conform." Laws 1893, chap. 130.

One question raised in the court below was that the statute, in so far as it was made to apply to the facts in the case, was a violation of the equal protection clause of the fourteenth amendment. Of this it was said:

"That the fourteenth amendment was not intended to, and does not, strip the States of the power to exert their lawful police authority is settled, and requires no reference to authorities. And it is equally settled-as we shall hereafter take occasion to show-as the essential result of the elementary doctrine that the equal protection of the law clause does not restrain the normal exercise of governmental power, but only abuse in the exertion of such authority; therefore that clause is not offended against simply because as the result of the exercise of the power to classify some inequality may be occasioned. That is to say, as the power to classify is not taken away by the operation of the equal protection of the law clause, a wide scope of legislative discretion may be exerted in classifying without conflicting with the constitutional prohibition. "It is beyond doubt foreclosed that the Indiana statute does not offend against the equal protection clause of the fourteenth amendment, because it subjects railroad employés to a different rule as to the doctrine of fellow-servant from that which prevails as to other employments in that State. Tullis v. Railroad Co., 175 U. Š. 348 [20 Sup. Ct. 136]; Pittsburg, etc., R. Co. v. Ross, 212 U. S. 560 [29 Sup. Ct. 688]. But while conceding this, the argument is that classification of railroad employés for the purpose of the doctrine of fellow-servant can only consistently with equality and uniformity embrace such employés when exposed to dangers peculiarly resulting from the operation of a railroad, thus affording ground for dis

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