Court Opinion

ID: 9807815
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 20:16:37.870633+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:59:14.930384
License: Public Domain

RodmaN, J.

Dissenting.

I dissent from the opinion of the court for this reason. When the plaintiff performed the services as Clerk in respect of which he sues, as the law then stood he was entitled to receive the fees from the county, in the event that nolle prosequi should be entered on the indictments. It was a vested right to payment on the happening of a contingency which- the Legislature could not deprive him of. If an Accident Insurance Company agrees to pay B a certain sum in case he shall be disabled or killed on a certain journey, his right to receive the money on the happening of the contingency is a vested right, although the right is not complete until the contingency happens. When it happens the right by relation becomes absolute ah init'-n. It cannot be supposed that the Legislature could discharge the Company from its contract at any time before the contingency happened.
The argument for the defendant is that the Legislature had a right to substitute the State as a debtor in the place of the county. But I conceive the Legislature has no right to compel a creditor to give up his claims against a solvent debtor against whom he has a practical remedy, and to substitute in his place the State against whom he has no remedy. Besides it seems plain to me that the Legislature never intended to .make the State liable for the plaintiff’s claim. I think the Act of 1874-75 violated a contract, and was void as in conflict with the Constitution of the United States.
Pkb CukiAM. Judgment reversed.