County Commissioners v. State Lunacy Commission

¹⁶² Burke, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. This is an appeal from an order of the Superior Court of Baltimore City passed on the 13th day of August, 1915, dismissing a petition for mandamus filed by the appellant against Arthur P. Herring, the Secretary of the Lunacy Commission of the State of Maryland. The object of the petition was to require the defendant to approve the statement submitted to him and exhibited with the bill. This statement will be presently referred to.

The defendant demurred to the petition. At the hearing of the demurrer it was admitted by the defendant, as stated in the record, “that all the facts stated in the petition are true subject to their legal relevancy, and agreement in open Court that the demurrer together with said admission shall be treated as an answer if required.” The Court sustained the demurrer, and, treating it as an answer under the agreement, dismissed the petition, and from this action the petitioner has appealed. Whether the State is liable, under the Act of 1914, Chapter 778, to the petitioner for the sum of $5,223.18 for the support and maintenance of dependent insane persons of the State of Maryland for the year 1914 treated at Sylvan Retreat in Allegany County as shown in the statement referred to, is the sole question presented by this appeal. The question is a narrow one, — its determination depending upon the proper interpretation of the statute.

No constitutional question is involved, — the single question being whether the State by the Act mentioned has imposed this liability upon itself. If it intended to do> so, there is no reason why the writ of mandamus should not have issued as prayed. In the construction of the Act the Court must endeavor to ascertain the intention of the Legislature, and this intention may be gathered not merely from the language of the enactment, but also from the causes which prompted its passage and from surrounding circumstances existing at the time, or, as was said in C. & O. Canal Co. v. B. & O. R. R. Co., 4 Gill & Johnson, 152: “Statutes should be construed with a view to the original intent and meaning of the makers, and ¹⁶³ such construction should be put upon them as best to answer that intention which may be gathered from the cause or necessity of making the Act, or from foreign circumstances, and when discovered ought to be followed, although such construction may seem to be contrary to the letter of the statute.” The Act under consideration will be examined in the light of these principles. It is entitled: “An Act to appropriate certain sums of money to the County Commissioners of Allegany County, Maryland, for the support and maintenance at Sylvan Retreat' of dependent insane persons of Maryland, ft> meet the difference between the amount paid by the counties of Maryland and the actual cost of supporting and maintaining such persons at said Asylum.” The first sec^ tion imposes the duty upon County Commissioners to keep minute and accurate account of all monies received and disbursed for the support and maintenance of dependent insane persons of Maryland in their charge at Sylvan Retreat, and at the end of the years 1914 and 1915 shall prepare a complete statement thereof, “which shall be submitted 1» the Secretary of the Lunacy Commission, and upon his aproval of the same and it shall appear that there is a deficiency between the amount paid by Allegany County and other counties of Maryland and the actual cost of supporting and maintaining such persons, the said deficiency shall be reimbursed by the State.” The sum of $10,000 or so much thereof as might be necessary is appropriated by section 2 of the Act “to the County Commissioners of Allegany County to pay for any and all deficiencies arising from the support and maintenance of dependent insane persons of Maryland, approved and ascertained as provided in the above section for the year 1914, and a like sum of $10,000 for the year 1915, or so much thereof as may be