Court Opinion

ID: 9621239
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 05:54:14.144528+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:05:02.962540
License: Public Domain

Given, Judge,
dissenting:
As strange as it may seem, the majority opinion in this case permits a legislative enactment to override and destroy a constitutional provision, the Good Roads Amendment, Section 52 of Article VI. The effect of the holding is that the Legislature may now authorize the levying, collection and expenditure of any and all revenues referred to in the constitutional amendment, including all revenues derived from gasoline, other motor fuels, motor vehicle *662registration license fees or taxes, “and all other revenue derived from motor vehicles or motor fuels”, by municipalities or other governmental subdivisions, without requiring the application of any of such revenues to the “construction, reconstruction or improvement” of the State roads, or “the payment of the interest and principal on all road bonds heretofore issued or which may be hereafter issued”. That the Legislature will possibly not do so is no answer to the problem. We are here concerned only with the power of the Legislature to act.
Section 52 of Article VI of the Constitution was submitted to a vote of the people at the general election held November 3, 1942, pursuant to the provisions of Chapter 11 of the 1941 Acts of the Legislature. In that chapter it was directed that the proposed amendment should be known as the “Good Roads Amendment”. Balloting on the proposed amendment was required to be “For ratification of ‘Good Roads Amendment’ ” or “Against Ratification of ‘Good Roads Amendment’ ”. Publication of the proposed amendment in some newspaper in each county in which a newspaper was published was required to be made at least three months prior to the election. Thus, there can be no doubt that the people understood that the purposes of the proposed amendment related solely to good roads of the State, not to streets and alleys of municipalities. The purposes of the amendment, to help provide a system of good roads for the entire State, and to establish and stablize a Good Roads bond market for the State, were, and are, common knowledge.
I think of no better way to demonstrate the manner in which the meaning of the constitutional amendment has been twisted and destroyed than to quote the amendment, and insert within the quote, within parentheses, the added or changed meaning effected by the majority opinion, as follows: “Revenue (except revenue collected by municipalities or other governmental subdivisions) from gasoline and other motor fuel excise and license taxation, motor vehicle registration and license taxes, (except as such revenues relate to buses) and all other revenue derived *663from motor vehicles (except buses) or motor fuels (except motor fuels used in municipalities) shall, (within the discretion of the Legislature) after deduction of statutory-refunds (or refunds authorized by municipalities or other governmental subdivisions) and costs of administration and collection authorized by legislative appropriation, (or by municipalities or other governmental subdivisions) be appropriated and used solely for construction, reconstruction, repair and maintenance of public highways, (including streets and alleys) and also the payment of the interest and principal on all road bonds (and street and alley bonds) heretofore issued (whether by the State, a municipality or other governmental subdivision) or which may be hereafter issued for the construction, reconstruction or improvement of public highways, (including streets and alleys) and the payment of obligations incurred in the construction, reconstruction, repair and maintenance of public highways (including streets and alleys. Provided: That any such tax collected by a municipality or other governmental subdivision need not be appropriated or used for public highways, or streets or alleys).” An attempt to harmonize the language of the amendment with the language included in parentheses, the language necessary to reflect the meaning of the majority holding, clearly reveals the impossible position of the majority.
The language of the amendment, in my view, plainly and definitely requires that all revenues derived from the sources designated in the amendment, which undoubtedly include the tax imposed by the statute in question, be appropriated by the State Legislature and used solely for the specific purposes therein mentioned. There is no exception even hinted in the language, and no words used from which any exception could possibly be implied. There is not the least indication that the Legislature was to have power to delegate the levying, collection or expenditure of any such revenues to any municipality, or that any of such revenues could be used for any purpose other than “construction, reconstruction or improvement” of the roads of the State. On the contrary, the language *664of the constitutional amendment plainly and specifically applies to all revenues derived from the sources therein mentioned. The majority opinion dares not attempt to find in the amendment language justifying, even by implication, any such exception. The language in the amendment is simply ignored or by-passed.
Since the Court holds that the Legislature may authorize a municipality to levy and collect the seat mile tax, and that such a tax is not prohibited by the constitutional amendment it seems indisputable that, by the same reasoning, the Legislature could authorize municipalities or other governmental subdivisions to collect any “Revenue from gasoline and other motor fuel excise and license taxation, * * * and all other revenue derived from motor vehicles or motor fuels * * referred to in the amendment. The plain effect of the majority holding is to reestablish the law precisely as it was before the adoption of the amendment. It renders the amendment totally without effect in so far as the power of the Legislature is concerned. The Legislature now has power to accomplish precisely what it could have done before the adoption of the Good Roads Amendment. The Good Roads Amendment is now a dead amendment.
The case of Transport Corp. v. Wheeling, 115 W. Va. 293, 175 S. E. 219, cited in the majority opinion, does not support the majority view. That decision was made prior to the adoption of the constitutional amendment. The adoption of the constitutional amendment of itself invalidated all existing statutory provisions in conflict therewith. See Swift & Co. v. City of Newport News, 105 Va. 108, 52 S. E. 821, 3 L.R.A., N.S., 404.
The majority would invoke, in support of its conclusion, a supposed “ten years or more” of contemporaneous construction. The statute was not enacted until 1951. Therefore, no ten years contemporaneous construction, or any long time construction whatever would be possible. The fact that some municipality may have collected such a tax as here involved, by virtue of a statute invalidated by the adoption of the constitutional amendment, can not amount *665to contemporaneous construction. Moreover, the language of the amendment is so clear and plain that the rule of contemporaneous construction can have no application. See Flesher v. Board of Review, 138 W. Va. 765, 77 S. E. 2d 890, and cases there cited. Most certainly, the collection of such a tax, authorized only by a' municipal ordinance, should not be treated as contemporaneous construction of a constitutional amendment.
The majority argues that the Legislature, under its plenary power, as well as by virtue of Section 9 of Article X of the State Constitution, had power to enact the legislation here involved. Of course, there is no question that the Legislature may, in proper cases, authorize municipalities to levy and collect taxes. It is just as clear and certain, however, that the power of the Legislature in that respect may be limited by the people by the adoption of a constitutional amendment.
In my view, the conclusion reached by the majority is not in accord with the views expressed in the opinion in the recent case of State ex rel. State Road Commission v. O’Brien, Secretary of State, 140 W. Va. 114, 82 S. E. 2d 903, wherein it is stated: “* * * Article VI, Section 52, merely creates a fund into which all revenues from gasoline, and other motor fuel, excise and license taxation, motor vehicle registration and license fees, and all other revenues, derived from motor vehicles, or motor fuels, shall go, and provides that such funds shall be used only for the construction, reconstruction or improvement of public highways, and the payment of obligations incurred therein. This section is not self-enacting, and the fund created by it must rely upon legislative enactment for its resources. It does not provide that any revenue shall come into the fund, but it does provide that if, by legislative enactment, taxes are derived from certain sources, they may not go into any other fund or be used for any other purpose. In other words, the moneys which go into this fund do not constitute a part of the general revenues of the State, since they can not be used for general purposes, but only for the purposes specified in the Amendment * *
*666Being of the views indicated, I respectfully dissent. I am authorized to say that Judge Riley concurs in this dissent. We are of the opinion that Section 13 of Article 10 of Sub-chapter 17A of Chapter 129 of the Acts of the 1951 Legislature is clearly in conflict with Section 52 of Article VI of the State Constitution.