Attorney General v. Rice

• Decision Date: 20 January 1887
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court
• Parties: ATTORNEY GENERAL v. RICE.

31 N.W. 203

64 Mich. 385

ATTORNEY GENERAL v. RICE.

Supreme Court of Michigan

January 20, 1887

Quo warranto.

Information to determine right of respondent to hold office.

Lucius D. Johnson, for respondent.

MORSE J.

The attorney general files an information in this case to determine the right of the respondent to hold the office of supervisor of the township of Ironwood in the county of Ontonagon.

The legislature of 1885 (Act No. 23, of the Session Laws of 1885) organized certain territory in Ontonagon county into a township, to be called Ironwood. At an election held pursuant to the provisions of said act, on the sixth day of July, 1885, the respondent was elected supervisor of said township, and duly qualified, and entered upon the duties of his office. No election was held in said township in the spring of 1886, and the respondent claims to hold over under the statute until his successor has been duly elected and qualified, in manner and form as provided by the statute. 1 How.St. � 685. The organization of this township is attacked on the ground that no bill was legally introduced or enacted as a statute creating the township of Ironwood.

The replication of the attorney general to the plea of the respondent shows that no bill for the organization of the township of Ironwood was ever introduced into the legislature, but, before the expiration of the constitutional limit of 50 days in which to introduce bills, Senator Stephenson introduced a skeleton bill, under the title of "A bill to organize the township of Au Train;" that said skeleton bill was no bill at all, and simply consisted of the title as above given, indorsed on a blank sheet of paper; that said township of Au Train was to be located in Alger county. After the expiration of said 50 days, and on June 3, 1885, the chairman of the senate committee on towns and counties reported, as a substitute for the skeleton bill so introduced by Senator Stephenson, a bill to organize the township of Ironwood in the county of Ontonagon, and that on the same day the rules of the senate were suspended, and said bill, as a manuscript bill, was passed by the senate. Subsequently, it passed the house, and was approved by the governor, June 9, 1885. The replication was demurred to by respondent.

The attorney general contends that the constitution was violated in its spirit, because the title of the bill as introduced did not express the object of the act as passed. Article 4, � 20. We cannot extend the provisions of the constitution beyond its express terms in this respect. If the object of the act as passed is fully expressed in its title, the form or status of such title at its introduction or during any of the stages of legislation before it becomes a law, is immaterial. To hold otherwise would, in many cases prevent any alteration or amendment of a bill after its introduction, as, in legislative practice, it frequently becomes necessary to amend the title as introduced in order to conform to changes in the bill. The title to a bill is usually adopted after it has passed the house, and is not an essential part of the bill, although it is of a law. Larrison v. Peoria, A. & D.R. Co., 77 Ill. 17. The showing of the replication, however, if we can consider the facts therein gathered by parol, and not found in the legislative records, involves a plain violation of the constitution in another respect. No bill was introduced, but a title was handed up to pass as a bill until convenience or some future interest might enable the member introducing it to ingraft upon it any legislation he might desire.

The object of the constitution providing that no new bill shall be introduced after the first 50 days of the session (article 4, � 28) is to "prevent hasty and improvident legislation, and to compel, so far as any previous law can accomplish that result, the careful examination of proposed laws, or, at least, the affording of opportunity for that purpose." Cooley, Const.Lim. (1st Ed.) 139. Another purpose was, no doubt, to give the people of the state, or of any locality in the state, an opportunity to be heard upon proposed legislation affecting their interests. The legislative journals, referring as they do to the titles of all bills introduced, give some warning to the people of the measures introduced. The right of petition and protest has ever been recognized as one of the established privileges of the people in a free country; and they have a right to notice of proposed legislation, and an opportunity to express their assent or dissent. If there was no constitutional inhibition against such practice, bills might be introduced upon the last days of the session, and rushed at once through both houses, without any chance for the people to be heard before their passage, or to rectify the action until another biennial session of the legislature. The title of the bill in question as introduced gave no notice to the inhabitants of the territory embraced within the limits of this township of Ironwood as organized by this act. And if any person suspecting anything of the kind had investigated the matter, before the expiration of the 50 days, he would have found nothing but a title, which, without any bill attached thereto, would have conveyed to him no intimation of the act as passed. He would also have been justified, under the provisions of the constitution, in believing that the title could not be used for any purpose.

While the questionable practice of so amending bills, after the expiration of the 50-day limit, as to make the act passed entirely different from and foreign to the bill introduced,--in fact a new bill,--has obtained to a great extent in our legislative practice, it is to be hoped that the introducing of mere titles, without any body, is seldom resorted to. If it can be successfully maintained, the safeguard of the constitution will be completely broken down and its provisions nullified. But it is contended by the counsel for respondent that the proceedings of the senate, as...