In Re Volpi

Petitioner was convicted under an ordinance of the city of Stockton of selling intoxicating liquor containing more than one-half of one per cent by volume of alcohol and sentenced to pay a fine of $150, with the alternative of imprisonment in the county jail. Failing to pay the fine, he was imprisoned and now seeks release by habeas corpus on the following grounds: 1. That “no power is conferred upon municipalities to enact legislation for the enforcement of the eighteenth amendment, and any penal ordinance by municipalities upon the subject of prohibition or its enforcement is void and in violation of said section of the constitution. 2. That the ordinance is void in that it conflicts with the Volstead Act.”

The text of the eighteenth amendment is as follows:

In Rhode Island v. Palmer, 253 U. S. 350 , [ 64 L. Ed. 946 , 40 Sup. Ct. Rep. 486], the supreme court, having under consideration the eighteenth amendment and the Volstead Act; among other conclusions, announced that the first section of the eighteenth amendment “of its own force invalidates every legislative act—whether by Congress, by a state legislature, or by a territorial assembly—which authorizes or sanctions what…