Boyer v. State

• Decision Date: 01 December 1919
• Docket Number: 28
• Citation: 216 S.W. 17,141 Ark. 84
• Parties: BOYER v. STATE
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

216 S.W. 17

141 Ark. 84

BOYER v. STATE

No. 28

Supreme Court of Arkansas

December 1, 1919

Appeal from Little River Circuit Court; James S. Steel, Judge reversed.

Judgment reversed and cause remanded.

John N Cook, for appellant; Mahaffey, Keeney & Dalby (of Texas), of counsel.

1. The tick eradication law was not properly passed, in so far as by the amendment thereto it was made to include Little River County. Act 39 is amendatory, pure and simple, and section 1 violates every provision of article 5, section 23, of the Constitution. It attempts to extend the provisions of sections 1 to 6 of Act 86 (1915) by reference to its title only. 49 Ark. 131; 52 Id. 290; Cooley Const. Lim. (6 Ed.), p. 181; L. R. A. 1917 B, p. 176; 102 Tex. 170; 132 Ark 29, 612.

2. It was error to give the peremptory instruction to find defendant guilty. Kirby's Digest, § 2387; 49 Ark. 449.

John D. Arbuckle, Attorney General, and Robert C. Knox, Assistant, for appellee.

1. The dipping prescribed was being done under the direct supervision of the Board of Control and it must be presumed that the fluid used was satisfactory for the purpose used. The mere fact that it might not be exactly like the formula prescribed by some person connected with the Experiment Station of the University and inserted in their bulletin was no defense to this suit.

2. There was no error in refusing to permit defendant to prove that dipping had injured and killed cattle. The law requiring the dipping is for the good of the community and the fact that in a few cases it was injurious to cattle was no defense, where the whole community is benefited by systematic dipping. Ashcraft v. State, 140 Ark. 505. Defendant has not shown that the rules of the Board of Control were so arbitrary that it was an impossibility to comply with them. Ashcraft v. State, supra.

OPINION

SMITH, J.

Appellant was convicted of violating the Tick Eradication Law by failing to dip his cattle, and has prosecuted this appeal to review that judgment.

The trial was had in Little River County, and it is first insisted that the Tick Eradication Law was not properly passed in so far as by the amendments thereto it was made to include Little River County.

The General Assembly, by act No. 86, Acts 1915, page 338, created the Northwest Arkansas Cattle Tick Eradication District, and section 1 named the counties there embraced. Sections 1 and 6 of this act were amended by act No. 39 of the Acts of 1917, page 195. Section 1 of this amendatory act reads as follows: "Section 1. That section 1 of act 86 of the Acts of 1915 be amended so as to include the following named counties in the Northwest Arkansas Cattle Tick Eradication District, namely: * * * Little River. * * *"

It is said this method of extending the provisions of the act of 1915 offends against section 23 of article 5 of Constitution, which provides that no law shall be revived, amended or the provisions thereof extended or conferred by reference to its title only, but that so much thereof as is revived, amended, extended or conferred shall be re-enacted and published at length.

A decision adverse to appellant's contention was rendered by this court in the case of Hermitage Special School District v. Ingalls Special School District, 133 Ark. 157, 202 S.W. 26, where a substantially identical objection was made to the act there upheld.

The court excluded testimony to the effect that cattle dipped at the vat in question were killed and greatly damaged as the result of being dipped, and that dipping throughout the county had the same effect. No error was committed in this ruling, as the efficacy of dipping was not a proper subject of inquiry by the court, as that is a...