Court Opinion

ID: 9716024
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 06:23:53.340564+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:54:52.241078
License: Public Domain

*167Dissenting Opinion bx
Mb. Justice Bell:
I protest this decision. I protest the decision (1) because it is constitutionally unsound, and (2) because the Court is unfair to the people of Philadelphia when it fails to decide the vital and tremendously important public questions which are specifically raised in the Petition for a declaratory judgment in this case. I shall discuss these in their inverse order.
Philadelphia is agitated more than it ever has been in the last 50 years. Is the City Charter, which was won after a quarter of a century fight, to be preserved inviolate for a period of five years, or can it be amended, and if so, to what extent, how and by whom? More particularly, can the “No Politics” ban and the Civil Service provisions be eliminated by the legislature in some city departments and not in others, and if so, how? The Mayor of Philadelphia, the City Solicitor and leading officials of the City, the Attorney General of Pennsylvania and counsel representing all parties having a direct and indirect interest agree on the basic issues; they agree that the most important issue is whether the legislature having granted certain Home Buie powers to the City can alter, change or revoke any of the powers granted. Yet these basic questions or issues are unanswered by the Court’s Opinion — on the contrary the Opinion by its implications beclouds instead of answers them.
What does the Court’s failure to decide the basic questions involved mean to the people of Philadelphia, and what are the disastrous results which will likely flow from the Court’s Opinion?
The legislature has eliminated the “No Politics” ban and the Civil Service provisions in some City departments ; city council is in a turmoil trying to decide what it may and should do to amend these and other provisions of the Charter; figuratively speaking, the *168people of Philadelphia are up in arms over the issues herein specifically raised. The majority opinion, while refusing to pass upon the great fundamental issues involved, has pinpointed its decision on one of the tiny issues involved, but with this regrettable result — that if its opinion is carried to its logical conclusion it will be constitutionally impossible for either the legislature or the People to establish civil service provisions or political activities for employees after working hours in some departments but limit or prohibit them in other departments. The majority do not specifically so decide, but that is the logical and implied result of its opinion. Any decision which holds even impliedly that the American people cannot by their vote allow office holders, stenographers, clerks or employees in some departments of the City the right to engage in political activities after working hours, or the right of an office head to discharge an employee is in my judgment so unreasonable and so un-American as to be absolutely unjustifiable.
The net result of the majority’s failure or refusal to decide the basic questions which are involved and were so ably argued in this case will be this:
Both political organizations, the people throughout the entire City, the newspapers and city council will spend weeks and months, interspersed with bitter charges and counter-charges debating the basic issues here involved and here undecided; committees, partisan and bi-partisan, will be formed to determine what amendments may be and should be enacted by the legislature or by council, or what amendments may be and should be submitted to the people for their vote; and, of course, how they should be worded, and when the vote should take place. Enormous sums of money will be spent and a colossal amount of work will be done ■ to support or defeat, this .or that, proposed .amendment. *169The people will finally vote to adopt or reject each of the proposed amendments. Then what will happen? Whatever is passed or adopted is certain to be appealed by some interested party to this Court. If, for example, the people vote to retain the “No Politics” ban, or the Civil Service provisions in certain departments and not in others, the constitutionality of this amendment will undoubtedly be appealed to this Court, and the majority, unless one or more, upon more careful analysis or further study, changes his opinion, will declare it to be unconstitutional and void as special or local legislation which has no reasonable basis or classification.
But even if a majority of this Court by any chance would approve a new legislative act or a new ordinance, or a new amendment voted by the people of Philadelphia, irrespective of what changes or amendments were embodied therein, that would not conclude the matter. The constitutionality of the new act or ordinance or amendment will thereafter be immediately challenged on still another ground which has been specifically raised in the instant case by the very able counsel for the Greater Philadelphia Movement. This additional constitutional objection, which the majority fail or refuse to now pass upon, is based upon §16 of Article I of the First Class City Home Rule Act of 1919, which provides: “No proposal of a new charter or amendments of similar substance, purpose and intent shall be submitted to the qualified electors oftener than once in every five years.” Although this does not mention any Act of the legislature, counsel contends, in brief, that since the City Charter was adopted on April 17, 1951, effective January 7, 1952, amendments to the Charter can be made only by their submission by city council tó the people of Philadelphia; and the people of Philadelphia cannot vote to aménd their Charter until *170after it has been in existence for five years; and thereafter no similar amendment can be voted upon by the qualified electors until another period of five years has elapsed. While I disagree with this ingenious construction, the issue is specifically raised in the instant case and it is of such tremendous public importance that it should be decided now by this. Court, for if counsel’s contention is correct any amendment which the people would adopt prior to 1957 would be unconstitutional and void. All of the aforesaid enormous efforts of civic minded citizens, all of the large expenditure of money, all of the ill will and bitterness which inevitably will be generated, can, should be, and would be avoided if this Court decided, as it should, all of the vitally important public issues which have been presented in this case.
We shall now discuss in greater detail the constitutionality of the challenged Act of 1953 and particularly of §5 thereof.
The petition for a declaratory judgment in this case involved the meaning, validity and constitutionality of §5 of Act No. 433, approved August 2S, 1953, and of all the important constitutional questions arising thereout.
The Act authorizes the council of the City of Philadelphia to legislate with respect to the election, appointment, compensation,, organization, abolition, merger, consolidation,. powers, functions, and duties of the coroner, recorder of deeds, city treasurer,- clerk of the court of quarter sessions; oyer.and terminer and general jail delivery, and a board of inspectors of the Philadelphia county prison,- It then provides for the election of a. district attorney; and for-a continuation of the functions theretofore. granted ..by the ■ General. As: sembly. In view of the fact that .leading officials of the City attempted .to persuade the- legislature -to enact all. of this Act except. |5,:.and-that city.- council has abol: *171ished, merged and reorganized certain offices and has operated and legislated pursuant to the authority granted by the Act, it is astonishing to hear these game persons deny the right of the legislature to pass any law dealing with the organization of or regulating the affairs of the City of Philadelphia.
The Act in §5 removes four named City offices from the operation of certain provisions of Philadelphia’s so-called Home Pule Charter. The language and meaning of the Act are clear. We confine this opinion to a discussion of those important constitutional questions involved, which have any merit.
“When the constitutionality of an Act of Assembly is questioned, a Court can declare the act void only when it clearly and plainly violates the constitution: Evans v. West Norriton Township, 370 Pa. 150, 87 A. 2d 474; Tranter v. Allegheny County Authority, 316 Pa. 65, 173 A. 289.” Allentown Sch. Dist. Mer. Tax Case, 370 Pa. 161, 166, 87 A. 2d 480. See to the same effect Com. v. Cochran Post, 350 Pa. 111, 112, 38 A. 2d 250; 1 Cooley’s Constitutional Limitations, (8th Ed.) 371; Busser v. Snyder, 282 Pa. 440, 128 A. 80; Pennsylvania Railroad v. Riblet, 66 Pa. 164; Loomis v. Board of Education, 376 Pa. 428, 103 A. 2d 769.
“. . . Where the meaning of an act is doubtful, and two constructions are reasonably possible, one of which will render the act constitutional and the other unconstitutional, the courts should adopt a construction which renders the statute constitutional: Fidelity-Philadelphia Trust Co. v. Hines, 337 Pa. 48, 10 A. 2d 553; Carr v. Aetna A. & L. Co., 263 Pa. 87, 106 A. 107 . . .”: Evans v. W. Norriton Twp. Mun. Auth., 370 Pa. 150, 158, 87 A. 2d 474.
The power to legislate for cities is, under Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution of Pennsylvania, in the legislature. Under the law of Pennsylvania, cities *172and municipalities are not sovereigns; they have no original or fundamental power of legislation; they have the right and power to enact only those ordinances which are authorized by an act of the legislature and áre in conformity with the provisions of the enabling-statutes : Genkinger v. New Castle, 368 Pa. 547, 549, 84 A. 2d 303; Kline v. Harrisburg, 362 Pa. 438, 68 A. 2d 182; Murray v. Phila., 364 Pa. 157, 71 A. 2d 280; Phila. v. Fox, 64 Pa. 169, 180; Com. v. Moir, 199 Pa. 534, 541, 49 A. 351; Trenton v. New Jersey, 262 U. S. 182; Hunter v. Pittsburgh, 207 U. S. 161; Pittsburg’s Petition, 217 Pa. 227, 66 A. 348. Moreover, it has been held by the Supreme Court of the United States and by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, speaking through two of the greatest Judges this Court has ever had, Chief Justice Shabswood and Chief Justice Mitchell, and by the Superior Court as recently as 1945 in Iben v. Monaca Borough, 158 Pa. Superior Ct. 46, 43 A. 2d 425, that a legislature may change, modify or destroy a City’s Charter at will. In Phila. v. Fose, 64 Pa., supra, Justice Shabswood said (page 180) : “The City of Philadelphia is beyond all question a municipal corporation, that is, a public corporation created by the government for political purposes, and having subordinate and local powers of legislation: 2 Kent’s Com. 275; an incorporation of persons, inhabitants of a-particular place,' or connected with- a- particular -district, enabling- them to-conduct-its-local civil- government: Glover Mun. Corp. 1. ■ It is -'-mérely-' áh agency instituted-by the -sovereign for the-purpose of carrying out in detail-the objects of; government — essentially' á revocable agency — having ’ no vested 'right'-to any of-'-it's powers or franchises — the charter or act - of-'-erection being in-nó-sensé á'contract -w-it-h-the 'StatA^-'a'hd-therefore- fully- subject tó the-conlrol' of the legislature, * who *173may enlarge or diminish its territorial extent or its functions, may change or modify its internal arrangement, or destroy its very existence, with the mere breath of arbitrary discretion. . .
In Com. v. Moir, 199 Pa., supra (decided in 1901), Justice Mitchell said (page 541) : “Municipal corporations are agents of the state, invested with certain subordinate governmental functions for reasons of convenience and public policy. They are created, governed, and the extent of their powers determined by the legislature, and subject to change, repeal, or total abolition at its will. They have no vested rights in their offices, their charters, their corporate powers, or even their corporate existence. This is the universal rule of constitutional law, and in no state has it been more clearly expressed and more uniformly applied than in Pennsylvania.....”
This basic right of the legislature of Pennsylvania to control, modify, repeal or destroy the Charter as well as the very existence of a City has been so clearly and unequivocally stated by our Court and by the Supreme Court of the United States that we wonder that it is now questioned, doubted and denied. However, we do not have to place our decision on these majestic authorities because both the enabling legislative acts and the constitutional amendment under which the City of Philadelphia derives all its claimed or challenged powers, clearly limits those powers to the will of the legislature and the mandate of the Constitution.
Philadelphia’s Home Rule Charter of 1951 was adopted pursuant to the following acts and constitutional amendments, without which, as we have seen, Philadelphia would have none of the legislative powers claimed herein. The Genesis of Philadelphia’s legislative power was the so-called Home Rule Amendment, Article XV, §1 of the Constitution of Pennsylvania, *174adopted November 7, 1922. Tlie material provisions of this Amendment are as follows: “Cities may be chartered . . . Cities, or cities of any particular class, may be given the right and power to frame and adopt their own charters and to exercise the powers and authority of local self-government, subject, however, to such restrictions, limitations, and regulations, as may be imposed by the Legislature.” That enabling amendment is so clear as to need no exposition. It gives no absolute or inherent right to a city to frame a charter or even to exercise powers of local self-government. It gives to the legislature a right, in its sole discretion, to grant to a city the powers of local self-government subject to whatever restrictions and limitations may be imposed by the legislature. Nothing was done or accomplished under this constitutional amendment until the legislature, by Act of April 21, 191¡9, P. L. 665, passed the enabling First Class City Home Rule Act, which granted such cities the right to have a new charter or amendments, but again (in Section 11)* subject to the limitations, restrictions and regulations hereinafter prescribed. Section 17** of the First Class City Home Rule Act provides: “Subject to the limitations hereinafter prescribed, the city . . . may exercise all powers and authority of local self-government . . .”. Thereafter and pursuant thereto, the electorate of Philadelphia on April 17, 1951, adopted a Home Rule Charter effective on January 7,1952. This Charter was a voluminous, detailed framework of government, with minute directions and details for every office created or mentioned and the powers and duties of the officers thereunder. It provided, inter alia, that men and women employees in so-called County departments of Philadelphia (which were co-extensive territorially and *175geographically with the City of Philadelphia) who had always enjoyed the American privileges and immunities of engaging in political activities after working hours, should thereafter become and be called City employees but no longer possess such privileges and immunities and should be under civil service.
The present City Charter is a magnificent magnum opus, but were its designers and drafters possessed of the Biblical wisdom of Solomon they could not possibly have clearly and beyond question epitomized and incorporated into this document the provisions of countless thousands of pages of laws which had been enacted during a period of 200 years pertaining to the City and the County of Philadelphia. This monumental document will necessarily be the subject of interpretation, we venture to predict, for at least 50 years, and we only hope that the important civic questions arising therefrom will be approached by all parties concerned in a judicial manner and not with, the emotionalism and turmoil which have made the important issues in this ease a political football.
We come now to the City-County Consolidation Amendment, §8, Article XIV of the Constitution, which was adopted by the people of Pennsylvania on November 6, 1951 — 6 months after the City Charter was adopted and 2 months before it went into effect. Its main purpose was to eliminate the dual County and City sovereignty that existed in the same territorial area known as Philadelphia, to consolidate their governmental functions, and to enable the people of Philadelphia to frame and adopt their Charter and to legislate as to local affairs “until the General Assembly shall otherwise provideThis limitation is in accord, as we have seen, (a) with other provisions of the Constitution, and (b) particularly with the Home Rule Constitutional Amendment of 1922, and (c) with the *176First Class City Home Rule Act of 1949, and (d) with all the prior decisions of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania; and this is the controlling language which is ignored by the City and by the majority opinion in this case.*
The City-County Consolidation Amendment of 1951 is short and provides as follows: “(1) In Philadelphia all county offices are hereby abolished, and the city shall henceforth perform all functions of county government within its area through officers selected in such manner as may be provided by law. [Law unquestionably means legislative acts.]
“(2) Local and special laws, [meaning, unquestionably, legislative acts] regulating the affairs of the city of Philadelphia and creating offices or prescribing the powers and duties of officers of the city of Philadelphia, shall be valid notwithstanding the provisions of section seven of article three of this Constitution.
“(3) All laws [meaning, unquestionably, legislative acts] applicable to the county of Philadelphia shall apply to the city of Philadelphia.
“(5) The provisions of article fifteen, section one of the Constitution shall apply with full force and effect to the functions of the county government hereafter to be performed by the city government.
*177“(6) Tliis amendment shall become effective immediately upon its adoption.
“(7) Upon adoption of this amendment all county officers shall become officers of the city of Philadelphia, and, until the General Assembly shall otherwise provide, shall continue to perform their duties and be elected, appointed, compensated and organized in such maimer as may be provided by the provisions of this Constitution and the laws of the Commonwealth [meaning unquestionably legislative acts] in effect at the time this amendment becomes effective, but such officers serving when this amendment becomes effective shall be permitted to complete their terms.”
The City-County Consolidation Amendment specifically recognized and reaffirmed the supreme power of the legislature in and over the City of Philadelphia. Moreover, the City-County Consolidation Amendment also expressly provided that Article XV, §1 of the Constitution should (continue to) apply with full force and effect. Article XV provided, it will be recalled, that cities may be chartered, subject, however, to such restrictions, limitations and regulations as may be imposed by the legislature. It is important to note that the legislature has never been deprived of this power, nor has it ever abandoned or relinquished its power.
In the light of all of these Constitutional provisions and statutes which specifically preserved to the legislature the right to enact laws for cities, and to impose such restrictions, limitations and regulations as the legislature desired, and to enact local and special laws regulating the affairs of the City of Philadelphia, how can there be any possible merit to the contention that the legislature no longer has such powers.*
*178The majority place their decision on the ground that this Act is local and special legislation which is unconstitutional (1) because it applies only to the City of Philadelphia, (2) because it changes the City Charter, and (3) because it grants special privileges and immunities arbitrarily to the employees of some departments.
1. Notwithstanding any contrary implication in the majority opinion, if this Act of 1953 applied to all cities of the first class it would seem clear that the Act could not be invalidated on the ground that it was local legislation which was prohibited by Article III, §7 of the Constitution: Article III, §34 of the Constitution: Haverford Township v. Siegle, 346 Pa. 1, 28 A. 2d 786. Entirely apart from that, since Philadelphia has adopted under legislative permission a special City Charter applicable only to it, it is difficult if not impossible to perceive how the affairs of the City could be regulated by the legislature without expressly and specifically referring to the City of Philadelphia.
Moreover, §5 of this Act of 1953 cannot be voided as local legislation on the ground adopted by the majority, namely, “because it relates in terms to the City of Philadelphia only”, unless the entire Act is likewise so voided, since it enables, not “a city of the first class”, but City Council of the City of Philadelphia to legislate, organize and reorganize, merge or abolish five municipal offices; and City Council and the Mayor have *179organized and reorganized, merged or abolished the offices and departments of the City of Philadelphia under the terms and by virtue of this very Act of 1953; and also because the Act alters the term of the District Attorney of Philadelphia. Furthermore, and as a completo and crushing answer to the majority’s position, the City-County Consolidation Constitutional Amendment specifically says that “local and special laws regulating the affairs of the City of Philadelphia . . . shall be valid” notwithstanding the prohibition thereof contained in Article III, §7 of the Constitution. To summarize: The majority’s position that §5 thereof is local legislation for the reason that it refers and applies only to the City of Philadelphia is obviously utterly untenable.
2. Changing the Charter. The majority hold that a special law which regulates the affairs of the City of Philadelphia, or creates offices or prescribes the powers and duties of officers in said City, might be valid and constitutional, but not if (as here) it changes the Charter of the City. The City-County Consolidation Constitutional Amendment does not so provide. What does it provide?
The City-County Consolidation Amendment of 1951 provided, inter alia: “(2) Local and special laws, [meaning unquestionably legislative acts] regulating the affairs of the city of Philadelphia and creating offices or prescribing the powers and duties of officers of the city of Philadelphia, shall be valid notwithstanding the provisions of section seven of article three of this Constitution.”
The basis of the majority opinion is the “notwithstanding” clause. There are three possible interpretations of this “notwithstanding” clause.
Article III, §7 of the Constitution prohibits 28 different subjects including any local or special law *180“Incorporating cities, towns or villages or changing their charters: . . . Creating offices, or prescribing the powers and duties of officers in counties, cities, boroughs, townships, election or school districts.” The City-County Consolidation Amendment of 1951 naturally did not attempt to exclude by enumeration or name all of the 28 prohibitions of Section 7 of Article III; it did not say that local or special laws regulating the affairs of the City shall be valid “notwithstanding some of the 28 provisions of Section Seven of Article Three”; it said “local and special laws regulating the affairs of the City of Philadelphia . . . shall be valid notwithstanding the provisions of Section Seven of Article Three of this Constitution.” A literal interpretation of this language would mean, as the Attorney General contends, that none of the provisions or prohibitions contained in Article III, §7 now apply to the City of Philadelphia. But I believe that a careful analysis of the reasons for the Amendment, the history of this constitutional development and a consideration of the entire Amendment show that that is not the time meaning of this paragraph or clause. I 'believe it means this — local and special laws regulating the governmental affairs of the City of Philadelphia and creating offices or prescribing the powers and duties of officers of the City shall be valid notwithstanding the prohibitions thereof contained in Article. Ill, §7.
Certainly it is clear, as Mr.. Justice Stearne holds, that all provisions of Article III which.áre inconsistent with later, constitutional amendments are repealed by implication and the later amendment mtist ■ prevail..
The. majority .hold'.that 26 .of the 28 prohibitions contained.in Article-III,■ §7 -of .the Constitution are still applicable to Philadelphia' because .'they. were .not specifically excluded, from-the.grant of power-contained in. the. City-County Consolidation' .Amendment; and- that *1812 of the 26 prohibitions apply in this case and render the Act of 1953 unconstitutional. The Amendment is not as clear on this point as it should be. However, whether 26 of the prohibitions contained in Article III, §7 still apply, or whether none applies, or whether only those apply which are not inconsistent with the City-County Consolidation Amendment, is in my judgment, immaterial at this time, because none of the 26 are applicable to this challenged Act of 1953.
The reason why Article III, §7 of the Constitution of 1874 prohibited a local or special law incorporating cities or changing their charters, and the City-County Consolidation Amendment did not contain such a specific prohibition is clear. In 1874 when the Constitution was adopted, the legislature, and only the legislature, could grant or change a charter. It was therefore both wise and necessary at that time to restrict the right of the legislature by expressly prohibiting it from enacting local or special laws to incorporate a city or change its charter. The Commonwealth argues that this reason and necessity ceased in 1922 when the Home Rule Constitutional Amendment, to wit, Article XV, §1, empowered the legislature in its discretion to grant to cities “the right and power to frame and adopt their own charters and to exercise the powers and authority of local self-government, subject, however, to such restrictions, limitations, and regulations, as may be imposed by the Legislature.” If thereafter a charter and certain ordinances were adopted by one city council they would almost inevitably differ in some important particulars from those adopted by other city councils; and legislative acts imposing restrictions and regulations would necessarily deal differently with different charters and different provisions of local self-government; and consequently the prohibition in the 1874 Constitution against local or special laws changing charters *182was impliedly repealed. Whatever doubts may exist as to this contention, when the Home Rule Amendment of 1922 is considered together with the First Class City Home Rule Act of 1949 and especially with the CityGounty Consolidation Amendment of 1951 (which authorized the legislature to pass local and special laws to regulate the governmental affairs of the City of Philadelphia, to create offices for the City, and to prescribe the powers and duties of officers of the City, in spite of the prohibition thereof in Article III, §7 of the 1874 Constitution) all doubts are completely removed, because these Constitutional Amendments and the First Class City Home Rule Act taken together are absolutely inconsistent with and necessarily repeal the 1874 prohibition of changing a charter by local or special legislation. This becomes clear as crystal when the Charter of the City of Philadelphia is examined.
The Philadelphia City Charter is 100 pages in length. It is encyclopedic in scope and in detail. It creates offices and minutely describes and defines the powers and duties of every officer of the City of Philadelphia; and in every page it minutely and with very great detail regulates the affairs of the City of Philadelphia. That is exactly what it does and all it does. How, then, we may appropriately ash, is it possible to regulate the affairs of the City of Philadelphia, or to create offices, or to prescribe the powers and duties of officers of the City without changing the Charter? That question is unansioered by the majority opinion.
The reason for the language of the City-County Consolidation Amendment seems to us obvious. When this constitutional amendment provided that all local and special laws regulating the affairs of the City of Philadelphia should be valid, some persons might have had reasonable grounds for doubting whether that broad, general power was sufficient to enable the legis*1831ature to create offices or to prescribe the powers and duties of officers of the City. In other words, people might reasonably differ as to whether the power “to regulate the affairs” included also the power to “create offices”, and it was to remove any reasonable doubt on that subject that language granting to the legislature such powers ivas expressly inserted in the City-County Consolidation Amendment.
It was totally unnecessary to expressly authorize, in and by the City-County Consolidation Amendment, the legislature to change Philadelphia’s Charter since (a) the legislature had the constitutional power, as we have seen, to prescribe the conditions and limitations under Avhich a city could frame a charter; (b) the legislature could, under the prior decisions of this Court, alter or revoke any charter at will; and (e) the eneylopedic Philadelphia Charter had been adopted six months before the City-County Consolidation Amendment and the people of Pennsylvania, in adopting this constitutional amendment giving the legislature the right to pass local and special Iuavs regulating the affairs of the City of Philadelphia, knew that it was virtually impossible to regulate the affairs of the city without automatically and inevitably changing the massive, detailed Charter.
Moreover, the Constitutional Amendment of 1951— which of course is supreme over the Charter and over the Home Rule Act of 1949, and OATer any prior provision of the Constitution, if any, which is inconsistent therewith — does not limit the legislature to the innocuous position of only being able to pass legislation to permit city council to frame and pass an ordinance pursuant thereto; nor does its language limit it merely to regulating the affairs, and then only to a very limited extent, of former county offices and former county officers, as the majority, in effect, hold. This is con*184trary to the clear and specific language of the Amendment, which grants, not to city council or to the people of Philadelphia, hut to the legislature (a) the right to pass local and special laws regulating the [governmental] affairs of the City of Philadelphia, creating city offices and prescribing the powers and duties of city officers (Sec. 2); and (b) the right to enact laws to provide for the election, appointment, compensation and organization of former County officers (Sec. 7). The language of the Amendment is so plain and so clearly contrary to these contentions that the Amendment cannot be thus rewritten.
To summarize: The majority’s position that the legislature can pass local and special laws regulating the affairs of the City of Philadelphia provided they do not change the City’s Charter, is, in my judgment, so unreasonable, impractical and illogical as to be utterly unsupportable. Section 52 of the Statutory Construction Act of 1937 provides a presumption that the legislature does not intend a result that is unreasonable or impossible of execution or absurd. With due deference, I am convinced that the majority’s construction of the meaning of the Amendment on this particular point of prohibiting a change in the Charter is so unreasonable as to be absurd.
It has been contended that other sections of the 1953 Act regulate the affairs of the City of Philadelphia without changing its charter. An analysis will show how specious that contention really is. Section 1 of the Act of 1953 is a mere declaration of legislative purposes. Sections 2 and 4 of the Act of 1953 do not regulate the affairs of the City of Philadelphia, as the City contends; Section 2 merely contains enabling provisions authorizing City Council to legislate with respect to the five offices therein mentioned, and §4 merely confirms prior legislative acts and provides for *185a continuation of functions. Section 3 provides for the election of a district attorney in accordance with the express authority which was specifically granted to the legislature in §7 of the City-County Consolidation Amendment. The City’s contention or construction which has been adopted in the concurring Opinion gives to the Constitutional Amendment of 1951 which authorizes the legislature to pass laws regulating the affairs of the City of Philadelphia such a restricted meaning as to make Section 2 of the City-County Consolidation Amendment in effect absolutely meaningless.
The City’s contention that the legislature, if its power were unrestricted by 26 prohibitions in Article III, §7 could pass local and special laws granting divorces, changing the laws of descent, changing the rules of evidence, or fixing the rates of interest, is likewise without merit. This obviously would not be “regulating the [governmental] affairs of the city or creating offices or prescribing the powers and duties of officers of the city” which was the authority specifically granted to the legislature by the City-County Consolidation Amendment. Philadelphia is still an integral part of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the people of PenusjTvauia, when they adopted the City-County Consolidation x\mendment of 1951, never said or intended that Philadelphia could be insulated, divorced and separated from the State so as to permit local and special laws for Philadelphia with reference to statewide matters of divorce, descent, interest rates, rales of evidence and other similar subjects of statewide importance. The Amendment, I repeat, authorized the legislature to pass local and special laws regulating the governmental affairs of the City of Philadelphia.
3. Special or exclusive privilege or immtmity. Article TIT, §7 prohibits the passage of any local or special law “granting to any corporation, association or in*186dividual any special or exclusive privilege or immunity, or to any corporation, association or individual the right to lay down a railroad track.”
The main ground on which the majority seem to pinpoint their opinion is the latter part of §5 of the Act of 1953, which asserts that the provisions in the Philadelphia Home Rule Charter relating to civil service and prohibiting political activities by officers and employees of the City of Philadelphia shall be inapplicable to the sheriff, the city commissioners, the board of revision of taxes, and the registration commission, and to their employees. The majority hold this is unconstitutional because it is a local and special law which grants to certain individuals — I assume the officers and employees in the 4 offices mentioned — a special or exclusive privilege or immunity.
There are several answers to this contention, each of them controlling. The first one is that the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania has decided that the right to engage in political activities after work hours is not a special or exclusive privilege or immunity within the meaning of the Constitution. The legislature may prescribe reasonable conditions or regulations for public employment and may prohibit political activity of office holders without abridging their constitutional rights: See Duffy v. Cooke, 239 Pa. 427, 86 A. 1076; McCrory v. Philadelphia, 345 Pa. 154, 27 A. 2d 55. The converse must likewise be true — the legislature may permit political activity of office holders without abridging their constitutional rights, for if it is not a “special exclusive privilege” within the meaning of Article III, §7 of the Constitution to engage in political activities, Ixoav can the legislative permission to engage in such activities grant those persons a “special and exclusive privilege or immunity”? The answer is logical and obvious — it can’t. The reason is not difficult to dis*187cover. The right to hire and fire without a merit system, and the right to engage in political activities after working hours is not “a special or exclusive privilege” for a few privileged Americans; it is a universal right or privilege which, until a few years ago, had been enjoyed by all the American people and by private and public business since the birth of our Country.
The issue presented in this case is not whether the civil service system is desirable or undesirable or whether the ban on political activities is desirable or undesirable,* but only whether the legislature has constitutionally the right and the power to apply civil service and to ban political activities to some employees in some city offices. This is a matter for the discretion of the legislature, not of the Courts. A very wide discretion must, under our cases, be vested in the legislature; the act of the legislature must be held constitutional unless clearly and plainly unconstitutional and the classification must be sustained by the Courts *188■unless there can be found no reasonable ground for such classification.
This case was presented on agreed facts without any testimony. There is absolutely nothing in the record of this case which justifies the assumption by the majority that the employees of the 4 offices who were permitted to engage in political activities after work hours are performing precisely the same type of work and receiving the same pay as workers in other city offices. It is obvious that assessors of real property and the appraisers of personal property can be found and classified in no other department than in the board of revision of taxes and that they do not perform exactly or precisely the same work as do clerks and employees in the mayor’s department, or coroner’s department, or in the city treasurer’s department, or the clerk of court’s department, or in the board of inspectors of the Philadelphia County Prison. The same observation is likewise applicable to the sheriff’s deputies.
Reasonable provisions for civil service have been sustained as Constitutional by this Court. In Haverford Township et al. v. Siegle et al., 346 Pa. 1, 28 A. 2d 786, the Act of June 5, 1941, P. L. 84, provided for civil service for policemen in such municipalities as have three or more paid police officers. The Court said (page 9) : “Finally, it is argued that the Act violates the twenty-sixth clause of section 7, Article III, prohibiting local or special laws granting to any corporation or individual any special privilege or immunity. It is said that the statute grants privileges to members of the police force in first class townships having a police force of more than three members, and denies them to policemen in other such townships. The obvious answer is that such differences always happen whenever legislation regulating municipal affairs is made effective in certain municipalities and- not in *189others. If such an argument were sound, civil service could never have been inaugurated unless it were done in every city, town, borough and township in the Commonwealth at the same time. The patent unreasonableness of such a suggestion destroys it.”
The Haverford Township case holds that a grant of the privilege of civil service to policemen in towns having a 3-man police force and the exclusion therefrom or the denial thereof to policemen in towns having a 2-man police force is a “reasonable classification” and therefore constitutional. If that classification, where the policemen in the 3 police town and in the 2 police town do exactly the same work and have exactly the same powers and duties, and presumably receive the same pay, is constitutional, how can it be held that the classification in the instant case, where assessors and appraisers and other employees in one or more offices have work and duties manifestly different from employees in other city offices, is plainly arbitrary and clearly unjustifiable. The Haverford Township case directly or in principle controls the instant case and destroys the City’s contentions and the majority’s position on this issue.
In Iben v. Monaco, Borough, 158 Pa. Superior Ct., supra, the Court sustained the Constitutionality of the Act of May 14, 1937, P. L. 632, 53 PS 327, which granted to any policeman or fireman of a borough who was injured in the performance of his duties, his full salary for the period during which he was disabled (less workmen’s compensation payments received), even though the Act was limited in its benefits to two classes of employees and did not apply to all municipal employees generally... The Court held that' the Act did not violate Article III,-section 7-of the.Constitution. This decision once again demonstrates that even- -where money payments' are' provided' under- an Act,' the-legis*190lature may validly and reasonably separate employees of certain municipal departments from others and grant them special benefits and privileges, and at the same time exclude employees of other municipal departments therefrom.
This proposition of special or exclusive privilege on which the majority peg their opinion was considered by the able counsel who argued this case to be so totally inapplicable that it was neither argued nor briefed in the lower Court and except for the city solicitor, none of the many counsel for all of the parties involved discussed or even mentioned the subject in their lengthy and well considered briefs in this Court; nor was it considered to be even worth mentioning by Judge Milner in his exhaustive, scholarly and learned opinion for the Court below.
The majority and the City Solicitor cited two cases of this Court and one of the Superior Court to support their position. These cases instead of supporting that position are so inapposite and so far-fetched as to demonstrate the utter untenability of the majority’s position. Those cases, and many other cases which we shall cite, do, however, aptly illustrate what is meant by the words “special privilege and immunity”; and further demonstrate that this clause has never heretofore by the remotest stretch of the imagination been applied as the majority now apply it.
The first case cited by the majority is Com. ex rel. Graham v. Schmid, 333 Pa. 568, 3 A. 2d 701. In that case this Court held unconstitutional a provision of a third class city law which permitted veterans a lower passing grade in civil service examinations than other candidates, and granted them a 15% credit, not merely as a preference, but as an aid in establishing eligibility. This was held to create a special privilege.
The second case cited is Carney v. Lowe, 336 Pa. *191289, 9 A. 2d 418. The Court held invalid a provision of a third class city law which permitted the appointment of war veterans to civil service positions without regard to any age limitations, prescribed under the General Civil Service Regulations. This Act likewise gave veterans a special privilege.
In Wood v. Philadelphia, 46 Pa. Superior Ct. 573, the Superior Court held unconstitutional a statute which exempted veterans from taking the examination for a civil sendee position. This obviously gave veterans a special privilege.
Those are the only decisions of this Court or of the Superior Court which the majority cite to sustain their position that this was local and special legislation Avhich granted special and exclusive privileges to employees of four City departments. To these cases we add: Com. ex rel. Maurer v. O’Neill, 368 Pa. 369, 83 A. 2d 382, and Kurtz v. Pittsburgh et al., 346 Pa. 362, 31 A. 2d 257. In the O’Neill case the Court held an act to be unconstitutional Avhich gave a preference to veterans over non-veterans for promotion to higher public positions.
In the Kurts case this Court declared unconstitutional an act Avhich gave to dependent wiA^es and children of State employees in the armed services part of such employees’ pay.
These cases are so different from the instant case, and the analogy is so farfetched as to furnish no possible support for the majority’s opinion. In this connection and as further illustration of Avhat is meant by “privileges and immunities”, we call attention to Loomis v. Board of Education, 376 Pa. 428, 103 A. 2d 769, and Turco Paint & Varnish Co. v. Kalodner, 320 Pa. 421, 184 A. 37.
Loomis was a school teacher employed by the State. He was also a lieutenant colonel in the Reserves. He *192requested a military leave of absence for 15 days without loss of salary in accordance with the Act of July 12, 1935, which clearly granted him such right. The Commonwealth contended that the Act was unconstitutional because it violated Article III, §7 of the Constitution as a special law granting to individuals “a special or exclusive privilege and immunity.” We sustained, in a unanimous opinion, the constitutionality of that Act and rejected the contention that the Act granted to individuals “a special or exclusive privilege.” In other words, we held that it was constitutional to grant a person in the Reserves his full salary (not only during periods such as illness and vacation, but also) for the period of 15 days in each year in which he was engaged in army training or maneuvers. The Court there said: “Nothing but a clear violation of the Constitution will justify the judiciary in nullifying a legislative enactment. Every presumption must be indulged in its favor, and one who claims an Act is unconstitutional has a very heavy burden of proof: Tranter v. Allegheny County Authority et al., 316 Pa. 65, 173 A. 289; Busser et al. v. Snyder et al., 282 Pa. 440, 128 A. 80; The Pennsylvania Railroad Co. v. Riblet, 66 Pa. 164. When a statute is challenged as prohibited special legislation, the reasonableness of the classification made is for the Legislature in the first instance; the duty of the court is limited to considering whether the Legislature had any reasonable ground for making it: Chester County Institution District et al. v. Commonwealth et al., 341 Pa. 49, 17 A. 2d 212; National Transit Company et al. v. Boardman, Secretary of Revenue, 328 Pa. 450, 197 A. 239 . . . Courts may not.question the wisdom of the legislative classification unless there can be found no reasonable ground for it. *. . . The test .is,'not wisdom,, but good faith in the classification.’ :. J.A. Seabolt et al. v. The Commis*193sioners of Northumberland County, 187 Pa. 318 41 A. 22.”
In Turco Paint & Tarnish Co. v. Kalodner, 320 Pa., supra, the Court sustained the Corporate Net Income Tax Act as well as the exclusion therefrom of building and loan associations, banks, trust companies, insurance companies, and the like. It said (pages 432-433) : “. . . ''Classification cannot be made arbitrarily. ... It must always rest upon some difference which bears a reasonable and just relation to the act in respect to which the classification is proposed, and can never be made arbitrarily and without any such basis. ... Nor may any question be raised concerning the right of the Commonwealth to classify properties and their owners for the purpose of taxation’: Schoyer v. Comet Oil & Refining Co., 284 Pa. 189, 197.
“Mr. Justice Roberts stated in State Board v. Jackson, 283 U. S. 527, 539: "A very wide discretion must be conceded to the legislative power of the state in the classification of trades, callings, businesses or occupations, which may be subjected to special forms of regulation or taxation through an excise or license tax. If the selection is neither capricious nor arbitrary, and rests upon some reasonable consideration of difference or policy, there is no denial of the equal protection of the law. Our duty is to sustain the classification adopted by the legislature if there are substantial differences between the occupations separately classified. Such differences need not be great.’
“We have sustained for purposes of taxation the classification of corporations manufacturing beer from all other manufacturing corporations (Com. v. Ger-mania Brewing Co., supra), and we held the distinction made between them a reasonable one. Classification has been upheld between anthracite coal and bituminous coal (Heisler v. Thomas Collieries Co., supra, *194affirmed 260 U. S. 237); stock insurance companies and mutual insurance companies (Com. v. Girard Life Ins. Co., 305 Pa. 558); corporate owners of taxicabs and individual owners (Com. v. Quaker City Cab Co., 287 Pa. 161, reversed on another point in Quaker City Cab Co. v. Pa., 277 17. $. 389); foreign insurance companies and domestic insurance companies (Germania Life Ins. Co. v. Com., 85 Pa. 513); money owed by individuals and money owed by corporations (Fox’s App., 112 Pa. 337) ; stock in trust companies and stock in other associations (Com. v. Mortgage Trust Co., 227 Pa. 163, 177) ; and in many other situations.”
What is meant by the words “special or exclusive privilege or immunity” as used in Article III, §7 of the Constitution is clear from the foregoing authorities. The question of “special or exclusive privilege or immunity” and the question whether the legislative classification was reasonable or arbitrary, arises, as clearly appears from the authorities, only when money, or position, or preferment, or taxes, or exemptions are granted or imposed by the legislature; the clause obviously has no connection or relationship with the question involved in the instant case. If, however, it be assumed arguendo that political activities- could be “special privileges and immunities” within the meaning of Article III, §7, I would hold that the record is barren of facts which would enable this Court or any other Court to hold, in the light of the foregoing authorities that there were no differences or characteristics to justify the legislative classification.
To summarize:
(1) The Constitution grants, not to a city but, to the legislature the right and power to legislate. A City has no power or right of self-government or a right to frame or adopt its own Charter, except if, as, and when the legislature permits, and then subject to what*195ever restrictions and limitations the legislature may impose. The right of the City of Philadelphia to frame and adopt its own Charter is authorized by the Home Buie Amendment of 1922 and by the enabling Act of 1949 to wit, the First Class City Home Buie Act, and said Amendment and said Act, as well as the City-County Consolidation Amendment of 1951 preserve to the legislature the right and power to impose upon the City of Philadelphia such restrictions, limitations and regulations as it may desire, provided, of course, that they do not violate the Constitution.
(2) The legislature of Pennsylvania, under the City-County Consolidation Constitutional Amendment, has the undoubted right to enact a local and special law to regulate the governmental affairs of the City of Philadelphia, and to create offices and to prescribe the powers and duties of officers of the City; and this necessarily includes the right to amend the voluminous, detailed City Charter.
(3) The Act of 1953 and §5 thereof are valid and constitutional.
(4) The provision in Article I, §16 of the First Class City Home Rule Act. of 1949: “Limitations on Presenting Petitions For and the Adoption of Charters and Amendments — No proposal of a new charter or amendments of similar substance, purpose and intent shall be submitted to the qualified electors oftener than once in every five years.” — even when considered in conjunction with the Home Buie Amendment of 1922 — -refers by its terms, and particularly by its proviso only to petitions to and resolutions of City Council and the subsequent vote of the people on the proposals submitted by Council, and has no application to an Act of the Legislature which is specifically authorized to regulate the affairs of the City by the *196City-County Consolidation Amendment of 1951, winch is the latest and supreme law on this subject.
For each and all of the foregoing reasons, I would affirm the judgment of the Court of Common Pleas No. 3 of Philadelphia County in each of these appeals.

 Italics throughout, ours.

 53 P.S., Section 3421.11.

 53 P.S., Section 3421.17.

 The wisdom or folly of permitting the legislature to regulate or alter the powers of local self-government given to the City of Philadelphia is not within the province of this Court. It may not be amiss to point out to those who are fearful of the legislative power, that anyone who has read the newspapers for the several months that the Act here involved was being debated, will know how difficult it is for the legislature to pass any act which importantly affects and changes, over local objection, the administration of local affairs in Philadelphia.

 It is interesting to note that while the question was not speeifically decided, Mr. Chief Justice Steen, speaking for the Court, said in Lennox v. Clark, 372 Pa. 355, 370, 93 A. 2d 834; “Since *178clause (7) of tlie City-County Consolidation Amendment provides that the county officers are to continue, now- as city officers, to perform their duties ‘until the General Assembly shall otherwise provide,’ it would seem that any proposed reorganizations, re-groupings, abolitions, or mergers, of the former county offices, designed the more advantageously to incorporate their -functions into the existing municipal structure,' must wait upon action by the General Assembly.” '■■■•"

 To those wlio sincerely believe that political activities are anathema and civil service is the answer to every problem of good government, may we say that most people who believe in good government and who have had actual expórtame with both civil service and political activities, agree that each possesses merits and demerits, advantages and drawbacks, and that each, but particularly political activities, is bad when carried to an extremo. When one studies the history of our Country and the record of fine government in the rural counties of Pennsylvania which never had civil service, one cannot help wondering how our Country grew to be the greatest Country in the world without civil service; and what our Country would be like today if engaging in political activities had been considered a special or exclusive privilege, and Jefferson, Hamilton, Madison, Franklin, Jay, Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt and Franklin D. Roosevelt had been prohibited from exercising one of the greatest privileges enjoyed by any freedom-loving nation.