State v. Shorrock

• Decision Date: 06 October 1909
• Citation: 55 Wash. 208,104 P. 214
• Parties: STATE ex rel. McFADDEN v. SHORROCK et al.
• Court: Washington Supreme Court

104 P. 214

55 Wash. 208

STATE ex rel. McFADDEN v. SHORROCK et al.

Supreme Court of Washington

October 6, 1909

Department 1. Appeal from Superior Court, King County; Geo. E. Morris Judge.

Application by the State, on the relation of J. Clinton McFadden, for writ of mandate against E. Shorrock and others, board of school directors. From an adverse judgment, relator appeals. Affirmed.

Revelle, Revelle & Revelle, for appellant.

John W Whitham, for respondents.

FULLERTON J.

On October 30, 1908, the board of directors of Seattle school district No. 1, King county, state of Washington, at the suggestion of the commissioner of health of the city of Seattle, and the King County Medical Society, adopted a resolution requiring all pupils desirous of attending the public schools of the district to be successfully vaccinated as a condition precedent to their right so to do, further directing that the resolution be not enforced against any one whose condition of health was such as to render it unsafe for him to undergo vaccination. Under the provisions of this resolution the appellant's minor son was excluded from one of the schools of the district, known as the University Heights school, solely because he refused to submit to vaccination. The appellant as relator thereupon applied to the superior court of King county for a writ of mandate against the board of directors to compel them to admit his son to the school. To his application the board of directors made a return in which they gave, as reasons for excluding the son, the resolution above mentioned, together with the recommendations on which it was founded; the fact that smallpox then existed to a greater or less extent in the city of Seattle, and was epidemic in a mild form in many of the nearby cities; that the minor son of the appellant refused to be vaccinated, and the parents and guardian refused to cause or permit him to be vaccinated, and that to permit him to attend the school would be a menace to good health; and further that by virtue of the laws of the state of Washington the board of directors are clothed with power and it is their duty, to require successful vaccination as a condition to school attendance whenever in their judgment conditions demand the exercise of the power. To this return the respondent demurred, on the grounds, first, that the act of the Legislature on which the resolution of the board of directors was founded is unconstitutional; second, that it was repealed by a subsequent statute; and, third, that it is too indefinite to be capable of enforcement. The superior court held the return to be sufficient, and overruled the demurrer. The appellant then elected to stand on his demurrer, whereupon the court entered a judgment dismissing the application.

The appellant urges in this court the objections to the return he insisted upon in the court below. He argues that the clause of the act of the Legislature which the board of directors rely upon to sustain their action is unconstitutional because it is not included in the title of the act of which it forms a part. In 1897 the Legislature by a general act under the title 'An act to establish a general uniform system of public schools in the state of Washington, and repealing,' etc., provided a complete code for the government of the state educational institutions, and repealed by express mention practically all of the prior acts relating thereto then upon the statute books. Laws 1897, p. 392, c. 118, amended by Laws 1905, p. 262, c. 142, § 3. The act, among other things, provided for the organization of school districts in cities having a population of 10,000 or more, and the election of a board of directors to have charge and control of the schools and school property therein. Section 92 of the act read as follows: 'Every board of directors shall have power, and it shall be their duty * * * Ninth: To require successful vaccination as a condition of school membership and to provide free vaccination to all who are unable to pay for the same.' It is this clause that is thought not to be within the title of the act.

The section of the Constitution providing that 'No bill shall embrace more than one subject, and that shall be expressed in the title' (article 2, § 19) has frequently been a subject for consideration by this court. In the early case of Marston v. Humes, 3 Wash. 267, 28 P. 520, we said that this word 'subject' as used in the Constitution could be interpreted in two ways; one to hold that the word is not capable of further reduction, and the other 'to hold that it means a single subject in a more enlarged sense in which may be included a large number of sub-subjects; that to adopt the first would so tie the hands of the Legislature as to make legislation extremely difficult if not impossible while to adopt the second would substantially subserve the object which the framers of the Constitution had in view, and at the same time leave the Legislature free to legislate in a reasonable manner.' The more liberal construction was thereupon adopted, and it has been the rule followed by the court since that time. Thus, in Lancey v. King County, 15 Wash. 9, 45 P. 645, 34 L. R. A. 817, it was held that an act of the Legislature will not be declared void under this clause of the Constitution, except in cases where the violation is most clear, and that both public policy and legislative convenience require that this provision should be liberally construed, that the purpose of the title is only to call attention to the subject-matter of the act, and that the act itself must be looked to for a full description of the powers conferred. In State ex rel. Savings Union v. Whittlesey, 17 Wash. 447, 50 P. 119, it was said that while the object of the...