Heath v. Rotherham

• Decision Date: 11 September 1909
• Citation: 77 A. 520,79 N.J.L. 22
• Parties: HEATH v. ROTHERHAM.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

77 A. 520

79 N.J.L. 22

HEATH

v. ROTHERHAM.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

Sept. 11, 1909.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

For other definitions, see Words and Phrases, vol. 6, pp. 5551, 5552.]

Mandamus by Forrest A. Heath against John Rotherham. Peremptory writ granted.

Argued June term, 1909, before SWAYZE, TRENCHARD, and MINTURN, JJ.

Merritt Lane and George L. Record, for relator.

. Alan H. Strong and Alexander Simpson, for defendant.

SWAYZE, J. The defendant in this case, acting as chairman of the Republican county committee of Hudson county, filed with the city clerk of Jersey City a list of vacancies in the county committee. This seems to have been an attempted compliance with the act of 1909. P. L. 1909, p. 159. The relator complains that it was not a compliance with that act, for the reason that the act requires the chairman of the county committee to file with the clerks of the several municipalities a statement of the whole number of committeemen. The controversy between the parties is whether an entirely new county committee is to be elected at the ensuing primaries, or whether a certain number of the former members of the county committee hold over pursuant to the constitution adopted by the committee.

The defendant first assails the act itself as unconstitutional upon several grounds, which I will deal with in the order in which they were presented.

First. That the provisions of the act are not embraced within the title, which is "An act to amend an act entitled 'A further supplement to an act entitled "An act to regulate elections,"'" etc. The point made is that the choice of a county committee has nothing to do with the conduct of a public election. The object of the constitutional provision has been stated often enough to be the giving of notice to the public of the subject-matter of the intended legislation, and. If the title is sufficient to apprise the public that legislation of the character proposed may actually be intended, it is sufficient. We think that, in view of the fact that the election boards have for many years prior to the enactment of the act to regulate elections in 1898 been chosen by the chairman of the county committees of the Republican and Democratic parties, the title has come to have such a meaning that a reasonable man ought to know that legislation affecting the chairman of the county committee so far as concerns his duties in connection with the election may be intended under such a title. By the legislation for nearly 20 years the county committees have been recognized as a part of the machinery of public elections, and, although thoughtful persons may well think that an exaggerated importance is thereby given to mere party machinery, we think it clear that the constitutional provision requiring the object of an act to be stated in its title is sufficiently complied with in this case. The connection of the chairman of the county committee with the conduct of elections is so important and so intimate that the method of his own selection has a direct bearing upon the public election itself. This objection is therefore invalid. It is true that this court said in State v. Woodruff, 68 N. J. Daw, 89, at page 94, 52 Atl. 294, at page 296, that "a primary is not an election in the sense of the common law. It is merely a method for the selection of persons to be balloted for at such an election." But this expression must be read in the light of subsequent legislation, and of the recent decision of this court in State v. Bienstock, 73 Atl. 530, 538. A primary election may not have been an election in the sense of the common law, but it has been treated as such by our statutory law and in common parlance.

The second objection, that the act seeks to include in the election act more than one object by intermixing in one and the same act such things as have no proper relation to each other, stands on no better ground than the first objection, and must likewise fail.

The third objection is that the act impairs the obligation of the contract between members of the party represented by the county committee. This argument rests upon the fact that the Republican county committee of Hudson county is a corporation owning real estate worth about $15,000. The argument carried to its logical conclusion would deny all rights to Republicans, unless they are at the same time in some way members of the corporation. We are not now called upon to pass upon the question of property rights. It is quite enough to say that it is within the power of the Legislature to define a county committee within the meaning of the election law, and only such a county committee as the Legislature chooses to recognize can have any right to deal with the election machinery. There may at the same time exist a private corporation bearing a similar name and having property rights, but that private corporation, limited as it necessarily must be in its numbers, is evidently not the county committee which the Legislature had in mind, and it may very well be doubted whether it would be within the power of the Legislature to give to a private corporation of more or less exclusive membership the control of the election machinery which is vested in the county committees that comply with the legislative requirements. There is, however, another answer to this argument. Mr. Rotherham, the defendant, acting as chairman of the committee, undertook to file a list under the act of 1909. We can hardly assume that he did this without the authority of the Republican county committee. It is not even suggested that any one questions that his act was with the tacit assent of all the members of the corporation known as the Republican county committee. By that act he and they therefore elected to come within the scheme of the Legislature, and, having so elected, they cannot now say that their membership and the right to vote therefor is not subject to the legislative requirements.

The next objection is that the Legislature has made the affidavit of a voter at a primary conclusive evidence of the voter's qualification. To this the answer is that it was for the Legislature to determine how the party affiliations and the resulting right to vote at a party primary were to be determined, and as long as these requirements were not arbitrary, and left it open to the voluntary will of the voter whether he would take part in the primary or not, we think that there was no constitutional objection.

The objection that the statute conflicts with the constitutional provision forbidding the appropriation of money for the use of any society, association, or corporation whatever is equally futile. Since the election of the county committee has a direct bearing upon the conduct of the public election, the money...