State ex rel. Washington Toll Bridge Authority v. Yelle, 36240

• Decision Date: 13 December 1962
• Docket Number: No. 36240,36240
• Citation: 61 Wn.2d 28,377 P.2d 466
• Parties: The STATE of Washington on the relation of the WASHINGTON TOLL BRIDGE AUTHORITY, Plaintiff, v. Cliff YELLE, as State Auditor and Member of the Washington Toll Bridge Authority, Respondent, The Washington State Finance Committee, the Washington State Employees' Retirement Board, Board of Trustees of the Washington State Teachers' Retirement System, and the Washington State Highway Commission, Intervenors.
• Court: Washington Supreme Court

Page 28

61 Wn.2d 28

377 P.2d 466

The STATE of Washington on the relation of the WASHINGTON TOLL BRIDGE AUTHORITY, Plaintiff, v. Cliff YELLE, as State Auditor and Member of the Washington Toll Bridge Authority, Respondent The Washington State Finance Committee, the Washington State Employees' Retirement Board, Board of Trustees of the Washington State Teachers' Retirement System, and the Washington State Highway Commission, Intervenors.

No. 36240.

Supreme Court of Washington, En Banc.

Dec. 13, 1962.

John J. O'Connell Atty. Gen., Harold S. Shefelman, Thomas R. Garlington, Sp. Asst. Attys. Gen., Olympia, Elvin J. Vandeberg, for plaintiff.

Dore, Dubuar & Dore, Fred H. Dore, Seattle, John J. O'Connell, Atty. Gen., David C. Cummins, Olympia, James M. Morris, Seattle, for respondent.

FOSTER, Justice. ^*

This is an original mandamus application to compel the State Auditor to sign refunding bonds for (1) 'The Washington State Ferry System Refunding Revenue Bonds, 1955,' and (2) 'The Washington Toll Bridge Authority, Ferry and Hood Canal Bridge Revenue Bonds, 1957.'

The total original face value of the two issues was $40,500,000, of which $37,920,000 is unpaid. In order to avoid impending default, the legislature of 1961 chose to refund both issues. While retaining the original plan of payment from tolls, a new fund denominated 'The Puget Sound Reserve Account' was established, from which temporary loans were sanctioned.

Pursuant to Laws of 1961, Ex.Ses., chapters 7 and 9, pp. 2551 and 2569, by resolution No. 362, the Toll Bridge Authority authorized a bond issue of $38,000,000 to refund both issues, which bond the State Auditor refused to sign. This proceeding seeks to compel him to perform that statutory duty.

We find the ten arguments advanced by the auditor in support of his refusal to be without merit.

We are met at the threshold by respondent's contention that 'he is not that member of the Authority who is required by law and Resolution No. 362 to sign the proposed bonds.' No useful purpose would be served by restating, even in abridged form, the respondent's supporting argument for it is sufficient to say that RCW 47.60.060 requires the member of the Toll Bridge Authority who is State Auditor to sign the bonds, and that the auditor is a member of that agency, albeit by the Governor's appointment. The constitution, by Art. 4, § 4, confers original jurisdiction in mandamus on the Supreme Court to all state officers. The objection is devoid of merit.

The title of the Laws of 1961, Ex.Ses., chapter 7, p. 2551, is:

'AN ACT Relating to revenue and taxation; increasing the motor vehicle fuel tax, the use fuel tax and motor vehicle license fees, gross weight fees, fees in lieu of gross weight fees, seating capacity fees, providing for the distribution of said revenues; establishing an urban aid account in the motor vehicle fund; establishing a Puget Sound reserve account; providing for the use of the urban aid account and the Puget Sound reserve account; authorizing investment of the Puget Sound reserve account; * * * [amending and repealing certain designated sections of prior statutes]; providing effective dates; and declaring an emergency.'

Respondent makes two contentions that the statute is in violation of Art. 2, § 19, of the constitution, ¹ which prohibits the enactment of a statute containing more than one subject, which must be expressed in the title. Respondent argues that (1) three subjects are included in both the title and body of the act, and (2) one subject in the title is not included in the body.

In considering such claimed defects, it is well to remember that the constitutional provision is an admonition addressed to the legislature and such objections do not involve any invasion of private rights. It was explained in Holzman v. Spokane, 91 Wash. 418, 420, 157 P. 1086, 1087, as follows:

'* * * The doctrine that all reasonable doubts as to the constitutionality of an act of the Legislature should be resolved in favor of upholding the act has peculiar force in the solution of the question of whether or not the act has been in form constitutionally passed, because such a constitutional question has to do with legislative procedure. In other words, it has to do with the methods of transacting public business by a co-ordained branch of the state government, and not with those constitutional guaranties of personal rights which it is the peculiar province of the courts to protect.'

The respondent contends that the subjects of revenue and taxation are unrelated to the Puget Sound reserve account. Resort is had to dictionary definitions of the terms from which the conclusion is drawn that such relationship is lacking. This but exemplifies the comment of a great jurist that it is misleading to make a fortress out of the dictionary in an attempt to interpret statutes. ²

The general subject in both the title to chapter 7 and in the body of the act is revenue and taxation. The distribution of the tax and the creation of the Puget Sound reserve account are integral parts of the scheme. Respondent's argument is a mere assertion to the contrary. The simultaneous creation of a special account, for the distribution of the proceeds of a tax in the act imposing it, is a common legislative device and has been held to be germane to the title of an act relating to revenue and taxation. Commonwealth ex rel. Bell v. Powell, 249 Pa. 144, 94 A. 746; Winter v. Barrett, 352 Ill. 441, 186 N.E. 113, 89 A.L.R. 1398. It was said by the Supreme Court of Indiana in State ex rel. Test v. Steinwedel, 203 Ind. 457, 467, 180 N.E. 865, 868:

'* * * Section 19, art. 4 does not, by restricting the contents of an 'act' to one subject, contemplate a metaphysical singleness of idea or thing, but rather that there must be some rational unity between the matters embraced in the act; the unity being found in the general purpose of the act and the practical problems of efficient administration. It is hardly necessary to suggest that matters which ordinarily would not be thought to have any common features or characteristics might for purposes of legislative treatment be grouped together and treated as one subject. For purposes of legislation, 'subjects' are not absolute existences to be discovered by some sort of a priori reasoning, but are the result of classification for convenience of treatment and for greater effectiveness in attaining the general purpose of the particular legislative act. * * *'

The Puget Sound reserve account is embraced within the general subject of revenue and taxation.

However, the main argument in support of the claim that chapter 7 violates the single subject and title limitations of the constitution is that the Senate was misled by the inclusion in the title of the words 'establishing an urban aid account in the motor vehicle fund' while no such provision is in the body of the act. Respondent resorts to the printed bill and entries in the legislative journals to establish that the Senate was misled because the bill, as it originally passed the Senate, created an urban aid account which was stricken by House amendment without changing the title, so that the Senate accepted the House amendments in the belief that the urban aid provisions remained in the bill.

The short and simple answer is that we will not embark upon such an investigation because the enrolled-bill doctrine, long a citadel in our law, forbids, and matter embraced in the title not included in the body of the act is disregarded as surplusage. Whitfield v. Davies, 78 Wash. 256, 138 P. 883; State ex rel. Wolfe v. Parmenter, 50 Wash. 164, 96 P. 1047, 19 L.R.A., N.S., 707.

Again we decline to discard the enrolledbill rule and substitute in its place the journal-entry rule. It is just short of seventy years since the enrolled-bill doctrine was first announced in State ex rel. Reed v. Jones, 6 Wash. 452, 34 P. 201, 23 L.R.A. 340. That case is extraordinarily persuasive because it was written by Judge Hoyt, who, but four years earlier, had served as President of the Constitutional Convention. It is unnecessary to repeat the arguments for and against each theory because they are adequately summarized in Derby Club, Inc. v. Becket, 41 Wash.2d 869, 252 P.2d 259, and Roehi v. Public Utility District No. 1, 43 Wash.2d 214, 261 P.2d 92.

The matter was simplified by Judge Mackintosh in State ex rel. Dunbar v. State Board of Equalization, 140 Wash. 433, 249 P. 996, in a single sentence:

'* * * Finding an enrolled bill in the office of the Secretary of State, unless that bill carries its death warrant in its hand, the courts will make no investigation of the antecedent history connected with its passage except as such an investigation may be necessary in case of ambiguity in the bill for the purpose of determining the legislative intent. * * *'

The enrolled bill is fair on its face and carries its own passport to validity, which is impervious to collateral attack.

The first of five arguments that Laws of 1961, Ex.Ses., chapter 9, p. 2569, violates Art. 2, § 37, of the state constitution in amending existing law without complying with the constitutional formula is that it amends RCW 47.60.140, ³ which requires the toll bridge bonds to be paid solely from tolls.

Chapter 9 does not relieve the toll revenues from the burden of the complete payment of the bonds plus interest because the authorized loans from the Puget Sound reserve account must be repaid. Attention was directed to this circumstance in State ex rel. Hoppe v. Meyers, 58 Wash.2d 320, 363 P.2d 121.

The legislature has, from the very beginning, insisted that such bonds should be paid solely by tolls. Those bonds are not general obligations of the state. That is the inherent character of revenue bonds. The original provision of Laws of 1949, chapter 179, § 4, p. 489, 490, made this perfectly clear. The language of the act is:

'* * * Each such revenue bond shall contain a...