State ex rel. Harris v. Laughlin

• Decision Date: 30 April 1882
• Citation: 75 Mo. 358
• Parties: THE STATE ex rel. HARRIS v. LAUGHLIN.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

75 Mo. 358

THE STATE ex rel. HARRIS

v.LAUGHLIN.

Supreme Court of Missouri.

April Term, 1882.

Mandamus.

PEREMPTORY WRIT AWARDED.

Joseph R. Harris, relator, pro se.

Mandamus is the proper remedy. Tapping on Mand., *12; Moses on Mand., 19; Rex v. Barker, 3 Burr. 1267; Rex v. Windham, Cowp. 378; People v. Superior Ct., 19 Wend. 68; High on Extr. Leg. Rem., § 156, note; Judges v. People, 18 Wend. 79; Chase v. Blackstone C. Co., 10 Pick. 244; Virginia v. Rives, 100 U. S. 323; Ex parte Burtis, 103 U. S. 238; Ex parte Newman, 14 Wall. 165, 168; Ex parte Crane, 5 Pet. 190; Ex parte Bradstreet, 7 Pet. 647; People v. Judges, 1 Cow. 576; Sanders v. Nelson Cir. Ct., Hardin 17; Stafford v. Bank, 17 How. 278; Beguhl v. Swan, 39 Cal. 411; Ex parte Lowe, 20 Ala. 330; 4 Ala. 393, 569; 5 Ala. 130; 6 Ala. 172; 9 Ala. 627; 13 Ala. 314; 20 Ala. 331; 23 Ala. 518; 26 Ala. 50; 29 Ala. 71; People v. Scates, 4 Ill. 351; Ex parte Milner, 6 Eng. L. & Eq. 371; State v. Judges, 29 La. Ann. 785; Ex parte Henderson, 6 Fla. 279; State v. Judge, 2 Iowa 280; People v. Ins. Co., 19 Mich. 392; Lagrange v. State Treasurer, 24 Mich. 468; Field v. Judge, 30 Mich. 10; Tetherow v. Grundy Co. Ct., 9 Mo. 118; Hall v. Audrain Co. Ct., 27 Mo. 329; State v. Lewis, 71 Mo. 170; State v. Cape Girardeau Ct., 73 Mo. 560; Castello v. St. Louis Cir. Ct., 28 Mo. 259; Garrabrant v. McCloud, 15 N. J. L. 462; Ten Eyck v. Farlee, 16 N. J. L. 269; Moses on Mand., 30; Williams v. Judge, 27 Mo. 225; Blecker v. Law Commr., 30 Mo. 111; State v. Engleman, 45 Mo. 27; Ex parte Morris,11 Gratt. 292; Wright v. Johnson, 5 Ark. 687; Life Ins. Co. v. Wilson, 8 Pet. 302; 1 Chitty Prac., 797; Rex v. Middlesex, 4 B. & Ald. 298; Rex v. Worcester, 1 Chitty 649; Queen v. The Justices, 3 Ad. & E. (N. S.) 810; Rex v. Wiltshire, 10 East 404; Queen v. The Justice, 2 Q. B. D. 516; Queen v. Adamson, 1 Q. B. D. 201; Rex v. Inhabitants, 5 B. & Ad. 597; Reg. v. Richards, 3 Eng. L. & Eq. 410; Queen v. Brown, 7 Ell. & B. 757; Rex v. Justices, 5 B. & Ad. 672; State v. Sutterfield, 54 Mo. 395; Miller v. Richardson, 1 Mo. 310; Sipp v. St. Louis Cir. Ct., 1 Mo. 356; Anderson v. Brown, 6 Fla. 299; Purcell v. McKune, 14 Cal. 230; People v. Wayne Co. Ct., 1 Mich. 359; Rhodes v. Craig, 21 Cal. 419; Re Turner, 5 Ohio 542; Floral Springs Co. v. Rives, 14 Nev. 431; Ex parte The State, 51 Ala. 69; Ex parte Loring, 94 U. S. 418; Ex parte Flippin, 94 U. S. 348; Gunn v. County of Pulaski, 3 Ark. 427; State v. Smith, 19 Wis. 531; Brem v. Arkansas Co. Ct., 9 Ark. 240; People v. Wayne Cir. Judge, 39 Mich. 115; Miller v. Bay Cir. Judge, 41 Mich. 326.

The title of the act is sufficient. State v. Ranson, 73 Mo. 88; City v. Tiefel, 42 Mo. 592; Cooley Const. Lim., (4 Ed.) 176; Ryerson v. Utley, 16 Mich. 277; Sun Mut. Ins. Co. v. The Mayor, 8 N. Y. 253; Morford v Unger, 8 Iowa 82; Whiting v. Mount Pleasant, 11 Iowa 482; Indiana Central R. R. v. Potts, 7 Ind. 681; State v. Bowers, 14 Ind. 195; State v. County Judge, 2 Iowa 280; Brewster v. Syracuse, 19 N. Y. 116; Johnson v. Higgins, 3 Met. (Ky.) 566.

Patrick & Frank and F. D. Turner for respondent.

The amendatory act contravenes section 28, article 4 of the constitution of 1875, and is void. The provision that “no bill shall contain more than one subject, which shall be clearly expressed in the title,” is mandatory and equally obligatory upon the general assembly with any other provision in the constitution, and where a bill is adopted clearly and palpably in opposition to it, there is no alternative but to pronounce it invalid. State v. Miller,45 Mo. 498; Weaver v. Lapsley, 43 Ala. 227; State v. Ah Sam, 15 Nev. 30; s. c., 37 Am. Rep. 454; Cannon v. Mathes, 8 Heisk. 516; Prothro v. Orr, 12 Ga. 40; Cooley Const. Lim., (2 Ed.) § 150; Indiana C. R. R. Co. v. Potts, 7 Ind. 683; State v. Lafayette Co. Ct., 41 Mo. 39; People v. Mellen, 32 Ill. 183. The general object of the bill is all that the constitution requires to be expressed in the title of the bill. The title need not index the contents of the bill, and all matters congruous to and in prosecution of its general object may be inserted and be contained in the body of the bill without being specially mentioned in its title. Matter of Burris, 66 Mo. 446; People v. Hurlbut, 24 Mich. 57; s. c., 9 Am. Rep. 103; People v. Mahaney, 13 Mich. 495; White v. Lincoln, 5 Neb. 505; Ex parte Upshaw, 45 Ala. 236; Reed v. State, 12 Ind. 642; 45 Mo. 498; St. Louis v. Tiefel, 45 Mo. 278; State v. Mathews, 44 Mo. 523; State v. Bank, 45 Mo. 528; Walker v. State, 49 Ala. 331; People v. The Institution, etc., 71 Ill. 233; Parkinson v. State, 14 Md. 196; State v. County Judge, 2 Iowa 281.

The rule of the constitution of 1875, that the subject of a bill, with the exception of bills called appropriation bills and bills passed under the third subdivision of section 44 of article 4 of the constitution, shall be expressed in the title thereof, is open to an additional exception as to acts which are professedly amendatory of others, which exception owes its origin to a construction of the constitutional provision by the courts of this State and by the courts of other states having similar provisions in their constitutions. When the words of an act declare it to be an act to amend an act or a section of an act, the title of the amendatory act need not necessarily express the subject of the act or of the section of the act which it amends, or of the amendment proposed, by words of its own, but will so express it sufficiently if it declare the act to be “An act to amend,” and recite in the title after so declaring the title of the original act which it amends. This is so because the subject of the amendatory act is required in all cases to be germane and congruous to the general object of the original act which it affects, and to recite the title of the original act in the title of the amendatory act is to express the subject of the amendment in the title of the amendatory act. State v. Ranson, 73 Mo. 88; St. Louis v. Tiefel, 42 Mo. 588; State v. Bowers, 14 Ind. 195; People v. Willsea, 60 N. Y. 508; Yellow R. I. Co. v. Arnold, 46 Wis. 221; People v. Briggs, 50 N. Y. 561. If the title of an amendatory act instead of reciting in it in full the title of the original act which it amends, states the subject of the act or of the section which it amends in its own words, or states that it is an act to amend section so and so of chapter so and so, or chapter so and so, and in its own words or in some of the words only of the title of the act which it amends, describes the subject of such section or such chapter, the constitutionality of the act turns entirely upon the question whether the language employed in the title of the amendatory act adequately expresses the subject of the act or of the section amended, or of the amendment in the amendatory act; and under such circumstances the title of the amendatory act can in nowise be aided or helped by the fact, if it be so, that the title of the original act would have embraced the amendatory provision had it been inserted in the original act. The fact that the title to an original act would have authorized the amendatory provision to be inserted in its body had it been done cannot be considered by the court where the title of the original act is not recited in the title of the amendatory act. State v. Ranson, supra; People v. Molineux, 53 Barb. 9; State v. Mead, 71 Mo. 266. An amendatory act, entitled “An act to amend section ____ of article ____ of the Revised Statutes,” expresses no subject and only contains a referance where the subject might be found. A reference to the subject is not what the constitution requires. It must be expressed “in the title.” People v. Hills, 35 N. Y. 449; People v. Briggs, 50 N. Y. 561; House Jour., 30th Gen. Ass. Mo. pp. 1654, 1655; Leonard v. January, 56 Cal. 3 The provision in the constitution of 1865 had been, long prior to its adoption, a part of the organic law of many other states, and in many of them it had been held that “the legislature must determine for itself how broad and comprehensive shall be the subject of a statutory enactment under it, and how much particularity shall be employed in the title defining it.” Bibb Co. Loan Association v. Richards, 21 Ga. 592; Ex parte Pollard, 40 Ala. 98; Mut. Ins. Co. v. New York, 4 Seld. 241; Brewster v. Syracuse, 19 N. Y. 117; State v. Town of Union, 33 N. J. L. 354; People v. Banks, 67 N. Y. 568; 42 Mo. 592; 14 Ind. 195; 7 Ind. 681.

This general interpretation of provisions similar to that in our constitution of 1865, had a tendency to uphold acts whose titles expressed their subjects in a doubtful and obscure manner, and to destroy the mandatory nature of the provision; and this was doubtless the cause which led the convention of 1875 to define in the constitution the degree of particularity which must be used in the title of a bill in expressing its subject, and to require its subject to be “clearly expressed.” It is a settled rule of construction, that where a provision of the organic law antecedently to a revision of the constitution is settled either by clear expressions in the constitution, or adjudications on it, a change of phraseology, if it evidently purports an intention to work a change in the law, will be construed to do so, and that where the words of a statute differ from the words of a prior statute on the same subject, it is evidence they are to have a different and not the same construction. The change from the original requirement “shall be expressed,” to the subsequent requirement, “shall be clearly expressed” in the title, should be given all the force the change imports. Hyatt v. Allen, 54 Cal. 355; Sedgwick on Construction of Statutes, 365; Davis v. Davis, 75 N. Y. 225; Matter of Brown, 21 Wend. 319; Ennis v. Crump, 6 Texas 35; Miller v. The State, 3 Ohio St. 475; Rich v. Keyser, 54 Pa. St. 89; Lehman v. Robinson, 59 Ala. 236. A bill is held, under provisions in constitutions similar to that in the...