This is an appeal from an order sustaining a demurrer to a complaint. According to the complaint the plaintiff is a grocer licensed under sec. 98.12, Stats., to sell soda-water beverages. Soda-water contains a trace of alcohol, stated as 1 to 1791 by volume. The city has an ordinance requiring a person sеlling non-intoxicating liquor to procure a' license, and soda-water is a non-intoxicating
(1) Sec. 98.12 provides for the licensing by the dairy and food commissioner of persons engaged in the soda-water business. It was held in E. L. Husting Co. v. Milwaukee,
Sec. 18 of ch. 79, Laws of 1931, reads: “Section 18. Subsection (10) оf section 98.12 of the Statutes is repealed.” This, a priori, repeals the exemption clause of sec. 98.12 and leaves the plaintiff subject to the provision of the dеfendant city’s ordinance. Ch. 79, Laws of 1931, was a re-visor’s bill purporting to amend twenty-five sections and to
The plaintiff claims that the enactment of the revisor’s bill did not operate to repeal sub. (10) of sec. 98.12 because it went on thе erroneous assumption that that subsection had become “obsolete” because it was repealed with the rest of the Prohibition Act, whereas, as abоve stated, this court held that it was not so repealed but was continued in force by sec. 2 of the repealing statute. It must be conceded that this claim is not entirely without support in reason. Enactment of revisor’s bills stand on a different footing from ordinary acts of the legislature.
“Being the work of the revisor, it may be assumed that [in their еnactment] there was no intention to work any radical change” of the law. Van Brunt v. Joint School District,185 Wis. 493 , 497,201 N. W. 755 .
“The work of restating, consolidating, revising, and systematizing our statutory law is an immense task involving а mass of detail, and it is almost' inevitable that errors will creep in. Considering the time allowed it is beyond the power of human vigilance to avoid it. It has been the pоlicy of the legislature in the enactment of the revision, and the policy of the court in construing it, that unless there is a clearly expressed intention to work a change in the substantive law, the revised matter should be given the same effect that it originally had.” Wisconsin Gas & E. Co. v. Ft. Atkinson,193 Wis. 232 ,213 N. W. 873 .
“The revisor’s notes are treated as of much importance in ascertaining the legislative intent.” State ex rel. Globe Steel Tubes Co. v. Lyons,183 Wis. 107 , 119,197 N. W. 578 .
However, notwithstanding these expressions of the court and the mistake of the revisor in proposing the repeal of
(2) The appellant alsо urges that sec. 66.05 (9) (a), empowering municipalities to license persons selling nonintoxicating liquors, is void for want of a definition of the term “intoxicating liquors.” We considеr this incorrect. That statute was a re-enactment of the licensing provisions of sec. 165.31, and in that re-enactment the meaning of the term “non-intoxicating liquor” is the same as it was in sec. 165.31. The word “liquor” and the term “intoxicating liquor” were expressly defined in the act of which sec. 165.31 was a part as having the same meaning as in the “Natiоnal Prohibition Act” (sec. 165.01 (12), Stats. 1927) ; and the' term- “non-intoxicating liquor” was expressly defined as “liquor” containing alcohol in any degree not defined as “intoxicating liquor.” Sec. 165.01 (13). These definitions were upheld as sufficiently definite. Davis v. State,
(3) Counsel for appellant also urges that one prosecuted under a сriminal act is entitled to know the elements of the offense with which he is charged, and that as sec.
(4) Appellant’s counsel also contends that if sec. 66.05 (9) (a) be construed as purporting to confer on the city power to pass an ordinance requiring a license to sell nonintoxicating beverages cоntaining alcohol, it is unconstitutional because discriminatory. The holding of this court in Milwaukee v. Meyer,
By the Court. — The order of the circuit court is affirmed.