State ex rel. Jones v. Clausen

Citations

• 78 Wash. 103
• 138 P. 653
• 1914 Wash. LEXIS 986

Syllabus

<p>Statutes — Construction — Intent — Custom. The settled practice, for twenty years, of the legislature to create offices and fix the salaries of officers and deputies in the general appropriation bill, should be considered by the courts in ascertaining the intent of the legislature to thereby increase a salary fixed by an earlier general law.</p> <p>States — Officers—Salary—Deputy Auditor — Statutes—Appropriation Bills — Scope. The legislature has power in a general appropriation bill to increase the salary of the state officers, fixed by the act of 1890; and the provision in the Laws 1913, p. 9, appropriating $3,600 for the salary of the deputy state auditor for two years, suspends Rem. & Bal. Code, § 9005, fixing his salary at $1,200 per year.</p> <p>Statutes — Title—Amendments—Requisites. Const., art. 2, § 37, providing that no act shall be revised or amended by mere reference to its title, but the act or section amended shall be set forth at full length, has no application to an act which is complete in itself although it is a substitute for a former act on the same subject.</p> <p>Statutes — Titles and Subjects — Appropriation Bills — Salary of State Officers. The title to the general appropriation bill,Laws 1913, p. 9, “an act making appropriations for .... maintenance of and sundry expenses at the various . . . state offices, and for sundry civil expenses of the state government,” is sufficiently broad to sustain a provision increasing the salary of a deputy state officer, fixed by an earlier general act; especially in view of the settled practice of the legislature for twenty years to include such provisions in the general appropriation bill.</p> <p>Main and Ellis, JJ., dissent.</p>