Opinion ID: 2331935
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Department of Elections for New Castle County.

Text: As in the Highway Department case, two acts are involved. The First Election Act was passed May 18, 1955, 50 Del.L. c. 155, 15 Del.C. § 103, and note. It abolished the pre-existing Department of Elections for New Castle County with nine members (see 15 Del.C. § 103 before amendments), and attempted to create a new Department of eleven members, naming all of the eleven in the act. The effect, as in the Highway case, was to remove from office certain of the incumbent officers. By the Second Election Act, December 5, 1955, 50 Del.L. c. 545, 15 Del.C. §§ 103 and note, 109, the First Election Act was repealed; the old Board was re-established; the membership was increased to seventeen members; the members theretofore appointed and serving unexpired terms were continued in office; and seven additional members were appointed in the act. The Second Election Act is assailed on much the same grounds as those urged in the Highway Department case. The conclusions set forth in that case govern here so far as applicable. Two points must be dealt with specially. 1. Title. The title is as follows: An act to repeal the act of May 18, 1955, entitled `An act amending Chapter 1, Title 15, of the Delaware Code by abolishing the present Department of Elections for New Castle County and creating a new Department of Elections for New Castle County', which act was denominated Senate Bill No. 255, as amended; to ratify the acts of the Board of Elections for New Castle County appointed pursuant to the act of May 18, 1955, aforesaid and to amend Chapter 1, Title 15 of the Delaware Code by increasing the membership of the Department of Elections for New Castle County and appointing seven persons to fill the vacancies thereby created and presently existing and to further amend said Chapter 1, Title 15 of the Delaware Code by changing the organization date of the department. This title is challenged on the same grounds as those urged against the title of the Second Highway Act. The reasons and authorities already set forth in rejecting the contention in the Highway case are applicable to the Election case. The title is sufficient. 2. Extension of Terms of Office. This is a point not raised by the Highway case. The facts are these: Sigmund Schorr, one of the defendants, was a member of the old Department of Elections. He had been appointed for a term expiring August 10, 1955. By the First Election Act, passed May 18, he was appointed a member for a term extending to July 1, 1961. By the Second Election Act he was appointed for a term extending until October 1, 1961. Six other defendants (Heinhold, Scott, Ford, McClafferty, Devine, and Grabowski), who were not members of the Old Department, were appointed to the first New Department by the First Election Act for terms extending to July 1, 1961. By the Second Election Act they were appointed for terms extending until October 1, 1961. Relator says that the effect of these acts was to extend the term of office of Schorr twice, and of each of the others once, in violation of art. XV, Sec. 4, of our Constitution. That section provides: No law shall extend the term of any public officer or diminish his salary or emoluments after his election or appointment. This argument seems to assume the validity of the First Election Law, for if that law were void in toto, as relator elsewhere asserts, there would be no valid term of office to be extended by the second law. Defendants reply that there was no extension of term, because the offices created under the First Election Law were extinguished by the second law. This is an argument of doubtful validity. If a valid office was created by the First Election Law, and if (in substance though not in form) the Second Election Law extended the term of that office, why would there not be a violation of the constitutional prohibition against extension? Defendants say that the prohibition against extending the term of any public officer applies only to constitutional officers, citing State ex rel. Green v. Isaacs, 36 Del. 110, 171 A. 627. This is a decision of the Superior Court in 1934 which appears to adopt that view. But the correctness of the holding in this case is highly doubtful, to say the least, and we shall assume here that the provisions of art. XV, Sec. 4, apply to statutory offices with fixed terms. But we do not think that any office was validly created by the First Election Act. We think it beyond doubt that the First Election Law was unconstitutional and void. Under the guise of abolishing and immediately re-establishing the Department of Elections and naming the personnel of the re-established Department the General Assembly sought to legislate out of office certain of the members of the Old Department, that is, to remove them from office. Now each of these officers held office for a fixed term, of either four or six years. 15 Del.C. § 103. It was held in State ex rel. Green v. Collison, 39 Del. 245, 197 A. 836, that the provisions of our Constitution specifying the methods of removing an incumbent from office are, as concerns an officer holding office for a fixed term, exclusive. They preclude arbitrary removal from office. These constitutional grounds for removal are: (1) by the Governor, upon the address of two-thirds of all the members elected to each House, art. III, § 13; (2) by impeachment by the House and trial by the Senate, art. VI, § 2; and (3) by the Governor, upon conviction of misbehavior in office or any infamous crime, art. XV, § 6. The historical background of these provisions, including the Debates of the Constitutional Convention of 1897, is set forth at length in the opinion of the majority of the court in the Collison case, and the legal principles and precedents are exhaustively discussed. Referring to the reasons that prompted the framers of our Constitution to limit the power of removal from office, Chief Justice Layton said: For these weighty reasons, based upon experience, and with deliberation, certain causes of removal and certain methods of removal were provided as the sole causes and the sole methods. Removal by impeachment if for cause. Removal upon the address of the General Assembly is predicated on cause. Conviction of misbehavior in office or of infamous crime is cause. Every provision in the organic law with respect to removal from office points straight at cause, and nothing except cause. If an officer behaves himself well while in office he gives no cause for his removal. 39 Del. 264-265, 197 A. 845. The dissent in the Superior Court, and the reversal in the Supreme Court, 39 Del. 460, 2 A.L.R.2d 97, 119 A.L.R. 1422, were on other grounds, i. e., that the term of the office involved in that case was not fixed and was an office held at the will of the Governor. The majority opinion below, we think, correctly states the law with respect to arbitrary removals from office, whether attempted by the Governor, or by the General Assembly, or by any other State authority. Let us apply the rule to this case. We see at once that by the transparent device of abolishing the old Department and instantly re-creating it (so that in truth it never was abolished), and naming the members of this supposed new Department, the General Assembly has attempted to do indirectly that which it may not do directly  remove from office, without cause, officers holding offices for fixed terms. The effect of the act is exactly the same as if the General Assembly were to declare by legislative act: John Doe is hereby removed from his office; Richard Roe is appointed in his place, As we have above noted, the power of the General Assembly is unlimited save as curbed by constitutional inhibition; but if a constitutional prohibition exists, as it does here, it may not be avoided by going through meaningless forms. In our opinion the First Election Act is unconstitutional and void. Hence there exists no problem of extension of term, for the appointments under the first act were wholly ineffective. This holding of unconstitutionality applies also to the First Highway Act, which undertook to remove certain of the members of the Department, and likewise to the First Liquor Commission Act, as will be seen hereafter. 3. Death Occurring Prior to Passage of Act. Some point is sought to be made of the fact that one of the appointees named in the Second Election Act died before the effective date of the act. How this could avail to impair the title to office of the other appointees we fail to understand. In our opinion the Second Election Act is constitutional.