State ex rel. Dustin v. Rusk

Citations

• 15 Wash. 403
• 46 P. 387
• 1896 Wash. LEXIS 205

Syllabus

<p>STATUTES — REPEAL BY IMPLICATION — CONSTITUTIONAL LAW — TITLE OF ACT — LEGISLATIVE CONTROL OF SUPERIOR COURT DISTRICTS.</p> <p>The act of March 2, 1891. entitled “ an act providing for judges and additional judges for the superior court in various counties in the state of Washington,” etc., is repealed by implication by the act of March 19, 1895, entitled “an act in relation to superior courts and the election of superior court judges,” as the plain intent of the legislature appears in the latter act to be to provide for the election of all the superior court judges of the state by the districts provided for in the act.</p> <p>The subject matter of an act providing for the election of superior court judges by newly established districts is sufficiently embraced in the title reciting that it is “ an act in relation to superior courts and the election of superior court judges.”</p> <p>Construing in the light of the circumstances surrounding the adoption of the constitution and the legislative construction thereof, art. 4, §5, of that instrument, which provides that “There shall be in each of the organized counties of this state a superior court, for which at least one judge must be elected by the qualified voters of the county at the general state election ; provided, that until otherwise directed by the legislature ” judges shall be elected pursuant to certain groupings of counties set forth in such section, it must be held that it was thereby intended to vest in the legislature the discretion to determine as to when each of the counties should elect a judge for itself, and how the counties not entitled to so elect should be grouped for judicial purposes.</p>