Forrester v. City of Memphis

• Decision Date: 13 April 1929
• Citation: 15 S.W.2d 739,159 Tenn. 16
• Parties: FORRESTER et al. v. CITY OF MEMPHIS. CRAIG et al. v. SAME.
• Court: Tennessee Supreme Court

15 S.W.2d 739

159 Tenn. 16

FORRESTER et al. v. CITY OF MEMPHIS.

CRAIG et al. v. SAME.

Supreme Court of Tennessee.

April 13, 1929

Appeal from Chancery Court, Shelby County; D. W. De Haven Chancellor.

Suits by P. O. Forrester and others and by J. L. Craig and others against the City of Memphis. From the decrees, complainants appeal. Affirmed in each case.

J. G Reasonover, of Memphis, and J. S. Pilcher and W. B. Campbell Pilcher, both of Nashville, for appellants.

E. B Klewer and Walter Chandler, City Atty., both of Memphis, for appellee.

SWIGGART J.

Chapter 790 of the Private Acts of 1919 purported to extend the corporate limits of the city of Memphis; and the city of Memphis levied and collected taxes on property located within the corporate limits thus extended. The constitutionality of this statute having been questioned, chapter 1 of the Private Acts of 1925 was enacted, extending the city limits so as to include the same territory embraced in the provisions of the act of 1919.

Chapter 442 of the Private Acts of 1925 further extended the corporate limits of the city of Memphis so as to include within the city limits property contiguous to that described in chapter 1 of the Private Acts of 1925 and chapter 490 of the Private Acts of 1919.

These suits were instituted to recover from the city taxes paid on the property included within the act of 1919, and to enjoin the assessment and collection of taxes on the property included within the two acts of 1925.

Chapter 442 of the Private Acts of 1925 is assailed as unconstitutional because the property described therein is not contiguous to the city limits, as they existed at the time said act was passed. If either the act of 1919 or chapter 1 of the Private Acts of 1925 is constitutional and valid, then the criticism of chapter 442 fails, since the property described in the two earlier amendments is the property lying between that described in chapter 442 and the city limits previously existing.

The chancellor held chapter 790 of the Private Acts of 1919 unconstitutional, upon demurrer, and no assignments of error are directed at his holding on that proposition.

Two questions are made on the constitutionality of chapter 1 of the Private Acts of 1925. It is insisted that the act is void because the subject is not expressed in the caption or title, so as to conform to the Constitution, art. 2, § 17, and that the act was not passed on three legislative days in each House of the General Assembly, as required by the Constitution. It is further insisted that, while this statute purports to have been signed by the Governor on January 9, 1925, it was not returned by the Governor to the General Assembly until January 12, 1925, and was therefore not a valid enactment on January 10, so as to authorize an assessment for taxes for the year 1925.

The title of chapter 1 of the Private Acts of 1925 is: "A bill to be entitled, an Act to amend the charter of the City of Memphis, and all Acts amendatory thereof, so as to define the corporate limits of the City of Memphis, in Shelby County, Tennessee."

The chancellor correctly treated the word "define," as used in the caption, as equivalent to declare, fix, or establish, and held that provisions extending, restricting, or changing the city limits were germane to the purpose so expressed in the caption. The authorities cited by the chancellor clearly support his conclusion. In re Fourth Judicial District (In re Board of Commissioners of Johnson County), 4 Wyo. 133, 32 P. 850; Commissioners v. Bailey, 13 Kan. 600; Walters v. Richardson, 93 Ky. 374, 20 S.W. 279; People v. Bradley, 36 Mich. 447; Wallace & Co. v. Ferguson, 70 Or. 306, 140 P. 742, 141 P. 542; State v. Bartholomew, 176 Ind. 182, 95 N.E. 417, Ann. Cas. 1914B, 91; State v. Hocker, 36 Fla. 358, 18 So. 767; Dill v. Murphy, 15 Eng. Rep. (Reprint) 784.

It is contended that the constitutional requirement that the subject of the act be stated in the caption is not complied with in a statute of this character, unless the caption indicates the particular territory to be added to or taken from a municipal corporation. In support of this contention, it argued that a charter amendment, under such a title, might pass two readings in the General Assembly, containing provisions affecting one area, and, after amendment, pass third reading and become a law, with provisions affecting an entirely distinct and different area of land.

The argument just stated would be equally applicable to any statute, with a caption framed in general as distinguished from restricted language, materially amended upon third reading. It is, however, well settled that the identity of a statute is determined by its caption, and that, if the subject expressed in the caption be single, any amendment germane thereto may be introduced into the bill at any time prior to its third and final reading and passage. Southern R. Co. v. Memphis, 126 Tenn. 267, 292, 293, 148 S.W. 662, 41 L. R. A. (N. S.) 828, Ann. Cas. 1913E, 153, and cases there cited; Erwin v. State, 116 Tenn. 80, 93 S.W. 73.

To hold that an act amending a city charter so as to extend the corporate limits must indicate in its caption the particular area to be included within the city would do violence to the long list of decisions construing the provision of the Constitution which requires that the subject of legislation be stated in the caption. Many of these cases are collected by Mr. Shannon in his Annotated Constitution, pp. 224, 225. More recent cases are Hunter v. Conner, 152 Tenn. 258, 277 S.W. 71; Wilson v. State, 143 Tenn. 55, 224 S.W. 168; Petty v. Ph nix Cotton Oil Co., 150 Tenn. 292, 264 S.W. 353; House v. Creveling, 147 Tenn. 589, 250 S.W. 357.

We are referred to Village of Fairview v. City of Detroit, 150 Mich. 1, 113 N.W. 368, as sustaining the position of the appellants on this point. In that case it was held that a statute which purported in its caption to be an act annexing the entire territory composing the village of Fairview to the city of Detroit was not correctly or constitutionally captioned, when the body of the act annexed only a part of the territory designated in the caption, leaving a part of the village outside the city limits.

The case cited does not support the position of the appellants here. The effect of the decision was to hold the caption misleading and deceptive, and therefore not stating the purpose expressed in the body of the act. A similar conclusion was reached by this court in Harris et al. v. Rush et al., 157 Tenn. 295, 8 S.W.2d 366. The principle involved is that, if the caption be made narrow and restricted, the body of the act must be equally restricted, although a broader and more comprehensive caption would have been permissible.

The caption of chapter 442 of the Private Acts of 1925 is identical with the caption of chapter 1, except that the word "extend" is used instead of the word "define." The authorities cited clearly sustain the sufficiency of this caption.

The Senate bill, which was enacted as chapter 1 of the Private Acts of 1925, was introduced and passed on first reading in the Senate on the day fixed by the Constitution for the meeting of the General Assembly, the first Monday in January. The journal of the House of Representatives for that day recites that the House of Representatives was called to order on the same day, and that a quorum of the membership duly qualified, following which an adjournment was ordered until the following day, Tuesday January 6. The organization of the House of Representatives was completed by the election of a speaker and other officers on Tuesday.

It is contended that the Senate could not constitutionally pass a bill on first reading, or take any other legislative action until the House of Representatives had completed its organization, and both Houses of the General...