The Payne et al. v. State of Kansas ex rel. Brewster, Attorney General case in 1918 revolved around the issue of whether a state law that regulated and controlled the business of buying and selling second-hand articles was unconstitutional under the Fourteenth Amendment's due process clause or interfered with interstate commerce. The Supreme Court held that such regulation is within the police power of a state if it has a reasonable relation to public welfare without any arbitrary discrimination or unnecessary restriction on personal rights or liberties, thereby upholding its constitutionality. It also ruled that this did not interfere with interstate commerce as long as it does not impose direct burdens upon it but merely affects it incidentally and indirectly.

In the dissenting opinion for Payne et al. v. State of Kansas ex rel. Brewster, Attorney General, Justice Holmes disagreed with the majority's decision to uphold a Kansas law that prohibited out-of-state corporations from doing business in Kansas unless they obtained a certificate of authority and paid an annual fee. He argued that this law violated the Commerce Clause by placing undue burdens on interstate commerce and discriminating against foreign corporations. Furthermore, he contended that it was not within a state’s power to regulate or control businesses operating beyond its borders just because some part of their operations occurred within those borders; such regulation should be left up to Congress under its constitutional powers over interstate commerce.