Opinion ID: 1095462
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Best Fit The Wording May Be Given

Text: Section 109 reads: No public officer or member of the legislature shall be interested, directly or indirectly, in any contract with the state, or any district, county, city, or town thereof, authorized by any law passed or order made by any board of which he may be or may have been a member, during the term for which he shall have been chosen, or within one year after the expiration of such term. [Emphasis supplied] On our oaths we must apply these words as best fits their common and ordinary meaning, our referents being the work of Noah Webster and Henry Campbell Black more than 1890's constitutional draftsmen. We have no interest in what the constitution makers intended, except insofar as that intent may be divined from the words employed, because in substantial part there is no other method of the remotest reliability of ascertaining the makers' intent. [1] Moreover, our state has changed since 1890. As it is a constitution we expound, McCulloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. (4 Wheat.) 316, 407, 4 L.Ed. 579, 610 (1819), we should read and apply Section 109 in the manner which best fits its language and best serves our state today. See Alexander v. Allain, 441 So.2d 1329, 1334 (Miss. 1983); Stepp v. State, 202 Miss. 725, 729-30, 735-36, 32 So.2d 447, 447-48, 33 So.2d 307, 309 (1948); Albritton v. City of Winona, 181 Miss. 75, 102-03, 178 So. 799, 806 (1938).