Case Name: The Mayor and Selectmen of the Town of Homer v. John B. Blackburn
Court: Louisiana Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Louisiana
Decision Date: 1875-07
Citations: 27 La. 544
Docket Number: No. 527
Parties: The Mayor and Selectmen of the Town of Homer v. John B. Blackburn.
Judges: 
Reporter: Louisiana Annual Reports
Volume: 27
Pages: 544–546

Head Matter:
No. 527.
The Mayor and Selectmen of the Town of Homer v. John B. Blackburn.
The mayor and selectmen of the town of Homer could not do any thing which they were not authorized to do by the statute from which they derived their powers, and this statute expressly prohibited them from imprisoning any person for any period beyond the time necessary for the offender to become sober, or until he should desist from violence. Therefore the ordinance which extends the imprisonment to ten days is illegal, and when the mayor sentenced the defendant to an indefinite imprisonment, that is, until he paid a certain fine, his judgment was doubly wrong, for it condemned under an illegal ordinance, and went much farther than the ordinance itself permits.
As the act of the Legislature under which the ordinance under consideration was enacted, was passed in 1874, its constitutionality must be tested by the constitution of 1868. Constructing together articles 73, 89, 94 of that constitution, it follows that the ordinance under which this action is brought, is illegal and unconstitutional, so far as it permits the mayor of Homer to imprison the defendant as he did, but not so far as it allows him to impose the fine which he fixed.
APPEAL from the Mayor’s court of Homer, parish of Claiborne.
J. & J. W. Young, T. O. Egan, for defendant and appellant. David M. OalUhan, for plaintiffs and appellees.

Opinion:
Morgan, J.
The defendant, for an illegal violation of a municipal ordinance of the town of Hoiner, was fined twenty-five dollars, and ordered to be imprisoned until he paid the fine.
The ordinance authorized the judgment, and the ordinance was perhaps authorized by the statute which conferred certain powers upon the mayor and selectmen.
But the Legislature had no power to confer judicial authority upon these parties. That power is fixed by the constitution, and the Legist lature can neither take from nor add to it. In this sense the first act passed in 1850, violated article 62 of the constitution of 1845; and the supplement thereof violated articles 78, 71 and 82 of the constitution of 1852.
Plaintiffs contend that article 94 of the constitution of 1868, coni fers this power, and therefore the defect of the' former Legislature is cured. But we do not see how an act of the Legislature which violates an article of the constitution of 1852 can become constitutional because authorized by the constitution of 1868.
The constitutionality of a law must be tested by the constitution which was in force when the law was passed.
It is therefore ordered, adjudged and decreed that the judgment appealed from' be avoided, annulled and reversed, and that there be judgment in favor of the defendant with costs in both courts.