Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1901-04-29
SOME NOTABLE EXAMPLES.
OF THE CARELESS LEGISLATION
ENACTED AT CHARLESTON,
LAST WINTER.
LAWS VERY BADLY DRAWN.
THE PROPOSED CONSTITUTIONAL
AMENDMENT
IL q Case in Point, 1t Being Decided
~ Misty-Another Faux Pas II in
the WellsburH Chnrtcr-The En-
tire Statute is Meaningless and
the Enacting Section Nonsensical.
other News of Importance from
Charleston
Special to the Register.

Special to the Register.
CHARLESTON, w. Va, April Is
The acts of the recent Legislature have
been issued in pamphlet form and are
being sent out by the Secretary of
State to the officials entitled to re-
ceive advance copies. Even cursory
glance through the pages reveals some
startling things In the way of legisla-
ton, illustrative of the carelessness
with which enactments were made by
the bull-headed and incompetent major
ity.
Take for instance the joint resolu-
ton intended to amend the Constitu-
ton so as to provide for an additional
judge of the Supreme Court of Appeals.
vt is as follows:
RI. That the following be proposed
as an amendment to the Constitution
of this State:
%. The Supreme Court Of Appeals
shall cosist of five judges. Those judges
in Office when this amendment takes
effect shall continue in Office until their
terms shall expire, and the Legislature
shall provide for the election Of an ad-
ditional judge of said Court at the next
general election, whose term Of office
shall begin on the first day of Janu-
airy, 1905, and the Governor shall, as
for vacancy, appoint judge of said
Court to hold Office until the first day
of January, 1905. The judges OF the
Supreme Court of Appeals and of the
Circuit Courts shall receive such salar-
les as shall be fixed by law, for those
now in or those hereafter to come into
Office
The amendment is not proposed to
any particular section or article of the
Constitution, and only by inference can
it be ascertained to which article it re-
fers. There were four resolutions
adopted by the Legislature proposing to
amend the Constitution, and an act was
passed providing for their submission
to a vote of the people for adoption or
rejection Under this act the amend
ment here referred to is known as the
Third proposed amendment" and the
act further speaks fit as providing that
Section of Article s, be amended so
as to read as follows, although provides
no such thing. In another place the
same act speaks Of the amendment as
amending sections and Is or article
g." AS the matter stands the resolu-
ton itself says nothing about what sec
ton it is meant to amend, and the act
t0 far toly ho
of the people upon it speaks of it, as
above, as amending section of ar
ticle s, and In another place as amend
ing sections 2 and Is of article s.
As to the effect of it, the resolution
covers the provisions of section all
right enough, but leaves out some very
important features of section 10. The
question arises, whether either section
will be amended by the resolution in
case it is adopted, and if they are so
amended, how much of section 16 will
be wiped out and succeeded by that
amendment If all of section 16 is WHIP
ed away, there are some very import
ant things left unprovided for-such as
forbidding judges to practice law or
hold other offices while in the judicial
Office If only part of section Is is
swept away, how big a part of it?
The strangest part of this particular
bit of legislative carelessness lies in the
fact that the resolution was prepared by
no less legal light than Judge Henry
Brannon, now president of the Supreme
Court of Appeals. The patron of the
resolution--Judge Reynolds, of Mineral,
/ believe-went to Judge Brannon and
got the resolution fixed up so that 1t
would be certainly correctly fixed
Another bad fall-down is found in
chapter 143 of the acts, purporting to
amend the charter of the city Of Wells
burg. The maker of the bill meant it
to amend and re-enact certain sections
of an act passed by the Legislature of
1887, but he takes very short cut in
telling about It, Amended section num-
Der So is as follows: "36. Election Off
cers-In said section Sc, strike out the
word marshal and insert in lieu there
of the words city clerk. Sections "a,
80 and 80 are sought to be amended in
the same way. Now it is well known
among lawyers and statute makers that
acts cannot be amended in that way.
Sections that are amended must be en-
bodied In full in the amending and re-
enacting act, except the words that are
meant to be left out of the new law.
This same act has other peculiarities
in the way of legislative enactment. 1t
says:
BE it enacted by the Legislature OF
West Virginia.:
THAT sections 80 and 81 of chapter
Ii of the act of the Legislature of West
Virginia, passed February %, 1895,
amending and re-enacting section 80
and 81 OF an act passed by the Legisla-
ture of West Virginia on the oath day
of February, 1887, incorp orating The city
Of Wellsburg. That section so be SO
amended and re-enacted that the word
marshal shall be stricken out and the
words city collector and treasurer be
inserted in lieu thereof, and that sec
ton 81 be amended so as to read as
follows, etc.
The entire statute means nothing.
The enacting section is absolutely nom
sensical. and the whole thing must fall
to the ground Of its own weight. The
people of Wellsburg may want their
charter amended ever so badly-may
really need that it should be amended
but they were represented in House
and Senate by men wholly unfit for the
law-making trade, and IL some Demo-
crat had arisen and tried to Sc, the
matter right he would have been duehed
an obstructionist, and would probably
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