Oregon Advisory Opinions February 15, 1943: OAG 43-25 (February 15, 1943)
Collection: Oregon Attorney General Opinions
Docket: OAG 43-25
Date: Feb. 15, 1943
Advisory Opinion Text
OAG 43-25.
Gentlemen: You have requested my advice as to whether House Bill No. 78 of the Forty-Second Legislative Assembly of the state of Oregon is valid as respects the provision in section 1 thereof authorizing the payment of taxes by the state on certain property which it now owns "exclusive of penalties and interest thereon which the tax collector of Marion county is hereby authorized and directed to cancel", the title of such bill being a bill "For an act providing for the payment of taxes on certain parcels of real property now owned by the state, and appropriating money therefor". You advise me that a question has been raised as to the validity of the act on account of the provision for the exclusion of penalties and interest by cancellation thereof by the sheriff not being stated in the title.
Section 20, article IV, of the Oregon Constitution provides that "Every act shall embrace but one subject, and matters properly connected therewith, which subject shall be expressed in the title * * *." In the case of State v. Laundy, 103 Or., 443 at page 455, the court discusses this section of the Constitution as follows:
"The language of the Constitution is, 'which subject shall be expressed in the title,' and hence it is the 'subject' of the act, and not 'matters properly connected therewith' which must be expressed in the title. The subject of the law is the matter to which the measure relates and with which it deals. The term 'subject' is to be given a broad and extensive meaning so as to allow the legislature full scope to include in one act all matters having a logical or natural connection. The word 'subject' includes the chief thing to which the statute relates, and the words 'matters properly connected therewith' include every matter germane to and having a natural connection with the general subject of the act; or as expressed in State v. Shaw, 22 Or. 289 (29 Pac. 1028):
'If all the provisions of the law relate directly or indirectly to the same subject, are naturally connected, and are not foreign to the subject expressed in the title, they will not be held unconstitutional.' "
The following are some illustrations of matters germane to the general subject which may be included in an act, though not stated in the title:
A section of an act which relates to the appointment of a county managing committee and its functions and duties, was within the purview of a title reading, "To provide for primary elections in cities having a population of more than ten thousand, and providing the manner of conducting the same," etc. Ladd v. Holmes. (1901) 40 Or. 167, 66 P. 714, 91 Am. St. Rep. 457.
A law which prescribes regulations for fishing and for punishment of violations, is not invalid because a section declared that, unless otherwise specifically provided, justices' courts should have concurrent jurisdiction in the first instance with the circuit court of all offenses. State v. Blanchard, (1920) 96 Or. 79, 189 P. 421.
An amendatory act condemning one aiding and abetting an officer of a bank in misappropriating bank funds, comes within the title of the act "regulating the business of banking." State v. Kubli, (1926) 118 Or. 5, 244 P. 512.
Such illustrations might be multiplied but no beneficial purpose would be served thereby. The present instance is one strictly within the language employed by the Oregon Supreme Court in the cases here cited. It is obvious that the interest and penalties accruing on delinquent taxes are matters properly connected with such taxes, and the payment of the taxes exclusive of such principal and interest, is within the subject stated in the title, that is the payment of the taxes. As is well said by the court in the cases cited, it is the subject only that is required to be stated in the title, and it is entirely unnecessary to include the various matters which may be properly connected therewith in the statement of the subject.A provision declaring two-county mortgages void is sufficiently relevant and germane to an act providing for the taxation of money secured by a mortgage on land, particularly when, as a means to that end, such act limits all mortgages on real property to land in one county. Farmers' Loan & Trust Co. v. Oregon & C. Ry. Co., (1885) 24 Fed. 407.
It is my opinion, therefore, that said House Bill No. 78, which has been passed by both houses of the legislature, is valid and binding in all of its parts.