20 Iowa 145 | Iowa | 1866
The first is, that the legislature, in 1862 (extra session in September, ch. 25), expressly provided a method by which cities or towns incorporated under special charters might be organized under the general law. And see, also, as not in conflict with this view, Rev., § 1144 and ch. 25, act 1864.
The second is, that while our general act for the incorporation of cities and towns is taken almost literally from the Ohio statute (2 Ohio R. S., 1860, p. 1491), it differs from it in the material feature that their statute proposed and was intended to abolish all special charters, and to give to all cities and towns a general uniform law, while ours starts out with expressly disclaiming such intention. And it is because of this intention in. the one case and its denial in the other (a difference in purpose, perhaps, not sufficiently realized at the time our act was drafted and passed) that much if not all the difficulty in the proper construction of our statute arises.
The chief justice desires it stated, however, that while he is not prepared to say that the conclusion reached in Whiting and Whiting v. The City of Mt. Pleasant, was, upon the facts of the case, at the time erroneous, he yields his assent to the present ruling because of the subsequent legislation, giving unmistakably a different construction to the purview and object of the general law.
Affirmed.