Court Opinion

ID: 9831517
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 21:09:19.656509+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:35.448096
License: Public Domain

On Motion for a Rehearing.
Upon a review of the record we think, as urged by appellant, there was error in affirming the judgment. We failed to observe that the bar of limitation had already been completed upon the whole of the appellee’s cause of action before the act of 1929 was passed. Quoting from 37 C. J. p. 696: “A statute providing that specified causes of action shall not be affected by the statute of limitations keeps alive such causes of action as are not barred when the statute is passed.”
. But,-as the result of authorities, the following proposition is laid down in 12 C. J. p. 980, § 576(3): “Statutes affecting' causes of action already barred. In most of the jurisdictions the general rule is laid down, without exception or qualification, that the legislature can not remove a statutory bar to a cause of action that has already become complete.”
See 17 R. C. L. p. 674 ; 25 Cyc. p. 988; Wood on Limitation (3d Ed.), §§ 11 and 12, pp. 32-40; Mellinger v. City of Houston, 68 Tex. 37, 3 S. W. 249, 255. As stated in the Mellinger Case, supra: “Or if an attempt were made by law, either by implication or expressly, to revive causes of action already barred, such legislation would be retrospective, within the intent of the prohibition [See. 16, Art. 1, Con.], and would therefore be wholly inoperative. We have no doubt that the law is thus correctly stated.” ⅝
 The county can set up the retroactive feature of the act, for the Legislature, in view of the restriction (section 16, art. 1, Const.), cannot compel the county to permit the action and waive the plea of limitation. Therefore it is believed the right of the county, under the facts, must stand as though the act of 1929 had not been passed, so far as the act compels the county to forego the right to plead the bar of limitation. In this view the judgment heretofore entered affirming the judgment of the court below will be set aside and judgment here now entered reversing the judgment of the district court and rendering it in favor of the county. The appellee will pay all costs of the trial court and of this appeal.