TRADING STAMPS. The current name for a method of conducting some kinds of retail business which consists of an agree ment between a number of merchants and a corporation that the latter shall print the names of the former in its subscribers' dic tionary and circulate a number of copies of the book, and that the merchants shall pur chase of the corporation a number of so called trading stamps, to be given to pur chasers with their purchases, and by them preserved and pasted in the books aforesaid until a certain number have been secured, when they shall be presented to the corpora tion in exchange for the choice of certain articles kept in stock by the corporation. Lansburgh v. D. of Col., 11 App. D. C. 512. Under Act of Congress Feb. 17, 1873, which forbids the sale of real estate or any article of merchandise or taking of payment with a promise to give any article or thing, in con sideration of the purchase by any person of any other article or thing, etc., it was held that the business was nothing more nor less than a gaming device; id. But later cases hold otherwise. The trading stamp business, when conducted honestly, is not contrary to public policy; S. & H. Co. v. Temple, 137 Fed. 992; and statutes which attempt to prohibit such business or which levy a li cense or excise tax on it as a separate Lusiness are uniformly held unconstitution al; State v. Dalton, 22 R. I. 77, 46 Atl. 234, 48 L. R. A. 775, 84 Am. St. Rep. 818; Peo ple v. Gillson, 109 N. Y. 389, 17 N. E. 343, 4
Am. St. Rep. 465; Ex parte McKenna, 126 Cal. 429, 58 Pac. 916; Young v. Com., 101 Va. 853, 45 S. E. 327; Montgomery v. Kelly, 142 Ala. 552, 38 South. 67, 70 L. R. A. 209; Ex parte Drexel, 147 Cal. 763, 82 Pac. 429, 2 L. R. A. (N. S.) 588, 3 Ann. Cas. 878; O'Keeffe v. Somerville, 190 Mass. 110, 76 N. E. 457, 112 Am. St. Rep. 316, 5 Ann. Cas. 684; and so of a municipal ordinance forbidding it; Denver v. Frueauff, 39 Colo. 20, 88 Pac. 389, 7 L. R. A. (N. S.) 1131, 12. Ann. Cas. 521; City Council of Montgomery v. Kelly, 142 Ala. 552, 38 South. 67, 70 L. R. A. 209, 110 Am. St. Rep. 43; and such business is not a gift enterprise or a lottery; Winston v. Beeson, 135 N. C. 271, 47 S. E. 457, 65 L. R. A. 167; State v. Dodge, 76 Vt. 197, 56 Atl. 983, Ann. Cas. 47; an injunction will be granted against a competing trading stamp company whose agents exchange its stamps• for partly filled books containing plaintiff's stamps which are non transferable; Sperry & Hutch inson Co. v. Weber & Co., 161 Fed. 219. An act forbidding the issue and distribution of trading stamps to be redeemed by any person other than the merchant who sells the goods with which such stamps are given is not a lawful exercise of the police power and is unconstitutional as being an unlawful depri vation of liberty and property; People v. Dycker, 72 App. Div. 308, 76 N. Y. Supp. Ill.