Court Opinion

ID: 9865151
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-25 16:25:23.62685+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:37:38.438016
License: Public Domain

Mr. Chief Justice Butler,
concurring.
The decision seems to me to be right.
The vigorous dissenting opinion of my brother Hilliard does not shake my faith in the conclusion that the statute assailed does not provide for the contracting of a *355debt within the inhibition of section 3 of article 11 of the state Constitution. The case, I submit, comes within the Special Fund doctrine repeatedly announced by this court in the cases cited in the principal opinion. The situation is this: An extensive public highway program is to be carried out. New highways are to be constructed throughout the state. Existing highways are to be improved. It is work that must be done sometime. The General Assembly, the exclusive judge of matters of public policy, has concluded that it is wise to have all this done during the present depression, while thousands of men are unable to find private employment, rather than to have the work distributed over a period of many years. To do the work will involve the expenditure of millions of dollars. That money is not now on hand. The federal government is to advance the money necessary to make these public improvements, and is to receive revenue anticipation warrants payable solely out of what in effect are license fees to be paid by those who use the public highways of the state for motor vehicle traffic. The 1934 amendment of article 10 of the Constitution segregates for exclusive use upon the public highways of the state all the proceeds derived from the imposition of licenses, registration fees and other charges with respect to the operation of motor vehicles upon the public highways of the state and the proceeds derived from the excise on gasoline. Such are the revenues out of which the advances are to be repaid to the federal government. The warrants, to be given are revenue anticipation warrants and do not create a debt in the constitutional sense. Those revenues are derived, not from general taxation, but from impositions which, though not tolls in the strict legal sense, bear some resemblance thereto, because, in effect, they are charges for the privilege of using the highways. It is clear, under all the authorities, that if a state obtains an advance of money to construct a road or bridge, to be repaid exclusively out of the tolls received, it would not *356offend against the constitutional provision inhibiting the contracting of a debt; and the same principle applies here. "Where revenue anticipation bonds or warrants are to be paid exclusively out of rents from dormitories, or charges collected from the users of electricity, gas, water, bridges or roads, such bonds or warrants do not create a debt within the inhibition of the state Constitution.
We need not be alarmed by the suggestion that highways do not endure for thirty years, and that from some other source must come the money to rebuild and repair the highways. The 1934 Amendment, supra, provides that the proceeds derived from the imposition of motor vehicle licenses, and from excise on gasoline, etc., shall, except costs of administration, be used exclusively, not only for the construction of public highways, but also for their maintenance.