State ex rel. Goodsill v. Woodmanse

• Decision Date: 20 October 1890
• Parties: State ex rel. Goodsill v. Woodmanse, Sheriff.
• Court: North Dakota Supreme Court

1 N.D. 246

46 N.W. 970

State ex rel.

Goodsill

v.Woodmanse, Sheriff.

Supreme Court of North Dakota.

Oct. 20, 1890.

Syllabus by the Court.

1. Section 27, c. 23, Laws N. Dak. 1890, entitled “An act to provide for the organization and government of state banks,” which prohibits all persons from doing a banking business in this state, except corporations which are organized under said chapter, examined and held to be constitutional. Said section does not contravene either section 1 of article 1 of the state constitution or section 1 of the fourteenth amendment to the federal constitution.

2. Said section 27 is upheld as a proper exercise by the legislature of that branch of the internal police power of the state which relates to the public safety.

3. Held further, that said section 27 is not a violation of section 61 of the state constitution, which provides that “no bill shall embrace more than one subject, which shall be expressed in its title; but a bill which violates this provision shall be invalidated thereby only as to so much thereof as shall not be so expressed.”

Habeas corpus proceedings.W. H. Francis and A. C. Davis, for relator. George F. Goodwin, Atty. Gen., for defendant.

Wallin, J.

Defendant's return to the writ shows that the relator is detained in defendant's custody, as sheriff of Kidder county, by virtue of a certain warrant of commitment for the alleged offense of doing business as an individual banker, contrary to the provisions of section 27 of the act entitled “An act to provide for the organization and government of state banks.” Chapter 23, Laws N. Dak. 1890, p. 106. Section 27 of the act reads as follows: “It shall be unlawful for any individual, firm, or corporation to continue to transact a banking business, or to receive deposits for a period longer than six months immediately after the passage and approval of this act, without first having complied with and organized under the provisions of this act. Any person violating the provisions of this section, either individually or as an interested party, in any association or corporation, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and, on conviction thereof, be fined not less than five hundred (500) dollars, nor more than $1,000, or imprisonment in the county jail not less than ninety days, or either, or both, at the discretion of the court.” The other provisions of the statute need not be quoted. For the purposes of this case, it will suffice to state that the statute contains 30 sections, which, taken together, provide fully and minutely for the organization and government of banking corporations in this state. By its terms, the business of conducting banks of discount, deposit, and exchange is made an exclusive corporate franchise; and all other kinds of banks, whether conducted by individual firms or other corporations, are forbidden, under the penalties prescribed by section 27 of the act. The statute throws around the business of banking in North Dakota numerous restraints, checks, and regulations which do not exist at common law. Many, if not all, of the features of the statute were borrowed from the existing laws of the United States regulating the organization and government of national banks, and similar enactments have likewise been passed by the legislatures of many of the states.

While not assailing the whole act as unconstitutional, the relator contends that section 27, above quoted, so far as it concerns individuals or firms doing business without incorporation, contravenes both the federal and state constitutions. Counsel for relator cite section 1 of article 1 of the state constitution, and also section 1 of the fourteenth amendment of the constitution of the United States, and claim that the relator's constitutional rights and personal liberty, as secured by these organic acts, have been ruthlessly violated and taken away by section 27 of the statute, for the reason that the section, among other things, prohibits individuals from carrying on the business of banking in a private capacity, and punishes all who violate the prohibition. This contention of the relator was urged with great learning and ability by the eminent counsel representing the prisoner, but we find no support in the authorities cited for the relator for the contention. It is true that it has been held that the provision relative to personal liberty found in our constitution might be violated by the enactment of a statute which operated to deprive a citizen of the right to pursue a lawful trade or avocation. In re Jacobs, 98 N. Y. 98;People v. Marx, 99 N. Y. 377, 2 N. E. Rep. 29. But, on the other hand, it is conceded that the business of banking, by reason of its very intimate relations to the fiscal affairs of the people, and the revenues of the state, is and has ever been considered a proper subject of legislative control, and strictly within the domain of the internal police power of every state. As a matter of fact, we have been unable to find an authority, and we have searched diligently, which has ever questioned the right of the legislature in the exercise of police power to regulate, restrain, and govern the business of banking. The relator, however, complains that section 27 does not merely regulate; it goes further, and prohibits individuals from banking in a private capacity. But the prohibition of private banking necessarily results from the inauguration of a banking system for the state, in which the business is made an exclusive corporate...