these states have adopted the only feasible scheme of taxation of the shares of state banks which will admit of a state property tax on national bank shares, since R. S. § 5219 (12 U. S. C. § 548), permits shares of national banks to be taxed only by the state where the bank does business, and then only if they are not assessed "at a greater rate than other moneyed capital

in the hands of individual citizens coming into competition with the business of national banks." See First National Bank v. Anderson, 269 U. S. 341, 348; Minnesota v. First National Bank, 273 U. S. 561. Both states assess for property taxation the shares of national banks doing business within their limits and assess in like manner the shares of state banks, and thus avoid discrimination in taxation between the shares of national and of state banks.

Appellant argues that every state may establish a tax situs within the state for shares of stock in its own banking corporations, and that Montana and North Dakota have done so by providing, in pursuance of their scheme for the local taxation of banking corporations, that the shares shall be taxable there. Corry v. Baltimore, 196 U. S. 466; see National Bank v. Commonwealth, 9 Wall. 353; Tappan v. Merchants' National Bank, 19 Wall. 490; Rhode Island Trust Co. v. Doughton, 270 U. S. 69, 81. It insists that as the shares are properly taxable by the respective states of their origin, and as due process forbids the imposition of a property tax upon intangibles in more than one state, they cannot be taxed in Minnesota.

The logic is inexorable if the premises are accepted. But we do not find it necessary to decide whether taxation of the shares in Montana or North Dakota is foreclosed by sustaining the Minnesota tax. Nor need we inquire whether a non-resident shareholder, by acquiring

stock in a local corporation, so far subjects his investment to the control and laws of the state which has created the corporation as to preclude any objection, on grounds of due process, to the taxation of the shares there, even though they are subject to taxation elsewhere, at their business situs.1 We leave those questions open. It is enough for present purposes that this Court has often upheld and never denied the constitutional power to tax shares of stock at the place of the domicil of the owner. Hawley v. Malden, 232 U. S. 1, 11, 12; Klein v. Board of Tax Supervisors, 282 U. S. 19, 24; Wright v. Louisville & Nashville R. Co., 195 U. S. 219; Kidd v. Alabama, 188 U. S. 730; Darnell v. Indiana, 226 U. S. 390. And it has fully recognized that the business situs of an intangible affords an adequate basis for fixing a place of taxation. See Wheeling Steel Corp. v. Fox, supra; De Ganay v. Lederer, supra; cf. Safe Deposit & Trust Co. v. Virginia, 280 U. S. 83, 91.

The rule that property is subject to taxation at its situs. within the territorial jurisdiction of the taxing state, readily understood and applied with respect to tangibles, is in itself meaningless when applied to intangibles which, since they are without physical characteristics, can have no location in space. See Wheeling Steel Corp. v. Fox, supra, 209. The resort to a fiction by the attribution of

'See Corry v. Baltimore, 196 U. S. 466, 476, 477; Tappan v. Merchants' National Bank, 19 Wall. 490, 499, 500; Flash v. Conn, 109 U. S. 371, 377; Whitman v. Oxford National Bank, 176 U. S. 559, 564; Hancock National Bank v. Farnum, 176 U. S. 640, 643; Nashua Savings Bank v. Anglo-American Co., 189 U. S. 221, 230; Canada Southern Ry. Co. v. Gebhard, 109 U. S. 527, 537; Relfe v. Rundle, 103 U. S. 222, 226; Bernheimer v. Converse, 206 U. S. 516, 533; Converse v. Hamilton, 224 U. S. 243, 260; Clark v. Williard, 292 U. S. 112, 121; Royal Arcanum v. Green, 237 U. S. 531, 542; Modern Woodmen of America v. Mixer, 267 U. S. 544, 551; Broderick v. Rosner, 294 U. S. 629, 643.

a tax situs to an intangible is only a means of symbolizing, without fully revealing, those considerations which are persuasive grounds for deciding that a particular place is appropriate for the imposition of the tax. Mobilia sequuntur personam, which has won unqualified acceptance when applied to the taxation of intangibles, Blodgett v. Silberman, 277 U. S. 1, 9-10, states a rule without disclosing the reasons for it. But we have recently had occasion to point out that enjoyment by the resident of a state of the protection of its laws is inseparable from responsibility for sharing the costs of its government, and that a tax measured by the value of rights protected is but an equitable method of distributing the burdens of government among those who are privileged to enjoy its benefits. See New York ex rel. Cohn v. Graves, 300 U. S. 308.

The economic advantages realized through the protection, at the place of domicil, of the ownership of rights in intangibles, the value of which is made the measure of the tax, bear a direct relationship to the distribution of burdens which the tax effects. These considerations support the taxation of intangibles at the place of domicil, at least where they are not shown to have acquired a business situs elsewhere, as a proper exercise of the power of government. Like considerations support their taxation at their business situs, for it is there that the owner in every practical sense invokes and enjoys the protection of the laws, and in consequence realizes the economic advantages of his ownership. We cannot say that there is any want of due process in the taxation of the corporate shares in Minnesota, irrespective of the extent of the control over them which the due process clause may save to the states of incorporation.

Affirmed.

MR. JUSTICE BUTLER took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.

146212°-37-16

Syllabus.

301 U.S.

HERNDON v. LOWRY, SHERIFF.

APPEALS FROM THE SUPREME COURT OF GEORGIA.

Nos. 474 and 475. Argued February 8, 1937.-Decided April 26, 1937.

1. A federal constitutional question going to the validity of a conviction of crime under a state statute was not decided on an appeal to the state supreme court because not properly raised (See Herndon v. Georgia, 295 U. S. 441). Afterwards that court considered the question and decided it against the convict, in a habeas corpus proceeding. Held that the scope of habeas corpus, in the circumstances, was a local question and that the ruling on the federal question was open to review by this Court. P. 247. 2. A state statute punishing as a crime the acts of soliciting members for a political party and conducting meetings of a local unit of that party, where one of the doctrines of the party, established by reference to a document not shown to have been exhibited to anyone by the accused, may be said to be ultimate resort to violence in the indefinite future against organized government, unwarrantably invades the liberty of free speech and so violates the Fourteenth Amendment. P. 260.

3. The power of a State to abridge freedom of speech and of assembly is the exception rather than the rule; and the penalizing even of utterances of a defined character must find its justification in a reasonable apprehension of danger to organized government. The limitation upon individual liberty must have appropriate relation to the safety of the State. Legislation which goes beyond this need violates the Constitution. P. 258.

4. The affirmance by the Supreme Court of a State of a conviction under a statute as having support in the evidence, necessarily construes the statute as authorizing punishment for the act so proven. P. 255.

5. Section 56 of the Penal Code of Georgia, as construed by the Supreme Court of the State, punishes, as an attempt to incite to insurrection, any attempt to induce others to join in any combined resistance to the lawful authority of the State. As an element, the accused must have contemplated resistance by force, but in this respect he may be found guilty if he intended that an insurrection "should happen during any time within which he might reasonably expect his influence to continue to be directly

operative in causing such action by those whom he sought to induce." Held that the statute, as construed and applied in this case, is repugnant to the Fourteenth Amendment in that it furnishes no sufficiently ascertainable standard of guilt and interferes unduly with freedom of speech and of assembly. Pp. 253, 261. 182 Ga. 582; 186 S. E. 429, reversed.

APPEALS from judgments, rendered on cross-appeals, in a habeas corpus proceeding. The court below sustained the trial court in deciding that the criminal statute involved did not infringe liberty of speech and assembly, but differed with its holding that the statute was too vague and indefinite, and reversed its decision discharging the appellant here.

Mr. Whitney North Seymour, with whom Messrs. W. A. Sutherland, Herbert T. Wechsler, and Carol King were on the brief, for appellant.

Mr. J. Walter LeCraw, Assistant Solicitor General of Georgia, with whom Messrs. M. J. Yeomans, Attorney General, and John A. Boykin, Solicitor General, were on the brief, for appellee.

MR. JUSTICE ROBERTS delivered the opinion of the Court.

The appellant claims his conviction in a state court deprived him of his liberty contrary to the guarantees of the Fourteenth Amendment. He assigns as error the action of the Supreme Court of Georgia in overruling his claim and refusing him a discharge upon habeas corpus. The petition for the writ, presented to the Superior Court of Fulton County, asserted the appellant was unlawfully detained by the appellee as sheriff under the supposed authority of a judgment pronouncing him guilty of attempting to incite insurrection, as defined in § 56 of the Penal Code, and sentencing him to imprisonment