Court Opinion

ID: 3299892
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2016-07-05 17:16:30.694093+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:25:32.763216
License: Public Domain

I concur. It is apparent that this statute raises a doubt whether or not it was contemplated by its framers that the state should be subject to its provisions. Under fundamental and familiar principles of construction of statutes such as this the existence of the doubt is the solution of the inquiry. Wherever such a doubt *Page 205 
does exist the construction favors the sovereign. The sovereign is not brought within the scope of its own laws unless the intent that this should be done is made plainly to appear. This general rule of construction favoring the sovereign in case of doubt is applied to grants by the state, to statutes of limitation, to rights of action, and, indeed, to all laws and contracts concerning which it may be thought that the state is included or is a party. If, in truth, the state desires to subject itself to the law here in question it could and should do so in language of clear and unmistakable import.
Sloss, J., and Shaw., J., concurred.