Park v. Candler

• Decision Date: 04 January 1902
• Citation: 40 S.E. 523,114 Ga. 466
• Parties: PARK, Treasurer, v. CANDLER, Governor.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

40 S.E. 523

114 Ga. 466

PARK, Treasurer,

v.CANDLER, Governor.

Supreme Court of Georgia.

Jan. 4, 1902.

STATE DEBT—PAYMENT—PUBLIC PROPERTY— PROCEEDS OF SALE—CONSTITUTIONAL LAW.

The mandate of the constitution embraced in that paragraph thereof which declares that the proceeds arising from the sale of the public property owned by the state shad be applied to the payment of the bonded debt of the state, and used for no other purpose whatever, is fully met when such proceeds are devoted to the payment of the interest on the public debt, because the interest contracted to be paid is as much a part of that debt as the principal named in the bond.

Pish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

1. In interpreting the provisions of a constitution it is to be presumed that the words therein used were employed in their natural and ordinary meaning; and, where a word has a technical as well as a popular meaning, the courts will generally accord to it its popular signification, unless the nature of the subject indicates, or the context suggests, that it is used in a technical sense. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

2. Constitutions are the result of popular will, and their words are to be understood ordinarily in the sense that such words convey to the popular mind. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

3. A constitution is to be considered as a whole, and effect is to be given, if possible, to each section, clause, and word; and, if the language of any part be doubtful, it must be interpreted by every fair intendment to harmonize with the main purpose, and not to defeat it. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

4. The presumption is that the same meaning attaches to a given word or phrase wherever it occurs in a constitution; and, where a word or phrase is used in one part of a constitution in a plain and manifest sense, it is to receive the same interpretation when used in every other part, unless it manifestly appears from the context or otherwise that a different meaning should be applied to it. Per Pish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

5. In interpreting a provision in a constitution, the meaning of which is doubtful or ambiguous, the courts, in endeavoring to arrive at the intention of the people, will consider the object sought to be accomplished and the mischief sought to be remedied by the provision, and to this end will deal with the provision in the light of prior or contemporaneous history and the conditions and circumstances under which the constitution was framed. Per Pish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

6. The proceedings and debates of a constitutional convention, while powerless to vary the terms of the constitution, are nevertheless valuable aids in determining the purpose and consequent meaning of a doubtful provision. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

7. The power of legislation may be taken away from the lawmaking power by the constitution as well by implication as by express prohibition, and prohibitions against legislation which result by implication are equally as effectual as when they are express, and are to be regarded in the one case no less than in the other. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

8. When all of the provisions of a constitution on a giveu subject disclose a plan for the regulation of the finances of the state, it is necessarily implied from the instrument that the general assembly should not pass any law which would have the effect of destroying such plan. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

9. While legislative and executive construction of a constitution, as fixed by a long-continued and unbroken exercise of a given power claimed to be authorized by the-constitution, is a weighty argument in favor of the constitutionality of such exercise of authority, a single exercise of power either by the legislative or executive department in a long period of years is entitled to little or no weight, when the question is before the courts for the first time, and no rights of any one interested in the case in hand have vested under such exercise of authority. Per Pish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

10. An interpretation of a constitutional provision by the general assembly, in order to be entitled to weight as contemporary interpretation, must be the result of legislation passed very nearly the time that the constitution was adopted; and legislation passed nearly five years after the adoption of the constitution is not entitled to be ranked as contemporary interpretation of the constitution by the general assembly in the sense of the rule just referred to. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

11. A doubt as to the constitutionality of any proposed legislative enactment should in any case be reason sufficient for refusing to adopt it. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

12. Generally, there is a presumption from the mere passage of an act or resolution by the general assembly that the members of that body have deliberately passed upon the question of the constitutionality of the act or resolution, and, as a result of this presumption, the courts, in case of doubt as to the constitutionality of the legislation, will hold the same to be constitutional; thus according to the members of the legislative department due credit for having deliberately and conscientiously passed upon the question, and giving to the legislation the weight which it should receive as the result of a deliberate and conscientious exercise of authority by the members of the legislative department of the government, who are equally bound with the members of the judicial department to support the constitution. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

13. Quaere: Where it appears upon the face of an act or resolution that the general assembly has not attempted to pass upon the constitutionality of the legislation therein provided, and that it is the manifest purpose of the act or resolution that it shall not go into effect until the courts shall determine that it is not repugnant to the constitution, is there any presumption at all in favor of the constitutionality of such an act or resolution? Per Fish and Cobb. JJ., dissenting.

14. The argument ab inconvenienti should not, as a general rule, be resorted to in interpreting the provisions of a constitution; and especially should the argument from inconvenience not be at ail considered when the lawmaking power under the constitution had ample authority not only to prevent the inconvenience complained of. but also to remedy it, after it had arisen, in a manner other than that contemplated in the act or resolution under considera-tion, even if it be regarded as of doubtful constitutionality. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

15. The expression "bonded debt" of a corporation, state, etc., in a strictly legal and technical sense, embraces both the principal and interest that may accrue upon a debt of that class. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

16. Such expression, in its popular sense, embraces only the principal of the debt. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

17. The term "bonded debt, " as used in paragraph 1, § 13, art. 7, of the constitution (Civ. Code, § 5900), which provides that the proceeds of the sale of public property shall be applied to the payment of the bonded debt of the state, and shall not be used for any other purpose whatever so long as the state has any existing bonded debt, was used in its popular, and not in its strictly legal and technical, sense. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

18. There is no mandatory requirement in the constitution that the interest on the public debt shall be raised by taxation, if there is revenue from any source which may be applied to the payment of such interest consistently with the constitution. Const, art. 7, § 14, par. 1 (Civ. Code, § 5901), requires only that the general assembly shall each year raise by taxation such an amount as may be required to pay the pub-lie expenses and interest on the public debt, and, if there is any fund from which either the public expenses or the interest on the public debt may be constitutionally paid, the sum required to be raised by taxation would be only the difference between the amount of public expenses or interest on the public debt and the fund constitutionally available to discharge these items; and, if there is a fund constitutionally available for this purpose which will pay such items in full, then no sum is required to be raised by taxation. Per Fish and Cobb, JJ., dissenting.

19. When all of the provisions of the constitution in reference to the public debt are taken together, and especially when such provisions are taken in the light of the proceedings of and debates in the convention which framed the constitution, it is clearly derivable from the terms of that instrument that it was the purpose of its framers to provide a plan whereby the state would at some time in the future be entirely relieved of debt, and this plan was to be effectuated by raising such sum annually by taxation as was necessary to pay the interest of the public debt each year, and the principal was to be discharged by a sinking fund made up of installments of a given amount raised each year by taxation and the proceeds of the sale of any public property that the general assembly might authorize to be sold; and, if the sinking fund and the proceeds of the sale of public property together were not sufficient to discharge the entire principal at the maturity of the debt, such additional amount as was necessary for this purpose was to be raised by taxation. Per Fish and Cobb, J J., dissenting.

20. The scheme provided in the constitution for the final redemption of the state from a condition of indebtedness was intended to be carried out in such a way that there would not be in any given year or series of years any burdensome tax levy to meet the principal of the public debt, or any part thereof. Per Fish and Oobb, JJ., dissenting.

21. Quaere: The constitution declaring that the proceeds of the sale of public...