Case ID: ala_207/html/0517-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "SOMERVILLE, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

(93 South. 381)
    STATE v. WILLIAMS.
    (8 Div. 852.)
    (Supreme Court of Alabama.
    May 16, 1922.)
    Statutes <&wkey;>77(l) — Act prohibiting stock in certain counties from running at'large held unconstitutional, as a local law.
    Acts 1919, p. 194, prohibiting live stock from running at large in counties having a population between 30,900 and 30,975, held void, under Const. 1901, § 104, subd. 23, prohibiting local laws establishing stock districts. (Response of Supreme Court to certified question.)
    @=oFor other oases see same topic and KEY-NUMBER in ail Key-Numbered Digests and Indexes
    Appeal from Circuit Court, Lauderdale County; C. P. Almon, Judge.
    Sam Williams was acquitted of violating the stock law, the court holding the act unconstitutional, and the State appeals.
    Affirmed.
    Harwell G. Davis, Atty. Gen., and J. C. Roberts and Mitchell & Hughston, all of Florence, for the State.
    A. H. Carmichael and James Jackson, both of Tuscumbia, for appellee.
    
      To the Supreme Court of Alabama:
    Being of the opinion that the act of the Legislature approved August 9, 1919 (Acts 1919, p. 194), is in violation of the Constitution of this state, for the reasons hereinabove stated, under and by virtue of the provisions of law, we submit the question for your determination.
    C. R. BRICKEN, P. J.
    WM, I-I. SAMEORD, J.
    HENRY P. MERRITT, J.
    Response to Certified Question.
   SOMERVILLE, J.

The Court of Appeals being of the opinion that the act approved August 9,1919 (Gen. Acts 1919, p. 194), which prohibits live stock from running at large “in all counties having a population of not less than thirty thousand nine hundred and not exceeding thirty thousand nine hundred seventy-five, according to the last or any subsequent federal census,” and provides for enforcement and penalties, is in violation of subdivision 23 of section 104, and also of section 105 of the Constitution of Alabama, certifies the question to this court for determination, as provided by law.

The act cannot be a general act, since, as the court judicially knows, it applies to only one county in the state, viz. Lauder-dale. Reynolds v. Collier, 204 Ala. 38, 85 South. 465. Being a local act, pure and simple, it is manifestly prohibited by subdivision 23 of section 104 of the Constitution, which forbids the creation of stock law districts by special or local laws, and must therefore be pronounced null and void.

Let this conclusion be duly certified to the Court of Appeals.

And the Justices concur.