Strange v. Levy

Adkins, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. This is an appeal from an order passed on April 3rd, 1919, by the Circuit Court for Anne Arundel County declaring Chapter 205 of the Acts of the General Assembly of Maryland of 1918 unconstitutional, null and void “in so far as it attempts to create the municipal office of President of the Annapolis Water Company and provide for his appointment by the Mayor of Annapolis., and so' far as. said Act imposes upon the counselor and one of the minority members of the Board of Aldermen the duty of being directors of the Annapolis Water Company,” and making perpetual a preliminary injunction passed by said Court on May 9th, 1918, restraining' and enjoining James E. Strange, Mayor of Annapolis from appointing George T. Melvin, or any other person, as president of said Water Company. The learned Court below based its. decision on the ground that said Act was passed as an Emergency Law under” Article XVT of the Constitution of Maryland, known as The Referendum, and therefore violates the proviso in section 2 of said Article “that no measure creating or abolishing any office, or changing the salary, term or duty of any officer, or granting ⁶⁴⁷ any franchise or special, privilege, or creating any vested right or interest shall he enacted as an emergency law.” The three questions argued on this appeal wer e: 1. Was the appointment of George T, Melvin as President of the Water Company actually made before the granting of the preliminary injunction ? 2.

Was any office created, or the salary, term or duty of any officer changed, within the meaning of said constitutional provision, by tbe Act of 1918 ? 3. Assuming that the constitutional provision was violated by the attempt to make the Act an Emergency Law, did that render the entire Act unconstitutional ? In the view we take of this case it is unnecessary to consider any of these points. In our opinion the Act of 1918 does not come within the purview of Article XVI of the