Court Opinion

ID: 9671201
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:32:43.100757+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:08.677972
License: Public Domain

PIPES, Justice
(concurring in the result).
I concur in the result. I am convinced that Sec. 23 of the Constitution of 1901 does not restrict the legislature's power to give persons and corporations the authority to institute eminent domain proceedings, and that the power given certain corporations, which would include appellee, to secure rights of way, including easements for pipelines, in § 74 of Tit. 10 is constitutional.
I am not convinced that some of the powers given for purposes other than rights of way are permitted under Sec. 23 of the Constitution, but those purposes are not before us in this case. If they were stricken from the statute, I think § 74 would still be constitutional under the rule that although a statute may be invalid or unconstitutional in part, the part that is valid will be sustained where it can be separated from the part which is void. If, after the deletion of the invalid part, the remaining portions of an act or statute are complete within themselves, sensible and capable of execution, the statute will stand notwithstanding its partial invalidity. Wilkins v. Woolf, 281 Ala. 693, 208 So.2d 74; Springer v. Williams, 229 Ala. 339, 157 So. 219; Harper v. State, 109 Ala. 28, 19 So. 857.
The part of the statute about which I am doubtful could be stricken in toto and the statute would still be complete, sensible and capable of execution as it probably has been for thirty-nine years.