Bissell v. Durfee

• Decision Date: 14 October 1885
• Citation: 24 N.W. 886,58 Mich. 237
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court
• Parties: BISSELL v. DURFEE.

24 N.W. 886

58 Mich. 237

BISSELL v. DURFEE.

Supreme Court of Michigan

October 14, 1885

Mandamus.

CAMPBELL J.

Relator applies for a mandamus to compel the probate judge to accept an executor's bond, which the judge states he would feel bound to accept as sufficient were it not for statute No 179, (page 244 of the Laws of 1885,) which it is claimed imposes new conditions upon such instruments. That statute is entitled "An act to provide that all sureties upon official bonds shall make justification under oath of their pecuniary responsibility." The body of this statute is made broad enough by its terms to apply to every kind of bonds which are required to be approved by any court or officer, and would include appeal and license bonds, and multitudes of others which have nothing to do with any office or agency, public or private. It requires sureties to swear, under penalties of liability for perjury that they are "worth in unincumbered property, not exempt from execution under the laws of this state, the penal sum thereof, after payment of all just debts, claims, and liabilities." The statute further imposes criminal responsibility by making it a misdemeanor to accept or approve any bond not so justified, and imposing on the persons so accepting or approving it a personal liability for all damages resulting to any one from such approval.

It is claimed by relator that under the constitution this statute cannot be made to apply to anything not covered by its title and that the title does not cover any but bonds of public officers. There is no doubt, under the constitution, that the only bonds covered are official bonds. Had the body of the statute been confined to persons filling those ambiguous positions which depend on the appointment of the public or some of the public functionaries, it is possible that such enumeration might be regarded as a legislative definition of what was meant by the term "official." But we need not determine how far this could be done. As the object of confining acts to the purview of their titles is to prevent the legislature as well as the people from being misled as to their contents, it is manifest that a definition might be so far from the natural meaning of the title as to be quite as deceptive as any other variance. In the present case there are no such definitions given; and, as already pointed out the body of the act contains no reference to any particular class or classes of bonds, but...