In Stone v. United States (1896), the U.S Supreme Court ruled on a case involving an individual, Mr. Stone, who was convicted for embezzlement while serving as an assistant treasurer at a national bank in Massachusetts. The key issue of the case revolved around whether or not certain evidence should have been admitted during his trial. This evidence included books and papers from the bank that were used to prove he had committed fraud by manipulating accounts and transactions within these records. The defense argued that this evidence was obtained without proper authorization and thus violated their client's Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable searches and seizures. However, the court disagreed with this argument stating that there is no constitutional right protecting corporations from having their business records seized by government officials when investigating potential criminal activity. Therefore, it upheld Mr.Stone’s conviction ruling that such documents are admissible as they represent corporate acts rather than personal ones which could be protected under Fourth Amendment rights if unlawfully seized.

In the dissenting opinion for Stone v. United States, Justice Harlan argued that the majority's decision to uphold a tax on income from property was unconstitutional. He contended that this tax violated the Constitution's requirement of apportionment among states according to population for direct taxes. According to him, an income tax is a direct tax and thus must be apportioned among states based on their populations rather than being levied uniformly across all individuals regardless of where they live or how much property they own. This interpretation would protect citizens in less wealthy states from bearing an unfair share of federal taxation burden compared with those in wealthier ones. Furthermore, he believed it was not within Congress' power to impose such a uniform non-apportioned direct tax as it contradicted constitutional principles designed to maintain balance between state and federal powers.