41 Ala. 9 | Ala. | 1867
On the 3d February, 1866, an act was approved, which is entitled, “An act to amend an act to incorporate a company to build a bridge across the Warrior river opposite the city of Tuskaloosa, approved January 2, 1833.” The act approved on the 3d February, 1866, consists of a single section, which directs that the act recited in the title “be amended by additional sections, numbered and worded ” in a specified manner, and that those additional sections should, “for all purposes, be
The language of the constitutional provision is as follows : “No law, nor any section of any law, shall be revised or amended by reference only to its title and number, but the law or section revised or amended shall itself be set forth at full length.” In the cases of Ex parte Pollard, and Ex parte Woods, (39 Ala. 77,) we used the following language, in reference to the meaning and effect of this clause: “It was never intended by the constitution, that every law which would affect some previous statute of variant provisions on the same subject should set out the statute or statutes so affected at full length. If this were so, it would be impossible to legislate. The constitutional provision relates to those cases, where the act is strictly amendatory or revisory in its character. Its prohibition is directed against the practice of amending or revising laws by additions, or other alterations, which, without the presence of the original, are usually unintelligible. If a law is in itself complete, and original in form, it does not fall within the meaning and spirit of the constitution.”
The act under consideration most clearly comes within the scope of the clause of the constitution thus construed. It is in form, not original, but amendatory. It is placed in the legal attitude of being incorporated in additional sections in the original act; and its full effect can not be determined, without reference to the original act; for the entire operation of one or more provisions of an act can
We have given careful attention to the argument, that the clause of the constitution under consideration is a mere rule of legislative proceeding, and does not render void a law not conformable to it. An anxious desire to allow effect to the will of the legislature, and to avoid a seemingly harsh visitation of a rule, the usefulness of which is hardly proportionate to its inconvenience, induced us to prolong our advisement on the case, with the hope of discovering reason or authority which would lead us to the support of that argument. But it still seems to us that the clause raises a question of legislative power, and is not a mere rule for the government of the general assembly in its proceedings. The prohibition is emphatic, that no law shall be revised or amended, except in the mode specified. This is a command, not specially, or professedly, addressed to the legislature alone. It is as general and comprehensive as any prohibition in the constitution. It is binding upon the executive, who approves or disapproves bills, and upon the judiciary, who declare the law, as well as upon the legislature. What warrant can there be, then, for the position, that it is simply a rule for the guidance of the legislature ? When the constitution says no law shall be amended, save in a specified manner, can the legislature say a law may be and shall be amended in a different manner ? The case is, to our minds, a plain one of irreconcilable conflict between the
Similar constitutional provisions are found in several other States; and the decisions, except in California and Ohio, concur in holding contravening acts void.—People v. Laurence, 36 Barb. 177; Sharp v. May, 31 Barb. 572; Brewster v. City of New York, 19 N. Y. 116; Bibb County Loan Association v. Richards, 21 Ga. 592; Davis v. State, 7 Md. 151; Commonwealth v. Drewry, 15 Grattan; Johnson v. Higgins, 3 Metcalf, 567; 4 La. Ann. 297; 5 ib. 94, 91; 11 ib. 722; 15 Texas, 311. In California, and in Ohio, the constitutional provision is regarded as merely directory.—Lehman v. McBride, 15 Ohio St. 573; Pim v. Nicholson, 6 ib. 176; Pierpont v. Crouch, 10 Cal. 315. The language of the Ohio constitution is somewhat different from ours, and that probably lessens the value of the decisions in that State as an authority here. The decision in Ohio is examined in The People v. Laurence, (supra,) and we entirely concur with the opinion in that case, that it is not allowable to set aside the obligation of a constitutional provision as directory.
There are, it must be conceded, regulations in the constitution, which are mere parliamentary rules, a want of conformity to which would not make a law void.—People v. Board of Supervisors, 27 Barb. 575. But the clause we are considering can not be classed with them. It is a restriction upon power. It takes away the authority to amend, except in a particular mode. It does not prescribe in what form, or by what rules, the legislature must act; but it prescribes what a law of a certain character must contain. It exacts that a law, amending another, must contain the law amended. The legislature can not dispense with this requirement. The inference of the purpose to guard the legislature against imposition and misapprehension and mistake, when a bill is passing through the forms of legislation, does not oppose the conclusion, that a diminution of power was intended. A restriction upon authority to amend laws in any other than the prescribed manner is the most effective mode of compelling an avoid
While the question is not in words decided in Ex parte Pollard, (supra,) there underlies the argument of the opinion in that case, an admission that a law infringing the provision of the constitution would be void.
The constitution (Art. 1, § 1) expressly declares, that all laws contrary to its provisions shall be void. The amending act here is obviously contrary to a provision of the constitution. The amending act does not contain the act amended; and if it is not void, we have what the constitution says shall not be.
What we have said shows, that the complainant had no
The decree is affirmed.
I cannot concur in the conclusion attained by the majority of the court, on one question involved in this case, and feel it incumbent upon me to state briefly some of the reasons which induce me to dissent.
The second section of the fourth article of the State constitution prescribes certain rules for the government of the legislative department in the enactment of laws. They are as follows : “All laws shall be passed by original bill, and their style shall be, Be it enacted by the senate and house of representatives of the State of Alabama, in general assembly convened. Each law shall embrace but one subject, which shall be described in the title; and no law, nor any section of any law, shall be revised or amended by reference only to its title and number, but the law or section revised or amended shall itself be set forth at full length.”
These fundamental rules are not directory merely — such as may be observed by the legislative department, or not, as may suit their convenience or pleasure. They are mandatory, and as binding upon the legislative department, as any constitutional injunction can be.- But, being rules of procedure only, prescribed for, and directed to, the legislative department exclusively, their observance and enforcement must depend alone upon the judgment and conscience of the individual members of that co-ordinate and co-equal department of the government.
I concede the power to the judiciary to declare constitutional law, and in cases where statutes, as rules of action, are violative of the constitution, to override the express
But no such question is here involved; it is a question of correct legislation only, that is presented for our decision; it is, whether a parliamentary rule, prescribed by the constitution, and applicable only to bills in their passage through the legislature, has been observed or disregarded by the law-making power? Has the judiciary the power to determine such a question, unless it be expressly conferred by the constitution ?
The powers of the State government are divided into three distinct departments, each of which is confided to a separate body of magistracy. The power of legislation being vested exclusively in the legislative department, they must, of necessity, be the sole judges of what is merely correct legislation. One, and but one, exception is made in the constitution, which I shall presently notice. If this be not a correct proposition, what becomes of the second section of the third article of the constitution, which declares that, “No person, or collection of persons, being of one of these departments, shall exercise any power properly belonging to either of the others, except in the instances hereinafter expressly directed or permitted ?” Can the judiciary step into the legislative department, on a question involving only the correct manipulation of the machinery of legislation, and supervise and control it? I have been unable to find language in the constitution, either “expressly directing or permitting this to be doneand, in my opinion, the judiciary cannot do it, without erecting themselves “into a co-ordinate political authority, and becoming practically associated with the law-making department,” in violation of the express prohibition of the constitution.
The courts of the country have been prompt to recognize the boundaries which separate the legislative from the judicial power, when encroachments have been made by the
I have stated, that there is one case in which the judiciary would have the power, the question being properly presented, to declare an act of the legislature invalid, for non-compliance with a constitutional requisition m its passage. The constitution declares, that “no bill shall have, the force of a law, until on three several days it be read in each house, and free discussion be allowed thereon, unless, in case of urgency, four-fifths of the house in which the bill shall be depending may deem it expedient to dispense with this rule.”—Art. IV, § 18. It is by force of the language employed in this section of the constitution—“no bill shall have the force of a law” — that the judiciary would be required, in the case stated, to declare that the act was not a law, and to deny to it all force as such; for the' constitution, in denying the force of a law to a bill passed in disregard of the requisites named, makes an injunction upon the judiciary department not to enforce it as a law. No such injunction exists as to that portion of the constitution which presents the main question under discussion. And from this, an additional argument may be adduced in support of my conclusion upon the main question — viz., that if the framers of the constitution had intended that no bill should have “the force of a law,” if passed in disregard of the second section of the fourth article, they would have so declared, as they did in reference to the second section of the third article; and having declared it in the one case, and not in the other, the
The last clause of the last section of the bill of rights, declaring that all laws contrary to the provisions of the bill of rights, or the provisions following in the constitution, “shall remain void,” was not intended to apply to rules of legislative procedure, prescribed by the constitution. Otherwise, why was it subsequently declared that “no bill should have the force of a law,” unless passed as directed ? This was a nugatory provision, if the last clause of the bill of rights accomplished the same purpose. The character of the “provisions” preceding this clause, to which it applies, is a clear indication of the character of the provisions following, to which it was intended it should be applied, viz., to provisions of latos, in and of themselves, as rules of action. Any other construction, it seems to me, is unwarranted by the phraseology itself of the clause, and unsound.
I do not feel concluded by any decision of this court, heretofore made, relating to the effect of the constitutional provisions under consideration. Neither in Ex parte Pollard and JEx parte Woods, nor in any other adjudication of this court, was the precise question here involved, considered and decided. The doctrine of stare decisis, therefore, does not apply.
I deem it unnecessary to say more, though the conclusion attained by myself upon the question decided by a majority of the court, might be strengthened by other arguments, especially by some of those suggested in the briefs of the able counsel for the appellants.