Monaghan v. Lewis

Citations

• 21 Del. 218
• 5 Penne. 218
• 59 A. 948
• 1905 Del. LEXIS 9

Syllabus

<p>Title of Act—Constitutional Requirement—Not more than one Subject —Taxation of Real Estate— Uniformity— Vested Rights—Contract—Repeal by Implication—Constitutional Provision Self-Executing—Payment of Taxes under Protest— What is Involuntary Payment under Law.</p> <p>i. The act entitled “An Act to Classify Real Estate for the purposes of Municipal Taxation, and to Exempt Certain Lands from Municipal Taxation within the City of Wilmington,” approved May 20, 1898 (Vol, 21, Laws of Delaware, Chap. 106) is not unconstitutional and void. It does not conflict with Section 16 of Article 2 of the Constitution, which provides that “ No bill or joint resolution, except bills appropriating money for public purposes, shall embrace more than one subject, which shall be expressed in its title.”</p> <p>2. If all parts of an act relate directly or indirectly to the general subject of the act, it is not open to the objection of plurality. The Constitution does not require that the title should do more than state in general terms the subject of the act; it need not go into details or furnish an abstract, synopsis or index of the contents of the act. The question whether an act embraces more than one subject must be determined, not from the title, but from the body of the act, and if that embraces but one subject, the fact that the title expresses more than one does not render the act objectionable on the ground of plurality; the subject mentioned in the title and not contained in the body of the act being treated as surplusage.</p> <p>3. It is not necessary that the title of an act should express the purpose to repeal another act (if it was an inconsistent act) or the purpose to repeal all inconsistent acts, as the repeal of inconsistent acts, by express words or by implication, is necessary, to render effective the general purpose of the act.</p> <p>4. It was not necessary that the title of said act of 1898 should refer to the exemption of certain lands from taxation, but having d