698 HARVARD LAW REVIEW the corporation completely efficient for the purposes for which the government has created it. He accepts the distinction made in Kidd V. Pearson between manufacture and commerce,^^ but sub- mits "That this principle does not render unconstitutional the conferring of the power to manufacture upon federal corporations engaged in interstate or foreign commerce." He refers to the Danbury Hatters' case ^^ as affirming the rights imder certain conditions of direct federal control over manufacture. The need of federal incorporation was urged by President Taft in his special message to Congress on January 7, 1910, pages 17-20, and H. L. Wilgus, writing on the question, "Should there be a federal incorporation law?" insisted that "the jurisdiction which can create corporations should be confined exclusively to that one which will have responsibility for their actions in every place." Some five years ago Victor Morawetz wrote in this Review a comprehensive article entitled "The Power of Congress to Enact Incorporation Laws and to Regulate Corporations." ^® He referred to the bank cases and the bridge cases and quoted Hamilton's opinion on the charter of the first bank of the United States to the effect that the creation of a corporation was but a mean having a natural relation to any of the acknowledged objects or lawful ends of the government; it is not an independent, substantive thing, but a quality, capacity or mean to an end. A mercantile com- pany is formed for the purpose of carrying on a particular branch of business, and to add incorporation to this would only be to add artificial capacity for prosecuting the business with more safety and convenience.^" Mr. Morawetz discussed the question how far national corpora- tions would be peculiarly subject to national legislation and how they would be affected by state laws, and also the questions of taxation by the states and national control and regulation of state corporations, and suggested that any attempt on the part of Congress to control or regulate state corporations by means of the imposition of prohibitory excise taxes should not be encouraged. The federal incorporation of railway companies was the subject of an article in the Harvard Law Review by Charles W. Bunn, of Minnesota, in April, 1917. He refers to Railroad Co. v. Mary- " 128 U. S. I (1888). " Loewe v. Lawlor, 208 U. S. 274 (190S).
- • June, 1913. *° Ford's Edition of the Federalist, p. 657.
