160 Ga. 189 | Ga. | 1925
At the general State election held on November 4. 1924, 0. R. Bennett was elected a member of the Public Service Commission of this State. Thereupon the Governor of this State, issued to him a commission in writing, commissioning him as a member of said Commission for a term of six years commencing January 1, 1925, and expiring January 1, 1931. Bennett took the oath of office and qualified as a member of said Commission. Upon the morning of January 1, 1925, Bennett presented himself, with
Thereupon Bennett filed his petition against the Public Service Commission, Paul B. Trammell as chairman of said Commission, and Paul B. Trammell, Walter R. McDonald, James D. Price, and James A. Perry, as members of said Commission, in which he alleged the facts hereinbefore stated. He further alleged that the act of the chairman in calling said Commission together in special session without official notification to him was contrary to law, exceeded the powers of said chairman and said Commission, and was null and void. He further alleged that said act of said Trammell, as a member and as chairman, and the act of the other members of the Commission who participated in said meeting, was without warrant or authority of law, and that said chairman and said members are now acting contrary to law and without authority of law in refusing and denying him the right to sit as a member in the sessions of said Commission, in refusing to give him any voice in the acts and doings of said Commission, and in wrongfully prohibiting him from performing any of the duties devolving upon him as a member of said Commission. He further alleged that all the acts of said chairman of said Commission and the several members thereof as heretofore stated are trespasses against his rights, and that such conduct of the chairman and members exceeds their powers and is null and void. The petition further
To the petition the defendants demurred on the grounds: (1) that the same sets out no cause of action; (2) that it affirmatively appears from the facts set out in the petition, and from matters of which the court will take judicial cognizance, that the term of office of the petitioner does not commence until December, 1925; (3) that the act of 1918 (Ga. Laws 1918, p. 154), as amended by the act of 1921 (Ga. Laws 1921, p. 232), and particularly the third section of said act of 1918 as thus amended, whereby it is purported to change the term of office of certain officers, is unconstitutional and void, for the reasons that said third section of said act is in conflict with article 3, section 7, paragraph 8, of the constitution of this State, wherein it is provided that “No law or ordinance shall pass which refers to more than one'subject-matter, or contains matter different from what is expressed in the title thereof;” and (4) that the proper proceeding to try petitioner’s title to this office is by an information in the nature of a quo warranto, and not by mandamus. The trial judge sustained this demurrer and dismissed the petition; but held that mandamus was a proper remedy for the assertion of the rights claimed by the petitioner. To the judgment dismissing the petition the petitioner excepted.
We can not agree to the contention of counsel for petitioner that, under the facts set out in the petition, petitioner was entitled to take his seat as a duly elected member of the Public Service
The commencement of the term of an office is generally a ques
The question in this case is when does the term of office of the petitioner begin — on January 1, 1925, or on December 1, 1925 P By section 2616 of the Civil Code of 1910, the petitioner was elected for a full term of six years from December 1, 1925, unless this section has been changed by subsequent legislation. On August 19, 1918, the legislature passed “An act to prescribe the manner in which the returns of elections for Secretary of State, Treasurer, Comptroller-General, and all other State-House officers, who are to be commissioned by the Governor, shall be made, and for other purposes.” By the first section of this act it is provided “That the returns for every election for Secretary of State, Treasurer, and Comptroller-General shall be sealed up by the managers separately from the other returns and directed to the President of the Senate and Speaker of the House of Bepresentatives, in the same manner and at the same time that the returns for the election of Governor are made, and shall be transmitted to the Secretary of State, who shall, without opening the same, cause the same to be laid before the Senate on the day after the two Houses shall be organized, and at the same time the returns for the election of Governor are laid before the Senate, and they shall be transmitted by the Senate to the House of Bepresentatives.” Section 2 of this act declares “That the returns of the election of every other officer, where the returns are required to be made to the Secretary of State, shall be sealed up in a separate package and transmitted to the Secretary of State, whose duty it shall be to open the returns, consolidate the vote and declare the result, and certify to the Governor the names of the persons elected, and the Governor shall issue commissions to such officers as shall appear from the certificate of the Secretary of State to have been elected.” Section 3 of this act declares “That the terms of the officers last mentioned shall commence on the first day of January next after they are elected.” Ga. Laws 1918, p. 154.
The rulings above made render it unnecessary to determine any other question raised in the discussion of this case, and it follows from these rulings that the judgment of the court below sustaining the demurrer to the petition should be affirmed.
Judgment affirmed.
In McGregor v. Clark, 155 Ga. 377 (supra), I dissented, but wrote nothing. I think it is proper for me to state the grounds of my dissent and my reasons therefor so far as applicable to this case. In the first place, I was, and still am, of
If the caption of this act had been declared to be to provide the manner of making the returns of the elections of the officers named, and to prescribe the commencement of their terms, the provisions of this act would hardly strike any one as containing separate, independent, and incongruous subject-matters. I shall undertake to show that, as the caption of this act embraces the general clause, “and for other purposes,” it in effect embraces both of the above purposes. • So I am of the opinion that this act does not include two subject-matters in the sense in which the term “subject-matter” is used in this provision of our State constitution.
Does the body of the act contain matter different from what is expressed in its title? Where the title of an act specifies some of the objects for which the act was passed, and contains the general clause, “-and for other purposes,” portions of the act not specially indicated in the title are nevertheless good under this general clause. Martin v. Broach, 6 Ga. 21 (50 Am. D. 306); Black v. Cohen, 52 Ga. 621; Goldsmith v. Rome R. Co., 62 Ga. 473; Butner v. Boifeuillet, 100 Ga. 743 (28 S. E. 464); Mayor &c. of Macon v. Hughes, 110 Ga. 795 (36 S. E. 247). So I am of the opinion that where the title of an act specifies one purpose and concludes with the words, “and for other purposes,” the legislature can embrace in the body thereof any matters which can be dealt with in one act. In Goldsmith v. Rome R. Co., supra, Judge Bleckley well said: “It would be improper to give to constitutional provisions of this kind a too rigorous and technical construction; for if, in applying them, we should follow the rules of a nice and fastidious verbal criticism, we would often frustrate the action of the legislature without fulfilling the intention of the framers of the constitution.” I agree fully with this sentiment; and in view of the familiar principle that an act of the legislature should.not be declared unconstitutional and void unless its conflict with some provision of the constitution is so plain and palpable as to leave no doubt of its constitutional invalidity, I am of the opinion that the act of August 19, 1918, neither embraces two subject-matters nor any