Opinion ID: 1364850
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 14

Heading: the curative effect of a decennial recompilation

Text: Both a defect in title and noncompliance with the single-subject command are objections to the form of an act rather than to its substance or content. Allen v. Retirement System for Justices and Judges [62] teaches that a bill, defective when passed for want of a good title, becomes impervious to attack after it is carried into the next decennial recompilation. Under the constitutional mandate of Art. 5, § 43, Okl. Const., [63] the legislature must revise Oklahoma laws every ten years. If the substance of the revision is not otherwise prohibited by the Constitution the revision will stand as authorized. [64] A statute's incorporation in a decennial recompilation purges or cures any defect present in that enactment's title. [65] By relation back the incorporation gives the statute validity from the date of the original enactment in a flawed form. [66] Any legislation that contains miscombinations of discrete subjects that may be challenged for noncompliance with the § 56 single-subject command under the germaneness standard should be deemed cured with the offending act's inclusion into the next decennial compilation. I would not  under Allen's teachings  allow an act to be the target of invalidation for noncompliance if the act had been carried into the 1991 recompilation.