The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1901-05-13

islature of the Organic Act; Under the
Constitution, the meeting of approprta-
ton lapses was q function. not of the
Legislature, but of the Minister of FL
nance, with the advice of the Execu-
tive Council but under the Organic Act
this function, under the conditions ana
within the restrictions created by sec
ton "a, is transferred to the Legislature,
subject to the check against inaction In
yolved in the later clauses of that Sec
ton; and under all the authorities here
tofore cited as illustrative of the mod
ern canons of constitutional construc-
ton, the present provision is mandatory
and is to be strictly pursued. The valid
ity of acts done under a mandatory stat
ute of this kind depends upon q strict
compliance with its requirements, Tor
otherwise the proceeding which is taken
ostensibly by virtue thereof viii be voio;
and this suggestion has particular appii-
cability to statute authorizing
new proceeding, or establishing new
function. Indeed, it may be observed
that all enabling acts. like this Organic
Act. implicitly prohibit any other than
the statutory mode OF doing the particu-
lar acts which they authorize; the spe-
cific function created must be strictly
pursued; and the provisions regulating
its procedure are mandatory as to the
essence of the thing required to be done.
..It was thus the intent of the trainers
of the Organic Act, in the establishment
of their general scheme of Legislation,
that, in the absence of abnormal condi-
tons, the entire business of the Legisia-
ture, including appropriations, should be
transacted at the regular biennial ses-
sion; they provided general safeguard
against emergencies and abnormal con-
ditions by creating the special session;
and they provided against the specifieal-
ly limited contingency of a lapse of ap-
preparations by creating the extra ses-
sion For all this they had excellent
reason.
."The trainers of this Act realized that
governmental emergencies arose; this
lesson they drew from the course of po-
litical history; and to provide against
contingencies of this specific character,
so far as those contingencies involved
appropriations, they drafted section "a to
operate as an emergency section Its OBJ
ject and purpose-its only object ana
purpose-is the consideration of appro-
priation bills Two conditions must be
satisfied before it can have actual opera
ton: there must, first, be a failure of
tha Legislature to pass appropriation
bills: and in the second place, the extra
session contemplated by it must be call
ed by the Governor upon the ADJOURN
ment of the Legislature. And TINS emer-
gency session is found in that portion OF
tbe Act which deals, not with the regu-
lar sessions of the legislature, put with
appropriations, pure and simple.
eff. at the regular session, the Legis-
1ature should adopt adequate approprla-
tion hills. no power would reside In the
Governor to call any extra session unoer
section "a; but, upon what principe Can
the Withholding of power from the Gov
ernor to convene the Legislature in extra
sassion for any other purpose than the
of appropriation bills, be
held to create any right in the Legisia-
tire to overlap that limitation and
generally? The gubernatoriai
mower under the section in question thus
denends upon a specifically limited con-
tinsency; it is upon that continsehcy
only that the Governor can Legally SET
the legislative power in motion, "ltnin
the limitations prescribed in the ACT anu
if section "a had never been written OF
if the Legislature had not rallied 10 pass
bills, the Governor Wouid
have no constitutional authority TO can
an extra session at all. 1t must thus
be plain that the extent of legislative
power, under this section, is limited to
the specific object for which it is given,
is measured by the terms in which IL
has been conferred, and cannot be en-
larged by the Legislature beyond those
terms or to any other object. And when
we reflect that this extra session has It's
origin solely In a specifically limited
gubernatorial power to
the Legislature In this extra
session arises only upon the special
fnfl anf q
must be manifest that
it was the intention of the trainers of
this instrument to allow none but the
urgent business of providing appropria-
tions to be transacted at such extra ses-
sion-that they intended that ordinary
legislative business should not be trans
acted at a session which could constitu-
tionally be convened only upon the spe-
cifc emergency of failure of appropri-
atoms which made it necessary.
eff the intention of the trainers of this
Act had been to permit a wide open ex-
ira session, if their intention were not
to restrict legislative action to the con-
sideration of appropriation bills-to the
of the precise business
which necessitated such extra session,
what was the necessity at all for section
"a and its limitations? Where was the
need for any extra session whatever?
Why should an extra session become per-
missible only upon the failure of the
Legislature to provide for appropriations
at it's regular session? And il it were
the intent of the trainers of this instru-
ment that at such extra session the
doors should be thrown wide open to gen.
eral legislation, If the intent were not to
restrict the Legislature to the considera-
ton of the particular business in which
it had lapsed, of what imaginable utility
is the language for the consideration Of
appropriation bills?' Upon the theory
of a wide open extra session, what ra-
tional motive can be assigned for the in
sertion of restrictive language particu-
larizing specific subject matter? If it
were intended to place the extra session
of section 81 within the same category
as the regular session Of section 41-to
obliterate all distinction between regular
and extra session-what need I repeat.
of section 81? But since the trainers of
this Act have written section 81 into it,
what motive, consistent with constitu-
tional sanity. can be ascribed for the
employment of it's restrictive language,
if 1t were not the intention of its franz
ers to limit the scope of legislative ac-