Ex parte Reynolds
| Decision Date | 06 June 1889 |
| Citation | 87 Ala. 138,6 So. 335 |
| Parties | EX PARTE REYNOLDS. |
| Court | Alabama Supreme Court |
Application for habeas corpus.
McDonald & Williams, for petitioner.
Agee & Micou, contra.
The city council of Anniston, by an ordinance adopted March 8 1889, prohibited the sale of intoxicants within the police jurisdiction of that city. The penalty prescribed for its violation is a fine of not less than one nor exceeding one hundred dollars, or imprisonment, or hard labor on the streets, for a term not exceeding six months. Petitioner was convicted under this ordinance, and sentenced to 30 days' labor on the streets. Contending that the sentence was illegal, petitioner sued out a writ of habeas corpus, returnable to the city court of Anniston. That court adjudged the sentence to be lawful, and remanded the petitioner to the custody of the city authorities. Thereupon petitioner applied to this court for appellate habeas corpus, and for a review of the city court's ruling. The city of Anniston appeared by counsel, and contests the discharge. It is admitted that the petition truly sets forth the facts and, it is both consented and desired that we consider and determine the merits of the application, without the issue of the preliminary writ.
The act "to incorporate the town of Anniston, Calhoun county, Alabama," was approved February 4, 1879. Sess. Acts, 353. It consists of eight sections, and conforms in the main to the usual routine observed in the incorporation of towns by special enactment. Section 1 gives the dimensions of the town. Section 2 provides for holding elections. Section 3 prescribes the oath of office, constitutes the intendant and councilmen a body corporate, with authority to sue and be sued, (the intendant to preside and preserve order and decorum at all meetings of the council,) and empowers the corporation "in general to do and perform all acts which are incident to bodies corporate, and to purchase, hold, and dispose of, for the benefit of said town, real, personal, and mixed property to the value of twenty thousand dollars." We have now summarized all the powers conferred by the third section. All other powers usually granted to municipal corporations are granted in the other sections of the statute. Among these are the powers to open, improve, and light the streets, to levy taxes, to prevent nuisances, to establish a police, jail, or guard house, to impose and provide for inflicting punishment, to grant occupation licenses, and to regulate places of amusement, and to preserve the good order and quiet of the town by appropriate ordinances, and their enforcement. We have only glanced at the powers conferred by sections 4 to 8 inclusive. To be fully understood, they must be read.
The act, with the title "to amend section 3 of an act entitled 'An act to incorporate the town of Anniston, Calhoun county, Alabama, approved February 4, 1879,"' was approved February 14, 1887. Sess.Acts, 307-332. Under this caption or title will be found a most elaborate statute changing the name of the corporation to that of "The Mayor and City Council of Anniston." It then proceeds to enumerate and confer all the powers deemed necessary to a full-rigged city government, with great fullness and particularity of detail. It not only specifies and confers all the powers which the entire act of February 4, 1879, had conferred, but it enumerates and grants many other powers necessary to a well-appointed city government. It then expressly repeals sections 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 of the act approved February 4, 1879. This act also must be read to be understood.
Our constitution (article 4, § 2) declares that "each law shall contain but one subject, which shall be clearly expressed in the title." The title of the present enactment is to amend section 3 of the act approved February 4, 1879. No one reading that section would have the slightest intimation of one-tenth of the provisions contained in the act approved February 14, 1887; and, in addition to this, the later enactment repeals the last five sections of the older statute. It thus violates each of the provisions of the constitutional clause copied above. It contains more subjects than one, and neither of the subjects of which it treats is sufficiently expressed in the title, if indeed it is expressed at all. In Ballentyne v. Wickersham, 75 Ala. 533, we considered this subject so fully that we consider it unnecessary to reproduce the argument. Chiles v. Monroe, 4 Metc. (Ky.) 72; State v. Harrison, 11 La. Ann. 722; Dorsey's Appeal, 72 Pa. St. 192; People v. Allen, 42 N.Y. 404.
The attempted enactment of February 14, 1887, being...
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State v. Kusick
... ... municipality has adopted a local option statute. Grider ... v. Tally, 77 Ala. 422, 54 Am. Rep. 65; Ex parte ... Reynolds, 87 Ala. 138, 6 So. 335; Long v. State, 165 ... Ala. 101, 51 So. 636; People v. Mueller, 168 Cal ... 521, 143 P. 748, L.R.A. 1915F, ... ...
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State v. Kusick
...be taken that a county or other municipality has adopted a local option statute. Grider v. Tally, 77 Ala. 422, 54 Am. Rep. 65; Ex parte Reynolds, 87 Ala. 138,6 South. 335;Long v. State, 165 Ala. 101,51 South. 636;People v. Mueller, 168 Cal. 521, 143 Pac. 748, L. R. A. 1915F, 788;Hensley v. ......
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South v. Fish
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State v. Smith
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