Blanch v. Cordero, 4451.
| Citation | 180 F.2d 856 |
| Decision Date | 22 March 1950 |
| Docket Number | No. 4451.,4451. |
| Parties | BLANCH et al. v. CORDERO, Auditor, et al. |
| Court | United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (1st Circuit) |
Arturo O'Neill, Hato Rey, P. R., for appellants.
Melvin Richter, Attorney, Department of Justice, Washington, D. C. (H. G. Morison, Assistant Attorney General, Paul A. Sweeney and Richard P. Williams, III, Attorneys, Department of Justice, Mastin G. White, Solicitor, Department of the Interior, Irwin W. Silverman, Chief Counsel, Division of Territories and Island Possessions, Department of the Interior, and Shirley Ecker Boskey, Attorney, Department of the Interior, all of Washington, D. C., on the brief), for appellees.
MAGRUDER, Chief Judge, and MARIS (by special assignment) and WOODBURY, Circuit Judges.
This is an appeal from a judgment of the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico affirming a judgment of the District Court for the Judicial District of San Juan dismissing a complaint praying for the issuance of a writ of mandamus directed to the insular Auditor and the insular Treasurer. The plaintiffs allege that they were all officers or employees of the People of Puerto Rico on July 1, 1932, whose salaries were specified in the budget bill enacted by the Legislature of Puerto Rico for the fiscal year beginning on July 1, 1932 and ending on June 30, 1933; and that their salaries as so specified were reduced by the governor of Puerto Rico and they were paid the salaries as so reduced for the above fiscal year. The object of these proceedings, which were instituted on June 16, 1947, is to recover the difference between the salaries as originally provided in the budget bill and the reduced salaries actually paid on the ground that the governor is without authority under the Organic Act to reduce any item of appropriation of money made by the legislature.1
Section 34 of the Organic Act, 39 Stat. 960, 961, 48 U.S.C.A. § 822 et seq., after provisions with respect to the enactment of legislation and the veto power, provides: "If any bill presented to the governor contains several items of appropriation of money, he may object to one or more of such items, or any part or parts, portion or portions thereof, while approving of the other portion of the bill."
It is contended that this language, while giving the governor power to eliminate or strike any item or part or portion of an appropriation bill, does not give the governor the power to scale down or reduce any item of appropriation of money made by the legislature. The contention rests upon a detailed grammatical analysis of the language employed. It is said that the word "thereof" is defined in the dictionaries as meaning "of that" or "of it", wherefore it must refer to an antecedent in a singular form, and the only antecedent in that form in the sentence under consideration is the word "bill". Thus it is said that the language of the Organic Act quoted above should be read as authorizing the governor to veto any item or items, or any part or parts, portion or portions of the bill, but not as authorizing him to veto any part or parts, portion or portions of an item in the bill.
The contention that the word "thereof" has reference to the word "bill" in the first part of the sentence quoted above, instead of to the word "items" repeated therein twice subsequently, was rejected after full consideration by the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico in De la Rosa v. Winship, 47 P.R.R. 312, and again in Leon v. Fitzsimmons, 61 P.R.R. 340.2 And in the latter case on appeal, Fitzsimmons v. Leon, 1 Cir., 141 F.2d 886, 888, this court brushed it aside in a dictum in the course of holding that the power to object to an item in a general appropriation bill did not confer power to reduce the amount of the salary set for an insular official in antecedent legislation establishing his office. We now reject the contention categorically.
It may be that "thereof" usually refers to a singular antecedent, but we are not aware that its reference must always be to such an antecedent. At any rate we see no grammatical objection to the use of the word...
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State ex rel. Wisconsin Senate v. Thompson
...eligible municipalities represents precisely the sort of measure that the line item veto power was intended to permit. See Blanch v. Cordero, 180 F.2d 856 (1st Cir.) cert. denied, 340 U.S. 819, 71 S.Ct. 49, 95 L.Ed. 601 (1950); Fitzsimmons v. Leon, 141 F.2d 886 (1st Cir.1944) (Organic Act o......
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Karcher v. Kean
...eligible municipalities represents precisely the sort of measure that the line-item veto power was intended to permit. See Blanch v. Cordero, 180 F.2d 856 (1st Cir.), cert. den. 340 U.S. 819, 71 S.Ct. 49, 95 L.Ed. 601 (1950); Fitzsimmons v. Leon, 141 F.2d 886 (1st Cir.1944) (Organic Act of ......
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Thirteenth Guam Legislature v. Bordallo
...the phrase "part or parts, portion or portions thereof" authorizes such reduction. This position finds clear support in Blanch v. Cordero, 180 F.2d 856 (1st Cir. 1950). In construing almost identical language in Section 34 of Organic Act of Puerto Rico,42 the court in Blanch held that the g......
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Gov't of the Virgin Islands & Cyril E. King v. Eleventh Legislature of the Virgin Islands & Senator & President of the Legislature
...any part, or parts, item or items, of any bill appropriating money." A final example and closer to home is Blanch, et al. v. Cordero, 180 F.2d 856 (1st Cir. 1950). In Blanch the Organic Act of Puerto Rico, which as of the time in question was being interpreted, read, "If any bill presented ......