City Council v. O'Donnell

Citations

• 29 S.C. 355
• 1 L.R.A. 632
• 7 S.E. 523
• 1888 S.C. LEXIS 145

Syllabus

<p>1. The charter of the city of Anderson makes no provision for a jury upon the trial of an offender before the mayor in the first instance for a violation of municipal ordinances.</p> <p>2. Where a statute provides that it shall take effect on its passage, it would seem that an amendment incorporated therein by subsequent statute would become operative from its passage.</p> <p>3. A statute which changes merely the mode of trial — as, from trial by mayor and jury to a trial by the mayor with right of appeal to the full council, and a new trial there, the aldermen sitting as a jury — will regulate the trial as to offences previously committed, and is not ex post facto. This case distinguished from Kring v. Missouri, 107 U. S., 221.</p> <p>4. The mayor may take judicial notice of the due publication of the ordinance of the city under which defendant was tried. City Council of Charleston v. Chur (2 Bail., 164), recognized and followed.</p> <p>5. Under a statute providing that “in all cases appealed to the city council, the mayor shall preside, and the aldermen shall sit as a jury to try the facts involved, and may also reverse, modify, or affirm any or all of the rulings of the mayor in the first trial of the case,” the appellant is entitled to a trial de novo before the full council.</p> <p>6. As municipal courts at the time of the adoption of the constitution of 1868 had the power to try without a jury offenders for violating the ordinances of the municipality, they still have that power, notwithstanding sections 11, 13, and 14, of article I., of the Constitution.</p> <p>7. The same act may constitute an offence both against the State and the municipal corporation, and both may punish it without violating any constitutional principle; and this may be so, even where the party brought to trial in the municipal court is then under prosecution in the State court for the same offence.</p>