Court Opinion

ID: 9812996
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 22:53:09.950547+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:27:28.157578
License: Public Domain

*585Douglas, J.,
concurring. I shall be glad indeed when all the office-holding cases are finally decided, not only from their intrinsic difficulty, but more so from the vast amount of discussion to which they have given rise. Much of this dis-eussion, viewed from my standpoint, has seemed irrelevant and indeed liable to mislead. Hence upon one or two occasions I have felt compelled to explain myself in a concurring opinion, as I did not wish to be misunderstood upon important constitutional questions. My personal views are fully set out in Wilson v. Jordan, 124 N. C., 707, and Green v. Owen, 125 N. C., 212.
I have given this case most careful consideration, especially in view of the division of opinion, and I see no reason to overrule the unanimous opinion of this Court as expressed in Wood v. Bellamy, 120 N. C., 212. If I follow that opinion to its necessary and legitimate results, I am forced to concur with the Court in the case at bar. In fact, the case as now before us presents no substantial difficulties to my mind. Whatever complications may have existed were solved when we decided that the plaintiff was entitled to the office. The only question now before us is whether he shall receive the compensation which the Legislature attached to the performance of its duties. We are not creating any office, for the office was admittedly created by the Act of 1897, and it does not appear to us that it was abolished by the Act of 1899. We are not affixing any salary to the office further than that we find expressly provided in the Act of 1899 — the last expression of legislative will. We are not levying any public taxes, nor appropriating any public money. This was done to the fullest necessary extent by both acts. That of 1897 raised and appropriated to the specific purposes of this case an ample fund, much of which still remains in the treasury unexpended and not otherwise appropriated. The case comes *586before ns on facts agreed, and it is expressly stated that “the State Treasurer has on, hand of the oyster fund collected under the provisions of chap. 13, Laws 1897, and chap. 19, Laws 1899, an amount sufficient and available for the payment of such salary and travelling expenses as the plaintiff may be entitled to.”' No one else is now claiming it, and no-one else is now performing the duties which would entitle him to receive it.
The only reason given why it should not be paid to the plaintiff is a construction of sec. 1, chap. 21, Laws 1899, which it seems to me would ascribe to- the Legislature most unworthy motives. This section provides that “the Treasurer of the State of North Carolina shall not pay any compensation to any person or persons claiming the same for services rendered concerning the shell-fish industry, unless such person or persons are authorized to render such services under the provisions of the said act.” (Chap. 19, Laws 1899.)
We are asked who- were authorized to render such services under’said act ? Plainly the person or persons rightfully performing the official duties prescribed by that act. Can we say that the primary object of the Legislature was not the public welfare, but the private benefit of the individuals-'named in the act ? Have we any right to say that the Legislature!, in providing for the protection and supervision of one 'of the great industries of the State, intended to say to the Treasurer, “We think that the proper supervision of the shellfish industry is necessary for the public wolf are, and for this purpose we have appropriated the public money, but if that public money can not go into the pockets of our personal friends whom we have named in the bill, we prefer that those important public duties should remain unperformed and those great public interests entirely neglected.” The Legislature has not said so; it could not legally say so, and it shall not *587be made to say so, even inferentially by any construction of mine. It is my duty as well as 'my pleasure to place upon its acts a construction in harmony with the public interests which they are bound to protect, and the Constitution which they are sworn to obey. They may well have believed that the office held by the plaintiff had been legally abolished, and that they had the right to fill the offices they had presumably created. So believing, they may have intended simply to instruct the Treasurer not to pay any mere claimant under any other act, but if he could not pay their appointees, to hold the fund until it was legally determined to whom it should be paid. Such would have been their legal intent, and such I prefer to believe was their actual intention.
Of course I would deeply regret to see my native State visited by earthquakes or cyclones of a civil or material nature, and.I am glad to say they have no germ in the decision we are rendering. This case is a small one, actually and potentially. It enunciates no new principle, and involves but little money. Construing the two acts together, we find an office created by the Legislature with a salary attached thereto and a fund specifically appropriated for the payment thereof. AH we now say is that the man legally and rightfully performing the duties of the office is entitled to the compensation thereunto affixed by law.