Ex parte Whitwell

Citations

• 98 Cal. 73
• 19 L.R.A. 727
• 32 P. 870
• 1893 Cal. LEXIS 864

Syllabus

<p>Police Power—Unreasonable Ordinance—Regulation oe Insane Asylums. —An ordinance of the hoard of supervisors of a county, which provides that no hospital, or asylum, or place for the care of insane persons, or persons affected with inebriety, or other nervous diseases, shall be maintained, unless the building is constructed of either brick or iron, or iron and stone, or unless the building and the grounds to which the insane persons are allowed access shall he surrounded by a brick or stone wall at least twelve feet high and eighteen inches thick, and that no such building shall be permitted within four hundred yards of any dwelling or school; and which further provides that only one of the classes of persons therein mentioned shall he treated in the same building, . and that a separate house shall be required for the treatment of each of the diseases named, and that male and female patients shall not be cared for or treated in the same building, is unreasonable in its provisions, and not a proper exercise of the police power, and is therefore void.</p> <p>Id,_Extent of Polioe Power—Discretion of Legislature—Regulation of Useful Business—Province of Judiciary.—The police power is extensive, and in its exercise a very wide discretion as to what is needful or proper for that purpose is necessarily committed to the legislative body in which the power to make such laws is vested; yet when such power is exerted to regulate a useful business or occupation, the legislature is not the exclusive judge as to what is a reasonable and just restraint upon the constitutional right of the citizen to pursue any trade, business, or a vocation, which in itself is recognized as innocent and useful to the community; but it is always a judicial question whether any particular regulation of such right is a valid exercise of police power, though the power of the courts to declare such regulation invalid will be exercised with the utmost caution, and only when it is clear that the ordina