Covington v. City of East St. Louis

Citations

• 78 Ill. 548

Syllabus

<p>l. Constitutional law—special legislation. The clause of section 22, 3, of the constitution, which prohibits the General Assembly from passing local or special laws incorporating cities, towns or villages, or changing or amending the charter of any city, town or village, is applicable to and restrictive of the General Assembly, in the enactment of charters or amendments to charters for cities and villages. It has no reference to past legislation, but simply prescribes the limit of future legislation in this respect.</p> <p>2. Same—city ordinances. The General Assembly has the power to delegate legislative authority incident to municipal governments to cities, but this can only be done by general law, under the constitution of 1870. When, however, it is done by such law, the constitutional mandate is fully complied with, and the ordinances to be adopted by different municipalities, under the power so conferred, may be as variant in their terms as the varying municipal necessities or sense of public policy, in those who exercise the legislative authority, may require.</p> <p>3. All ordinances are necessarily local in their application, that is, they apply only to the municipality by which they are made, and can have no effect beyond it; and to hold that they are void because they are not of general and uniform operation throughout the State, would be to hold that it is impossible to invest municipal corporations with authority to make ordinances.</p> <p>4. The charter of a city existing at the time of the adoption of the present constitution, provided that any tract of land adjoining such city, laid off into city or town lots, a plat of which being duly recorded, etc., should be and form a part of said city, provided the city council should so declare. In 1875, the city council declared a tract of land, which came within the requirements of the charter, a part of said city: Held, that the action of the city council was lawful, and that such territory thereby became