Town of Longview v. City of Crawfordsville

• Decision Date: 13 January 1905
• Docket Number: 20,274
• Citation: 73 N.E. 78,164 Ind. 117
• Parties: Town of Longview v. City of Crawfordsville
• Court: Indiana Supreme Court

73 N.E. 78

164 Ind. 117

Town of Longview v. City of Crawfordsville

No. 20,274

Supreme Court of Indiana

January 13, 1905

From Montgomery Circuit Court; Jere West, Judge.

Action by the Town of Longview against the City of Crawfordsville for an injunction. From a decree for defendant, plaintiff appeals.

Reversed.

E. C Snyder and S. C. Kennedy, for appellant.

Finley P. Mount, for appellee.

OPINION

Monks, J.

The General Assembly of 1903 passed an act entitled "An act to provide for the extension of the corporation boundaries of cities not operating under a special charter and having a population, according to the last preceding United States census, of between six thousand and seven thousand and for the annexation of territory by such cities, and for the consolidation of such cities and incorporated towns lying within territory annexed to such city, and providing for remonstrance and appeal." Acts 1903, p. 201. Under the provisions of said act, appellee, the city of Crawfordsville, adopted an ordinance annexing to said city all the territory within the corporate limits of the town of Longview. It is provided in section three of said act, that "No such annexation shall be made under the foregoing sections of a part of the territory of any incorporated town, but only of the whole incorporated territory thereof; and in case of such annexation the two corporations shall be deemed to be consolidated under the name of the city annexing, and the consolidated corporation shall be bound for all the debts and liabilities and shall be the owner of all the corporate property, franchises and rights of every nature of both such municipal corporations."

The question presented by the record is the constitutionality of said act of 1903, under which said ordinance was passed by appellee. It is insisted by appellant that said act is in conflict with the Constitution of this State, because it is a special law, and because it grants privileges and immunities to citizens and a "class of citizens" which, upon the same terms, do not equally belong to all citizens. Section 22 of article 4 of the state Constitution provides that the General Assembly shall not pass local or special laws in any of the following enumerated cases, naming seventeen subjects. Nothing is said in the section named in regard to laws for annexation of territory to a city or town, or for fixing the boundaries thereof, or for uniting or consolidating a city and town. It is provided in § 23 of article 4 of the state Constitution: "In all the cases enumerated in the preceding section, and in all other cases when a general law can be made applicable, all laws shall be general, and of uniform application throughout the State." It has been held, since Gentile v. State (1868), 29 Ind. 409, that whether in cases not enumerated in § 22 of article 4 a general law can or can not be made applicable as required by said § 23, is a question to be determined by the legislature, and not by the courts. City of Indianapolis v. Navin (1898), 151 Ind. 139, 155, 156, 41 L.R.A. 337, 47 N.E. 525, and cases cited.

Appellee insists that, even if said act is a special law, as the subject thereof is not enumerated in § 22 of article 4, supra, the legislature, by passing the same, has determined that a general law can not be made applicable, and the judgment of the legislature can not be reviewed by the courts.

There is, however, another section of the state Constitution prohibiting the enactment of special laws, which must be considered in determining the question before us. Section 13 of article 11 of the state Constitution provides: "Corporations, other than banking, shall not be created by special act, but may be formed under general laws." This section relates to municipal as well as private corporations. Wiley v. Corporation of Bluffton (1887), 111 Ind. 152, 155, 12 N.E. 165; Corporation of Bluffton v. Studabaker (1885), 106 Ind. 129, 131, 6 N.E. 1.

It has been held by this court that said § 13 of article 11 does not prohibit the enactment of special laws which do not attempt to create new corporate powers or franchises, but which merely regulate existing corporations in the exercise of powers already conferred upon them; that such special acts are not unconstitutional, unless on a subject enumerated in § 22 of article 4, supra. City of Indianapolis v. Navin, supra; In re Application of the Bank of Commerce (1899), 153 Ind. 460, 463-465, 47 L.R.A. 489. See, also, Wallace v. Loomis (1877), 97 U.S. 146, 154, 24 L.Ed. 895; 1 Thompson, Corporations, § 585; 10 Cyc. Law and Proc., 177, 178.

Since 1857 there has been in force a general law for the annexation of towns to cities which adjoin each other, and the consolidation thereof. Acts 1857, p. 22, § 4208 Burns 1901, § 3233 R. S. 1881. But that law (§ 4209 Burns 1901, § 3234 R. S. 1881) provides that "The common council of the city and the president and trustees of the town shall first agree on the terms and conditions upon which such union, consolidation, or annexation shall take place, and also upon a day when an election shall be held for the people of such town and city to vote upon the question of union, consolidation, or annexation, upon the terms specified in such agreement," and that the same could not take effect unless a majority of the qualified voters of the town and a majority of the qualified voters of the city shall vote in favor thereof at the election to be held for that purpose. The only power said act of 1857 gave cities and towns was to agree with each other to such annexation, union or consolidation, in the manner set forth in said act. Neither alone had the power of annexation, union or consolidation. It is clear that said act of 1903 (Acts 1903, p. 201) was not a mere regulation of the exercise of a power already possessed by cities of the population named therein, but that the same attempted to confer upon cities of a population of more than six thousand and less than seven thousand the power to annex incorporated towns, and consolidate the same with such city by ordinance, when they adjoin such city. Before the taking effect of said act, cities in this State had no such power.

It is contended that, as said act applies to all cities having between six thousand and seven thousand population according to the last preceding census, such classification takes it out of the category of special legislation and makes it a general law. In jurisdictions where classification is permitted by the organic law, it is settled that the same, in order to furnish a basis for legislation that will exempt it from the charge of being special, must be a classification which, in the nature of things, suggests and furnishes a reason for and justifies the making of the class. The reason for the classification must inhere in the subject-matter, and the same must be natural, not artificial. Under this rule, neither mere isolation nor arbitrary selection is proper classification. In re Application of the Bank of Commerce, supra; State, ex rel., v. Parsons (1878), 40 N.J.L. 1; State, ex rel., v. Hammer (1880), 42 N.J.L. 435; State, ex rel., v. Hoagland (1888), 51 N.J.L. 62, 16 A. 166; Wanser v. Hoos (1897), 60 N.J.L. 482, 38 A. 449, 64 Am. St. Rep. 600, and cases cited; Anderson v. Trenton (1880), 42 N.J.L. 486, 488; Inhabitants, etc., v. State (1889), 51 N.J.L. 402, 18 A. 749, 6 L.R.A. 56; Pratt v. Browne (1902), 135 Cal. 649, 652, 67 P. 1082, and cases cited; Rauer v. Williams (1897), 118 Cal. 401, 50 P. 691; Sutton v. State (1896), 96 Tenn. 696, 710, 36 S.W. 697; Angell v. Cass County (1902), 11 N.D. 265, 268, 91 N.W. 72; L'Hote v. Village of Milford (1904), 212 Ill. 418, 72 N.E. 399; People, ex rel., v. Martin (1899), 178 Ill. 611, 53 N.E. 309; Bessette v. People (1901), 193 Ill. 334, 62 N.E. 215, 56 L.R.A. 558; State, ex rel., v. Jones (1902), 66 Ohio St. 453, 482, 64 N.E. 424, 90 Am. St. Rep. 592; State, ex rel., v. Beacom (1902), 66 Ohio St. 491, 506, 64 N.E. 427, 90 Am. St. Rep. 599; Appeal of City of Scranton (1886), 113 Pa. 176, 190, 6 A. 158; Ruan Street (1890), 132 Pa. 257, 19 A. 219, 7 L.R.A. 193; Gulf, etc., R. Co. v. Ellis (1897), 165 U.S. 150, 17 S.Ct. 255, 41 L.Ed. 666; 20 Am. and Eng. Ency. Law (2d ed.), pp. 1228, 1229.

In State v. Pugh (1885), 43 Ohio St. 98, 1 N.E. 439, the court said: "It is not the form a statute is made to assume, but its operation and effect which determine its constitutionality." In Lodi Tp. v. State (1889), 51 N.J.L. 402, 18 A. 749, 6 L.R.A. 56, the following language was used: "The rule is, that in any classification for the purpose of a general law, all must be included and made subject to it and none omitted that stand upon the same footing regarding the subject of legislation."

In State, ex rel., v. Parsons, supra, special laws are thus described: "Interdicted local and special laws are all those that rest on a false or deficient classification; their vice is that they do not embrace all the class to which they are naturally related; they create preferences and establish inequalities; they apply to persons, things or places possessed of certain qualities or situations, and exclude from their effect other persons, things or places which are not dissimilar in these respects."

The rule and reasons therefor are forcibly stated in State ex rel., v. Hammer, supra, at page 440: "Plainly, a law may be general in its provisions, and may apply to the whole of a group of objects having characteristics sufficiently marked and important to make them a class by themselves, and yet such law may be in contravention of this constitutional prohibition. Thus, a law enacting that in every city in the state in which there are ten churches, there should be three commissioners of the water department, with...