Whitney v. Hillsborough County

Decision Date25 March 1930
Citation99 Fla. 628,127 So. 486
PartiesWHITNEY v. HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY et al.
CourtFlorida Supreme Court

Suit by J. Harvey Whitney against Hillsborough County and others. A demurrer to the bill was sustained, and complainant appeals.

Affirmed.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Hillsborough County; L L. Parks, judge.

COUNSEL

Watson & Saussy, of Tampa, for appellant.

Sutton Tillman & Reeves, of Tampa, for appellees.

Chester B. Masslich, of New York City, amicus curiae.

OPINION

STRUM J.

This is a taxpayer's suit in equity to enjoin the further collection of taxes to pay certain bonds issued by Hillsborough county pursuant to chapter 10140, Acts of 1925, and to enjoin the payment of said bonds. The attack is primarily against the validity of said chapter 10140, the authorizing act. The proceedings taken by the county officers under the act are not questioned, save that the bill alleges that the act 'has been used for the levy of a tax for the benefit of a chartered private corporation.'

The bill of complaint charges that the act is violative of designated constitutional inhibitions, on account of which it is prayed that the act, as well as certain bonds issued by Hillsborough county under authority thereof, be declared void and that payment of the bonds be enjoined.

A demurrer to the bill was sustained, and complainant appealed.

The act provides an additional and supplemental method for improving highways in 'any county in the state of not less than one hundred thirty thousand population, according to the census taken by the State of Florida in the year 1925.'

That census had been completed and published prior to the passage of chapter 10140, supra. Hillsborough being the only county of not less than one hundred thirty thousand population according to that census, the act could not at the time of its passage, nor thereafter, apply to any other county, actually or potentially. Thus circumscribed, the provisions of the act are confined exclusively and permanently to Hillsborough county as definitely and unalterably as if that county alone had been specifically named in the act. The act does not relate to a class of counties generally, nor could it apply to counties subsequently acquiring a population of 130,000 or more, as it is limited to the state census of 1925. The act relates only to one definitely identified county, and can never extend to any other county. It is therefore a local or special law. Ex parte Wells, 21 Fla. 280; State v. Daniel, 87 Fla. 270, 99 So. 804; Vaughan v. State, 212 Ala. 258, 102 So. 222; Federal Land Bank v. Nix, 166 La. 566, 117 So. 720; Campbell v. City of Indianapolis, 155 Ind. 186, 57 N.E. 920; Sutton v. State, 96 Tenn. 696, 36 S.W. 697, 33 L. R. A. 589; State v. Schwab, 49 Ohio St. 229, 34 N.E. 736; State v. Scott, 70 Neb. 685, 100 N.W. 812; Board of Com'rs of Owen County v. Spangler, 159 Ind. 575, 65 N.E. 743; Seymour v. Orange, 74 N. J. Law, 549, 65 A. 1033; Bennett v. Common Council of City of Trenton, 55 N. J. Law, 72, 25 A. 113; 25 R. C. L. 815. For the reasons stated, the rule announced in Collier v. Cassady, 63 Fla. 390, 57 So. 617, and in Givens v. Hillsborough County, 46 Fla. 502, 35 So. 88, 110 Am. St. Rep. 104, holding the acts there involved to be general laws, does not apply to this act.

It is contended that although in its operation and effect the act is a special or local law, it purports upon its face to be a general law. From that premise appellant further contends that in the passage of the act the Legislature regarded it as a general law, which is submitted as a sufficient demonstration that constitutional requirements as to notice of the passage of special or local laws were not obeyed. It is therefore contended that this act must be struck down for failure to give notice of its passage because it would be illogical to apply to this situation the rule announced in Stockton v. Powell, 29 Fla. 1, 10 So. 688, 15 L. R. A. 42.

The legislative journals are silent as to notice. There is nothing in the record to enlighten us as to whether the act was passed by the Legislature as a local or general law, if indeed that question would be material. The fact that the act has been brought forward in a subsequent compilation, not an enactment, of General Laws as section 2516 et seq., Comp. Gen. Laws, is immaterial in the consideration of this question.

A clear conception of the doctrine first announced in Stockton v. Powell, supra, is important here. There is a presumption that a statute has been duly enacted unless the legislative journals, or other evidence of equal dignity, show the contrary. State v. Carley, 89 Fla. 361, 104 So. 577. See, also, State v. Brown, 20 Fla. 407; State v. Green, 36 Fla. 154, 18 So. 334; West v. State, 50 Fla. 154, 39 So. 412. The doctrine announced in Stockton v. Powell, however, does not rest upon that presumption. That doctrine was not that this court would 'presume' from the passage of a special or local law that the required notice had been given. So the situation here presented is not one involving the illogical application of a 'presumption' that notice of intention to apply for the passage of this act as a special or local law was given, when the act upon its face bears the guise of a general law.

The doctrine clearly announced in Stockton v. Powell, and consistently followed in an unbroken line of subsequent cases, is that the judiciary is 'without power' to inquire whether the required notice of application for the passage of local or special legislation has been given. Determination of that question is exclusively a legislative duty and function, committed to the Legislature by the Constitution itself. The postulate of the doctrine is that the Constitution itself divides the state government into three co-ordinate and coequal departments--legislative, executive and judicial [127 So. 490] --and provides (article 2) that 'no person properly belonging to one of the departments shall exercise any powers appertaining to either of the others, except in cases expressly provided for by this Constitution.' Further, the Constitution specifically provides (article 3, § 21), that 'the evidence that such notice [of intention to apply for the passage of local laws] has been published shall be established in the Legislature before such bill shall be passed.' The determination vel non of the fact of publication is exclusively a legislative function, the constitutional provisions just quoted excluding any interference in the matter by the judiciary. As it is not to be supposed that the Legislature is less faithful to its constitutional obligations than a court, and as the Constitution commits the question exclusively to legislative determination, the judiciary is without power to review the legislative judgment upon the question as indicated by the passage of the act. The courts therefore deem the question concluded by the passage of the act (State v. Fearnside, 87 Fla. 349, 100 So. 256; Jackson Lbr. Co. v. Walton County, 95 Fla. 632, 116 So. 771; Smith Bros. v. Williams, 126 So. 367, decided at this term) when, as here, the law was enacted at a regular, not an extraordinary, session of the Legislature. See Horton v. Kyle, 81 Fla. 274, 88 So. 757, wherein this court declined to apply the rule because it was obviously impossible for the required notice to have been given during the time intervening between the Governor's call for the special session and the time of the passage of the bill.

Chapter 10140, supra, was passed prior to the amendment of article 3, § 21, of the Constitution, adopted in 1928, requiring evidence that notice has been published to be attached to the proposed bill and to be spread upon the Journals, which now permits the courts to look to the Journals and to the evidence attached to the bill to ascertain whether they disclose that proper notice was given. See Douglas v. Weber, 128 So. 613, decided at this term.

It is contended that the act violates article 3, § 16, of the Constitution, in that it embraces more than one subject, and that the subject thereof is not embraced in the title; that is, that the provisions of the act are broader than the title.

The title is: 'An Act to Authorize Counties of Not Less Than One Hundred Thirty Thousand Population, According to the Census Taken by the State of Florida in the Year 1925, to Improve Highways Upon Petition and to Pay the Cost Thereof by Special Assessment in Whole or in Part and to Issue Bonds and Levy Taxes.'

The subject of the act generally, as disclosed by its provisions, is the improvement of county highways, the act providing an additional and supplemental method of accomplishing such improvements, and prescribing a method of present financing and ultimate payment for the projects undertaken thereunder.

The generality of the title of a statute does not invalidate it so long as the title fairly comprehends and gives notice of the object sought to be accomplished by the statute, when such generality is not deceptively employed to conceal incongruous provisions unrelated to the general subject of the act. State v. Daniel, 87 Fla. 270, 99 So. 804; 25 R. C. L. 842.

The title here involved gives sufficient notice of the subject-matter and object of the act to reasonably lead to inquiry into the body of the act to ascertain the method provided for accomplishing the object stated in the title. The title is not misleading. It is therefore a sufficient compliance with constitutional requirements as to the scope of the title. In re DeWoody, 94 Fla. 96, 113 So. 677; Lainhart v. Catts, 73 Fla. 735, 75 So. 47.

In the accomplishment of a public improvement, the financing thereof and ultimate payment therefor are matters germane to and properly connected with the...

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  • The administrative process and constitutional principles.
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    • Florida Bar Journal Vol. 75 No. 1, January 2001
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