Legal analysis from Dean's Law Dictionary will be displayed here.

This section contains the nature of the case and procedural background.

During 1932, the prices received by farmers for milk were much below the cost of production. A state legislative committee conducted an extensive study from which it determined essentially that low milk prices received by dairy producers created a risk of relaxed vigilance against contamination. In 1933, the state legislature established a Milk Control Board with power to 'fix minimum and maximum [retail] prices to be charged [by] stores to consumers for consumption off the premises where sold.' The Board fixed nine cents as the price to be charged by a store for a quart of milk. Nebbia (D), the proprietor of a grocery store in Rochester, was convicted based on selling milk for six and one-half cents per quart instead of the required nine cents. D was convicted and appealed, and the convictions were affirmed by state courts. D asserted the statute and order contravene the equal protection clause and the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The majority concedes that the dairy industry cannot be characterized as a public utility or a monopoly. The dissent points out that the legislative committee attributed decreased consumption notwithstanding low prices to consumers' reduced buying power; the dissent further states that higher store prices will not enlarge this power, nor will they decrease production.

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