286 Mass. 611 | Mass. | 1934
An Act further regulating the Use of Traps and Other Devices for the Capture of Fur-bearing Animals and providing for Local Option Thereon.
Whereas, The deferred operation of this act would in part defeat its purpose to terminate without further delay the uncertainty that has attended its subject matter, therefore it is hereby declared to be an emergency law, necessary for the immediate preservation of the public convenience.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General Court assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:
Section 1. Chapter one hundred and thirty-one of the General Laws is hereby amended by inserting after section one hundred and five A, as appearing in the Tercentenary edition, the following two new sections: —
Section 105B. Subject to the provisions of sections one hundred and five C and one hundred and fourteen A, whoever uses, sets or maintains any trap or other device for the capture of fur-bearing animals which is likely to cause continued suffering to an animal caught therein, and which is not designed to kill such animal at once or to take it alive unhurt, shall be fined fifty dollars; but this section shall not apply to traps or other devices for protection of property if set or maintained not more than fifty yards from any building, cultivated plot of land, or enclosure used for the rearing of poultry, including game birds, to the use of which building, plot or enclosure the presence of vermin may be detrimental.
Section 105C. If there is filed with the clerk of any city or town a petition signed by twenty-five registered voters thereof or in towns having a population of less than five hundred, by two per centum of the registered voters thereof, requesting such action, said clerk shall*615 YES. NO. YES. NO. cause to be submitted to the voters of such city or town at the next municipal election the following question, to be voted on by ballot, said question to be placed on the official ballot in cities, and in towns using official ballots at town elections, for the election of city and town officers: — “Shall the operation of section one hundred and five B of chapter one hundred and thirty-one of the General Laws, requiring for the taking of fur-bearing animals the use of traps that kill at once or take such animals alive unharmed, be suspended within this city (or town)?” or, if the operation of section one hundred and five B has been so suspended, the question: — “Shall section one hundred and five B of chapter one hundred and thirty-one of the General Laws, requiring for the taking of fur-bearing animals the use of traps that kill at once or take such animals alive unharmed, be again operative in this city (or town)?” as the case may be.
If a majority of the votes cast in such city or town in answer to the question submitted is in the affirmative, said section one hundred and five B shall not, or shall, as the case may be, thereafter apply to such city or town unless and until a majority of the voters thereof voting on the other question at a municipal election vote thereon in the affirmative.
Section 2. Section one hundred and five A of said chapter one hundred and thirty-one, as amended by chapter two hundred and three of the acts of nineteen hundred and thirty-three, is hereby repealed.
Section 3. • Said chapter one hundred and thirty-one is hereby further amended by inserting after section one hundred and fourteen, as appearing in the Tercentenary edition, the following new section: —
Section 11J/.A. The commissioner may by order, whenever in his opinion such action is necessary, suspend for not exceeding thirty days the operation, within any specified territory under the control of the department and designated in such order, of the provisions*616 of section one hundred and five B. The provisions of section one hundred and eighteen, so far as apt, shall apply to such an order.
Section 4. The selectmen of a town, upon petition filed with the town clerk and signed by twenty-five registered voters thereof, or in towns having a population of less than five hundred, by two per centum of the registered voters thereof, requesting that the question first set forth in section one hundred and five C of chapter one hundred and thirty-one of the General Laws, as appearing in section one of this act, be submitted to the voters of the town at a special town meeting in the current year, shall call such a meeting to .be held not later than thirty days following the filing of such petition. Said question shall be submitted to the said voters at such meeting voting by ballot thereon, with the same force and effect as if submitted under said section. Towns divided into voting precincts shall, if the selectmen so order, vote on said question at such election in their several precincts.
The order was transmitted to the Justices on May 23,1934, and on June 4, 1934, they returned the following answers:
To The Honorable the Senate of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts:
The Justices of the Supreme Judicial Court respectfully submit these answers to the questions in an order adopted on the twenty-second of May, 1934, copy whereof is hereto annexed.
The questions relate to the so called steel trap law adopted by the initiative at the election in 1930. St. 1930, c. 428, embodied in G. L. (Ter. Ed.) c. 131, § 105A. That law in substance prohibited under penalty the use of any trap or other device for the capture of fur-bearing animals likely to cause continued suffering to an animal caught therein, except that it did not apply “to traps or other devices for protection against vermin if set or maintained not more than fifty yards from any building or cultivated plot of
Several changes in the existing law are made by the proposed bill. By its § 2, St. 1933, c. 203, suspended by the referendum, is itself repealed so that, if the proposed bill becomes law, there will no longer be any § 105A. By its § 1, in the part described as § 105B, the provisions of G. L. (Ter. Ed.) c. 131, § 105A, as originally enacted, are in substance restored and reenacted; and, in the part described as § 105C, provision is made whereby the several cities and towns are authorized within their respective boundaries, from time to time, by popular vote, to suspend the operation of § 105B and again to make it operative.
The first question is whether the prohibition under penalty of the use of steel traps found in that part of the proposed bill set forth in its § 105B may properly be made subject to the kind of local option prescribed in that part of § 1 set forth in its § 105C.
A fundamental principle of our system of government is that power to make laws for the general welfare is vested in the General Court, except as affected by art. 48 of the Amendments to the Constitution. That power cannot be surrendered or delegated. In harmony with that principle, it has long been established that certain police regulations and other matters peculiarly affecting local interests, not embraced within the ordinary power to make by-laws and ordinances, may be intrusted by express legislation to
The purpose of the steel trap law as originally adopted was to suppress that kind of cruelty engendered by capturing the designated animals in traps of such construction as to cause them pain and suffering for an appreciable length of time. It created an offence against the public morals, which the commission of acts of cruelty to animals tends to corrupt. It was within the competency of the law making power under the Constitution to declare that purpose superior to the rights of owners of poultry and vegetables to protect such property against the depredations of predatory fur-bearing animals. Commonwealth v. Higgins, 277 Mass. 191. The need of drastic measures against the vermin mentioned in the proposed bill may differ in different places. The burden of damage done by such vermin depends upon their number and upon the pursuits of the inhabitants in a particular locality. These vary widely in the several cities and towns of the Commonwealth. That burden rests mainly upon those who cultivate the land or raise poultry. It is within the power of the General Court, in balancing the conflicting claims of those who bear this uncompensated loss, on the one side, and the danger to the public morals likely to follow from acts inflicting pain upon such vermin, on the other side, to determine that the operation of the statute should be placed under local control. Commonwealth v. Plaisted, 148 Mass. 375, 382-383. Commonwealth v. Kingsbury, 199 Mass. 542, 546. Commonwealth v. Maletsky, 203 Mass. 241, 245. Bradley v. Board of Zoning Adjustment, 255 Mass. 160, 171. Commonwealth v. Boston & Maine Transportation Co. 282 Mass. 345.
This principle is controlling although the form of submission to local option in the proposed bill relates to the sus
The first question is answered in the affirmative.
The second question is: “Do the words ‘unless in the meantime it shall have been repealed’, contained in the third sentence of section three of said article forty-eight, under the heading, ‘III. Referendum Petitions.’, apply to all statutes as to which a referendum petition has been filed, or is its application limited to statutes enacted less than thirty days prior to the next ensuing State election?”
The entire sentence from which are taken the words quoted in the question is very long. Its several parts are set off one from another by semicolons. That sentence, omitting parts not material to the question, is in these words: “If such petition is completed by filing with the secretary of the commonwealth not later than ninety days after the law which is the subject of the petition has become law the signatures of not less than fifteen thousand qualified voters of the commonwealth, then the operation of such law shall be suspended, and the secretary of the commonwealth shall submit such law to the people at the next state election, if thirty days intervene between the date when such petition is filed with the secretary of the commonwealth and the date for
The plain implication from the entire sentence of § 3 of “III. Referendum Petitions,” in which occur the words quoted in question two, is that the General Court may repeal the second class of laws, as to which the proviso or exception quoted in that question implies, pending a referendum, so that the referendum may become ineffective because the law made subject to the referendum petition has ceased to exist, and that it may not repeal with like effect the first class of laws, as to which the proviso or exception does not apply, because the words of said § 3 make it imperative that in general such laws be submitted to the vote of the people at the next State election; and it must be presumed that such submission, without proviso or limitation, was intended to be effective and operative upon an existing law. If there were no such proviso or exception in said § 3 as to either class of laws, an interesting question might arise whether the full legislative power, which, under “I. Definition,” of art. 48 of the Amendments, “shall continue to be vested in the general court,” might not authorize the repeal of any law pending a referendum.
It is difficult to discover why there should be express reservation of power in the Legislature to repeal a law when the petition for a referendum respecting it is filed so that less than thirty days intervene before the next State elec
It is respectfully suggested that the alternative in the second question, stated in its concluding phrase, viz., “or is its application limited to statutes enacted less than thirty days prior to the next ensuing State election,” does not refer to any situation created by § 3 of “III. Referendum Petitions” of art. 48 of the Amendments. That amendment refers to the filing of a referendum petition, not the enactment of a statute, within thirty days before the State election.
The answer to the second question is that the words “unless in the meantime it shall have been repealed” in the third sentence of § 3 of “III. Referendum Petitions” of art. 48 of the Amendments to the Constitution, do not apply to all laws as to which a referendum petition has been filed but are limited in application to laws as to which the completed referendum petition has been filed so that thirty days do not intervene prior to the next State election.
The fifth question in substance and effect is whether, if the proposed bill be enacted with an emergency preamble, the pending referendum as to St. 1933, c. 203, would nevertheless be required under art. 48 of the Amendments to be upon the ballot at the State election for the current year. The emergency preamble of the proposed bill sets forth facts constituting the emergency to be that the deferred operation of the act would “in •part defeat its purpose to terminate without further delay the uncertainty which has attended its subject matter” and declares that it is “necessary for the immediate preservation of the public convenience.” The enactment of the proposed bill with an emergency preamble would cause it to take effect as a binding and efficacious law, forthwith and without suspension. Art. 48, “The Referendum,” “II. Emergency Measures.” That subdivision of the Amendment is separate and complete in itself. It authorizes the enactment of any proper emergency law. It contains no exceptions. It does not expressly or by implication exempt from its scope laws as to which petitions for a referendum have been instituted under “III. Referendum Petitions” of art. 48. These two provisions, however, must be construed to be in harmony, so far as possible. An emergency law is itself made subject to a referendum petition by § 4 of “III. Referendum Petitions ” of art. 48. Unless and until an emergency law “shall not be approved by a majority of the qualified voters voting thereon,” as provided in said § 4, it is in full force and effect and binding upon the public notwithstanding the filing of a completed referendum petition concerning it. The proposed bill by its § 2 repeals G. L. (Ter. Ed.) c. 131, § 105A, as amended by St. 1933, c. 203. The latter, act has been suspended by the completed referendum petition. The proposed bill is not merely or primarily a repealing law, It is
An emergency law enacted pursuant to “II. Emergency Measures” of “The Referendum” of art. 48 differs essentially from an ordinary law subject to the referendum. Such an ordinary law does not take effect earlier than ninety days after it has become law and it is further suspended until after approval by vote of the people, provided a referendum petition respecting it is filed in accordance with § 3 of “III. Referendum Petitions” of art. 48. The several paragraphs of “The Referendum” mean that St. 1933,
The fifth question is answered in the negative.
The sixth question in substance is whether, if the proposed bill were enacted without an emergency preamble, the pending referendum as to St. 1933, e. 203, would be required under art. 48 of the Amendments to be upon the ballot at the State election for the current year.
This question is answered in the affirmative. The reasons are stated in the answer to the second question.
The fifth and sixth questions have been answered be
It is unnecessary to answer the seventh question because the fifth question has been answered in the negative.
By reason of illness, Mr. Justice Wait has been prevented from participating in the consideration of these questions and answers.
Arthur P. Rugg.
John C. Crosby.
Edward P. Pierce.
Fred T. Field.
Charles H. Donahue.
Henry T. Lummus.