35 S.W.2d 568 | Tenn. | 1931
This suit was brought to enjoin the payment of an appropriation made by the Legislature at the extra session of 1929 of $100 to each of its members, the act reciting that it was for stenographic hire and other unenumerated official expenses. Sustaining the insistence that the appropriation was in effect an increase of compensation, above that fixed by the constitution, the Chancellor overruled the demurrer of defendants, and issued the injunction. *156 The language of the act, being Section 4A of chapter 32 of the Acts of the Extra Session of 1929, is as follows:
"There shall be appropriated and paid out of any moneys in the Treasury to each member of the legislature the sum of one hundred ($100) dollars for stenographic hire and other extraordinary official expenses necessarily incurred by each member of the legislature at this extra session in the course of and in consequence of their duties as legislators, and the legislature declares as a fact that every member of this body has expended, at this extra session, at least the amount above set out for the official expenses above mentioned, and the State Treasurer is hereby authorized and directed to pay said sums of money as above set out."
The constitutionality of similar appropriations has been passed on by this Court in State ex rel. v. Thomason,
In the Thomason case it was held (1) that no appropriation could be constitutionally made for an increase of compensation to members of the General Assembly, and (2) that an appropriation for official expenses, as distinguished from compensation, may be constitutionally made. These propositions were re-affirmed inPeay v. Nolan. The cases differ in this: In the Thomason case it was conceded that the appropriation was in fact for official expenses; in the Nolan case it was held that the appropriation, while nominally for official expenses, was in effect for compensation, — this being the determinative fact in issue. In the instant case the attack on the appropriation is on the identical ground relied on *157 in the Nolan case, and the question now is whether or not the case now presented may be distinguished from that presented in the Nolan case.
Two distinctions are attempted to be made. The first relates to a variance in the form or language of the legislative enactment. The second to a difference in the amount. Under the first head it is stressed that the enactment now before us contains language, not only designating the appropriation as for expenses, as was true of that considered in the Nolan case, but goes further and expressly "declares as a fact that every member of this body has expended, at this extra session, at least the amount above set out for the official expenses above mentioned." The insistence made for appellants is that this declaration of a fact, which is the predicate of the enactment, and essential to its constitutionality, is a finding of fact conclusive on the courts.
Reliance is had on approving statements of this general rule in both of our cases above cited. For example, in State ex rel. v.Thomason, it was said that "this declaration of the Legislature is a conclusive finding of facts," etc., and in Peay v. Nolan that "the rule is that every inquiry into the validity of a legislative act is approached with the presumption that the legislature observed the Constitution, and when validity depends upon the existence of certain facts, the legislative determination is conclusive." But, all the authorities cited for support of this general statement of the rule clearly recognize that the legislative declaration is never binding on the Court unless consistent with reason and common knowledge.
In Block v. Hirsh,
"We repeat what was said in Block v. Hirsh,
Here the Court clearly recognized its right and duty, even in a case in which public policy and rights were involved, to look behind the declaration, or finding, of the Legislature, and give application to contradictory facts of common knowledge, of which the courts must take judicial notice.
Motlow v. State,
As already suggested, the distinction mainly insisted upon rests on the different language employed. Quite evidently this distinction goes to the form only, rather than the substance. While in the instant case the declaration of fact is expressed, in the former it was necessarily implied and was treated as having been made. No essential or controlling distinction can be taken between a legislative declaration made in words and one made by clear implication. A declaration that an appropriation is made for expenses, rather than compensation, is in all reasonable effect a declaration that the sum appropriated has been so expended. As said in Peay v. Nolan, "it is not the form of a statute, or the words that are used, but the object intended and the result reasonably effected by their use that must control the determination. Standard Oil Co. v. State,
"But the nature of a tax must be determined by its operation rather than by particular descriptive language *160
which may have been applied to it. As was said in Macallen Co.
v. Massachusetts,
This principle is clearly recognized in the opinion of this Court in State v. Anderson,
Not only is it so held in cases dealing with taxation and kindred subjects of a public nature, some of which have been cited, but we are not without cases from various jurisdictions wherein the constitutionality of appropriations by legislature for the expenses of State officials having constitutionally fixed salaries has been considered.
For example, in State ex rel. v. Raine,
In Peay v. Nolan, the appropriation was $750 for each member for seventy-five days; in the instant case the appropriation is $100 for twelve days. The proportion is practically the same. In the former case it was held that the Court could not reasonably assume that each and every member of the legislature had incurred official expenses of $750. Neither can we reasonably assume that in this case each member incurred official expenses of as much as $100. From the language employed it is apparent that the legislature did not undertake to determine the exact amount expended by each member for official expenses.
We have heretofore clearly recognized and now reaffirm the right of members of the legislature to be reimbursed for such official expenses as they may legitimately incur; to be ascertained and determined by such reasonable method as its wisdom may suggest. An appropriation of any substantial amount for that purpose, *162 which does not have for its basis some reasonably definite determination of the amount of official expenses incurred by the several members, does not satisfy the constitutional limitation, and for that reason cannot be sustained. Affirmed and remanded.
GREEN, C.J., concurs in result. *163