Hawke v. Smith

Hawke v. Smith, 253 U.S. 221 (1920), was a United States Supreme Court case coming out of the state of Ohio. It challenged the validity of the way in which the 18th Amendment had been passed.

Background

The state of Ohio's legislature reserved to the people the right to review the state legislature's ratification of any federal amendment. This meant that within ninety days of the ratification of an amendment by the state legislature, that ratification could be challenged by a petition signed by six percent of Ohio voters. This would then bring the issue to referendum.

In the case of Ohio and the 18th Amendment, the legislature ratified the amendment and, before the ninety-day waiting period had passed, the Secretary of State, Robert Lansing, declared the 18th Amendment to be in effect. Meanwhile, a petition was signed by at least six percent of the voters and, in the ensuing referendum, a majority of Ohio voters voted against prohibition, seemingly invalidating the passage of the 18th Amendment. The controversy regarding this situation eventually led to a court case which made it to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The issue before the court was whether or not a state had a right to reserve to its people the right to review its legislature's ratification of federal amendments. The prohibitionists argued that the Constitution provided for the ratifying of federal amendments by state legislatures—it said nothing about the people's right to review such amendments. Opponents of this view argued that the Constitution did not say anything about what constituted a state legislature and it was up to each of the states to decide what constituted its legislature. Thus in the case of Ohio, the idea of "state legislature" came with the limit of not being able to ratify a federal amendment without review by the people of the state, and, thus, the amendment had not been ratified.

Opinion of the Court

On June 1, 1920, the Court ruled that Ohio voters could not overturn the state legislature's approval of the Eighteenth Amendment.^[2]

Significance

Hawke v. Smith was important for two reasons. First, there had been several other states that had been considering referendums on Prohibition. This case made it clear that the 18th Amendment was valid. Second, the fact that the amendment passed in Ohio despite a majority of voters voting against it fostered the idea that Prohibition was the work of powerful groups and not the people themselves.

References

• Kyvig, David E. Repealing National Prohibition. 2nd ed. Kent, Ohio: The Kent State UP, 2000. Pages 14–16.