Messick v. Duby

168 P. 628, 86 Or. 366, 1917 Ore. LEXIS 150
CourtOregon Supreme Court
DecidedNovember 20, 1917
StatusPublished
Cited by17 cases

This text of 168 P. 628 (Messick v. Duby) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Oregon Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Messick v. Duby, 168 P. 628, 86 Or. 366, 1917 Ore. LEXIS 150 (Or. 1917).

Opinion

Mr. Justice Bean

delivered the opinion of the court.

The only question for determination in this case is whether or not Sections 3426-3430, were repealed by implication by the enactment of the Corrupt Practices Act in 1909. It is the contention of counsel for contestee that the old statute, Chapter 7, Title XXVII, has been superseded entirely by that act and that this election contest should have been begun and proceeded with under the later law.

1. Section 3426", L. O. L., provides:

“Any person wishing to contest the election of any person to any county, district, township, or precinct office, may give notice in writing to the person whose election he intends to contest that his election will be contested, stating the cause of such contest briefly, within thirty days from the time said person shall claim to have been elected. ’ ’

Under this section no election contest is permissible except by persons claiming the office: Marsden v. Harlocker, 48 Or. 90 (85 Pac. 328, 120 Am. St. Rep. 786).

The title of the Corrupt Practices Act is as follows:

“To propose by initiative petition a law to limit candidates’ election expenses; to define, prevent and punish corrupt and illegal practices in’ nominations [369]*369and elections; to secure and protect the purity of the ballot; to amend section 2775 of Bellinger and Cotton’s Annotated Codes and Statutes of Oregon; to provide for furnishing information to the electors and to provide the manner of conducting contests for nominations and elections in certain cases”: Laws Oregon, 1909, p. 15.

This act is embraced in Sections 3486 to 3539, L. O. L., inclusive. Section 3529, L. O. L., is as follows :

“Any elector of the state, or of any political or municipal division thereof, may contest the right of any person to any nomination or office for which such elector has the right to vote, for any of the following causes: 1. On the ground of deliberate, serious and material violation of any of the provisions of this act, or of any other provisions of the law relating to nominations or elections. 2. When the person whose right was contested was not, at the time of the election, eligible to such office. 3. On account of illegal votes, or an erroneous or fraudulent count or canvass of votes.”

Many of the general provisions of the act of 1909 are set forth at length in Livesley v. Landon, 69 Or. 275, 280 (138 Pac. 853), and need not be detailed here.

2-4. In the determination of the question of whether or not a former statute has been repealed by a later one, the intention of the lawmakers controls the courts, the same as in the construction of a law. It is a universal rule that a later act does not by implication repeal a former, touching the same subject matter, where there is no repugnancy between them and both can be sustained and enforced. Repeals by implication are not favorites of the law and if it is not perfectly manifest, either by repugnancy which cannot be reconciled, or by some other means clearly showing the intent of [370]*370the lawmakers to abrogate the former statute, both must be held to be operative: State v. Benjamin, 2 Or. 125, 126; Strickland v. Geide, 31 Or. 373 (49 Pac. 982); Cunningham v. Klamath Lake R. Co., 54 Or. 13, 20 (101 Pac. 213, 1099); Booth’s Will, 40 Or. 154, 156 (61 Pac. 1135, 66 Pac. 710); Sandys v. Williams, 46 Or. 327, 331 (80 Pac. 642); Pacific Elevator Co. v. Portland, 65 Or. 349, 387 (133 Pac. 72, 46 L. R. A. (N. S.) 363); Du Bois Lumber Co. v. Clatsop County, 74 Or. 409 (145 Pac. 653). The enactment of the Corrupt Practices Act by the people of the state does not indicate that it was the intention to supplant or repeal the former statute relative to the contest of an election to a county, district, or precinct office. We find no repugnancy between the two statutes. They are not inconsistent. Both can be harmoniously enforced. As we have heretofore said in effect: The later act covers a wide field and makes various provisions relating to “the manner of conducting contests for nominations and elections in certain cases.” But we think it does not contain all the provisions for such a proceeding. The older law, Section 3430, L. O. L., contains a plain command that the same shall not be construed so as to impair the right to contest any election in the manner otherwise provided by law. While the later statute does not provide for an appeal from the judgment of the Circuit Court it in no way displays an intention to take away the right of appeal conferred by the old act: See Livesley v. London, 69 Or. 275, 280 (138 Pac. 853); Tazwell v. Davis, 64 Or. 325, 330 (130 Pac. 400). Neither does the Corrupt Practices Act purport to take away the right of one claiming the office to contest the election of another person to any county, district, or precinct office under the former law without giving a bond for costs. The [371]*371act of 1909 provides for the contest of nominations and elections of offices not embraced in the older law and on different'grounds and by another class of persons. Its obvious purpose as its title indicates was to build a new structure of the later law relating to nominations and elections without impairing the old law involved herein. While two sections of the act are referred to in the old statute, one of which is amended, no reference is made to Sections 3426-3430, L. O. L. Although the language of Section 3529, subdivision 3, L. 0. L., may overlap or cover the same ground as the former statute, yet this alone is not enough to repeal the older act by implication.

It is stated in 36 Cyc., p. 1073, as follows:

“Where two legislative acts are repugnant to, or in conflict with, each other, the one last passed, being the latest expression of the legislative will, must govern, although it contains no repealing clause. But it is not sufficient to establish such repeal that the subsequent law covers some, or even all, of the cases provided for by the prior statute, since it may be merely affirmative, or cumulative, or auxiliary. Between the two acts there must be plain, unavoidable, and irreconcilable repugnancy, and even then the old law is repealed by implication only pro tanto, to the extent of the repugnancy. If both acts can, by any reasonable construction, be construed together, both will be sustained. Two statutes are not repugnant to each other unless they relate to the same subject. Furthermore it is necessary to the implication of a repeal that the objects of the two statutes be the same. If they are not, both statutes will stand, although they may refer to the same subject.”

It is manifest that the Corrupt Practices Act was intended to prohibit indulgence of any corrupt act connected with the nomination or election of public officers, of the state and to punish the offender by de[372]*372priving Mm of the right to hoM office during his term, and giving to an elector the right to commence proceedings to oust the incumbent from any public office. A proceeding brought for that purpose under the later act by a person not claiming the office naturally should be safeguarded against unnecessary and unreasonable attacks made upon a public official.

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Bluebook (online)
168 P. 628, 86 Or. 366, 1917 Ore. LEXIS 150, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/messick-v-duby-or-1917.