municipal bodies. It is insisted for appellant that the title of the act embraces, and that its body provides, for two subjectsmatter, viz. the sale of liquors by municipalities, and the prohibition of its sale, in violation of section 2 of article 4 of the constitution. This is hypercriticism. The act has but one subject; its purpose is single. It is simply to provide for the exclusive sale of liquors by municipalities. To do this it was necessary to empower them to engage in the business, and to prohibit others to engage in it. That is all that is expressed in its title, and that is clearly expressed therein, and that is all that is provided for in the body of the act. What else is therein prescribed and provided is mere detail, necessary to the carrying on of the business the municipalities are authorized to engage in. Of course, a town empowered to establish and conduct a dispensary of liquors must needs have a dispenser, and the provisions of the act for the appointment and prescribing the duties of dispensers are obviously cognate to, and complementary of, the subject expressed in the title; necessary to carrying out the purpose of the act, and hence covered by the expression of that purpose in the title. And we know of no constitutional guaranty or fundamental principle of government, or chart of liberty or inalienable right, that would be violated by the selection of a dispenser for a town who chanced to live beyond its corporate limits. Not only so, but as the dispensary, though carried on by a town, is for the country or county as well as the town, it would seem to be entirely appropriate for the county authorities to have the voice which is given them by the act in the selection of dispens

ers.

Much is said in argument for appellant to the general effect that though the establishment of dispensaries for the exclusive sale of liquors, as proposed by this act, may not be violative of the letter or spirit of any ordinance of the state or federal constitutions, yet that those organic governmental charters "do not contain all the constitutional liberties and guaranties of the people," and that "we have a vast reserve of such liberty, not found in any written constitution, and which, by the very nature of the case, could not be put into any written constitution," and that this act trenches upon this reserve of unexpounded and unformulated rights, which the legislature, though not inhibited therefrom by the organic law, is without power to interfere with. It will suffice, in reply to all this, to say that this court is thoroughly committed to the doctrine that the constitution of the state, and the constitution of the United States so far as it has any application, are not the sources of the legislative power residing in the general assembly of Alabama, nor in any sense grants of power to the legislature, but only limitations upon that power, and that, apart

from the limitations imposed by those fundamental charts of government, the power of the legislature has no bounds, and is as plenary as that of the British parliament. All which the general assembly is not forbidden to do by the organic law, state or federal, it has full competency to do; and, if there be any plausible objection to the soundness of this doctrine in any connection, it is surely unassailable in its application to the power of the legislature to regulate the liquor traffic.

Another objection to this act stated by counsel for appellant, but not urged in argument, is that, as a whole, it is violative of the interstate commerce clause of the constitution of the United States. As counsel do not deem this position worthy of discussion, we content ourselves with saying that it is without merit.

But counsel do insist in argument that the saving clause in section 10 of the act with respect to brewers and distillers is violative of the constitution of the United States. That section, so far as necessary to be here set out, is as follows: "No spirituous, vinous or malt liquors or intoxicating drinks shall be sold in any county of this state in which a dispensary is authorized to be located, except as herein provided. But nothing in this act shall be so construed as to prevent any person who manufactures spirituous, vinous or malt liquors in a brewery or distillery from selling the same by wholesale, in sealed packages, to dispensers, or to liquor dealers, whc may be otherwise authorized to sell such liquors." It is contended that the effect of these provisions is to limit the right to sell liquors to dispensers and other authorized dealers to brewers and distillers, and to prohibit such sales by other persons, wherever they may reside and carry on business, whether within the dispensary district, or without the district in the state, or beyond the state, and that in thus interdicting sales by persons and dealers of other states, other than brewers and distillers, to dispensers and authorized dealers in this state, this section of the act impinges upon the exclusive power of congress to regulate interstate commerce. The position is rested upon a wholly unwarranted construction of the section in question. The section has reference solely to counties in the state in which dispensaries are authorized to be located. Its general purpose and effect is to prohibit the sale of liquors in such counties by all persons except dispensers, and the proviso authorizes sales in such counties by brewers and distillers to dispensers, whether of the county or not, and to persons other than dispensers who are authorized dealers in liquors. Neither the prohibition of the section nor the proviso has any reference to sales by distillers or brewers or dealers or other persons made without the county, and hence the section has no operation at all upon sales made in other states to persons-dealers,

dispensers, or what not-in the county. There is no room for saying that the section has any application whatever to any phase of interstate commerce.

If it be conceded, as counsel insist, that the prohibition of this section 10 is broader than the title of the act, in that, while the purpose expressed in the title is to prohibit the sale of spirituous, vinous, and malt liquors, the prohibitive provision in this section goes also to "intoxicating drinks," which may not be composed in any part of spirituous, vinous, or malt liquors, and that, therefore, the prohibition of the sale of intoxicating drinks is unconstitutional and void the concession would not avail the appellant. Upon it this particular provision, not expressed in the title, would fail, but all other provisions of the act would remain intact and valid; and it is upon the assumed invalidity of the act as to its other provisions -those relating to spirituous, vinous, and malt liquors-that the alleged rights of the appellant are made to rest. It is quite customary for the legislature to confer additional powers, even upon a single municipality, by acts which are original in form, containing no reference to the existing charter; and there can be no question but that such an original act, if it contain but one subject, which is clearly expressed in the title, complies strictly with section 2, art. 4, of the constitution. Indeed, it is much to be doubted whether an act amendatory in form, and expressing in its title merely a purpose to amend the charter of a municipal corporation, can be said to comply with the constitutional provision in question at all, when its purpose is to confer the power to buy and sell liquor,-a power which is unusual in the charts of municipal life; and, at any rate, such an expression of the subject of this act as its title contains is obviously more in consonance with the purpose of the organic provision than any mere reference to municipal charters and expression of a purpose to amend them would be. The contention of appellant that this act should have been in form amendatory of the charters of all the municipalities in the state, and that its title should have expressed a legislative purpose to amend said charters, is lacking in all semblance of merit.

It is contended, further, that this act is violative of that provision of section 10 of article 14 of the constitution which is in these words: "No law hereafter enacted shall create, renew, or extend the charter of more than one corporation." There are two sufficient answers to this position. In the first place, a law conferring upon municipal corporations the power to deal in liquors does not create, renew, or extend the charters of such corporations. Such conferring of power is, of course, not the creation or renewal of municipal charters. And the other term of the provision, the prohibition of extension of more than one charter,

has reference solely to time, and not at all to additional powers. And, in the next place, the provision has no application to municipalities, but only to private corporations. These latter are sometimes chartered for specified periods, while the charters of the former are always perpetual.

And so in respect of section 5 of article 14: "No corporation shall engage in any business other than that expressly authorized in its charter." That, too, has reference to private corporations solely. But, if it applied to municipal corporations, the result would be the same. A power conferred upon a corporation by an independent and original act, such as the power to buy and sell liquor conferred by this act, is a power conferred by its charter, within the meaning of that section.

The act under consideration is not one "for raising revenue," within the meaning of section 31 of article 4 of the constitution. Its purpose is to provide for the dispensing of liquors by municipalities under such conditions and limitations as make it in fact, as it is in theory, a police regulation of the traffic. It was neither intended to raise revenue, nor does it in fact raise revenue. It merely provides, so far as it has reference to revenue at all, that the towns which carry on dispensaries shall pay the license tax raised and imposed by the revenue laws of the state from other dealers in liquor. Hence it is no objection to the act that it did not originate in the house of representatives. Dunbar v. Frazer, 78 Ala. 538.

It is insisted that this act provides for the carrying on of business of a private nature by counties and towns; that these munici palities are mere political subdivisions of the state for governmental purposes; that such business carried on directly by them is indirectly, but none the less essentially, a private enterprise in which the state is interested; and that, of consequence, the act is violative of section 54 of the fourth article of the constitution, which ordains, inter alia, that the state shall not "be interested in any private or corporate enterprise." There is authority for this answer to the position thus taken for appellant: That the purpose, object, and effect of the act is regulative of the liquor traffic, by putting it in the immediate control of men who have no personal interest to be subserved by increasing the volume of business, or by selling liquors of an inferior and deleterious quality, etc.; that under the police power the state has the undoubted right to provide such regulations, and that the pecuniary interest which the state is supposed to have in the business, through its subdivisions, is a mere necessary incident to the exercise of this undoubted power; and hence that the business so carried on is a public governmental concern, and not a private enterprise, within the purview of the organic provision in question. State v. Aiken, 42 S. C. 222, 20 S. E. 221.

But we place our decision of the point upon other considerations: The framers of the constitution of Alabama were careful to differentiate the state from municipal subdivisions, towns, cities, and counties in respect of what is forbidden to be done by the state, considered as a separate entity, on the one hand, and what the general assembly is inhibited to authorize such subdivisions to do on the other; and they embodied in the instrument two distinct provisions, having reference severally to the state and its said municipalities, containing, respectively, the one all the limitations intended to be ordained in this connection upon the powers of the state as such, and the other all the limitations intended to be put upon the power of the legislature in respect to authorizing action by counties and towns. This is the ordinance as to the state (article 4, § 54): "The state shall not engage in works of internal improvement, nor lend money or its credit in aid of such; nor shall the state be interested in any private or corporate enterprise, or lend money or its credit to any individual, association, or corporation." And this as to the towns and counties (section 55): "The general assembly shall have no power to authorize any county, town, or other subdivision of this state to lend its credit, or to grant public money or thing of value, in aid of, or to any individual, association, or corporation whatsoever, or to become a stockholder in any such corporation, association, or company, by issuing bonds, or otherwise." There is a notable absence from this last ordinance of any inhibition upon the legislature to authorize towns and counties to engage or be interested in private enterprises, and the intent of the members of the constitutional convention to leave the general assembly a free hand in this connection is emphasized and made to stand out in bolder relief by the inclusion of such a provision in the immediately preceding section, having reference solely to the state as an entity distinct from such subdivisions. And this intent is further borne out and sustained by reference to the history of the times just preceding the framing of this constitution, and to the conditions then existing, from which it is clearly deducible that enterprises of the nature provided for in the act under consideration were not among the evils which the convention had in mind and purposed to provide against by this ordinance, limiting legislative power in respect of authorizations to towns and counties. Garland v. Board, 87 Ala. 223, 6 South. 402. Hence our conclusion that it was entirely competent for the general assembly to authorize towns and counties to carry on the liquor traffic as an incident to the regulation of that traffic provided for by this act.

Pursuit of happiness is one of the citizen's Inalienable rights. But the lines of such pursuit are not unlimited. A man's chief joy may be in the death of his enemy, yet

the law does not allow him to pursue happiness in that direction. So his individual sense of bliss attained may result from carrying on the liquor traffic, but the law does not esteem that particular avocation, involving, as it does, in the eye of the law, baneful consequences to society, so necessary to his happiness as that his right to pursue happiness along that line is guarantied to him by the declaration of rights, and efforts towards the attainment of content may, without violence to organic guaranties, be confined entirely to other channels, or, if allowed to be exerted in this, be clogged and impeded by such regulations as the legislature may deem necessary or conducive to the public good. And the general assembly, having the right to prohibit entirely the sale of intoxicating liquor, may prohibit its sale by all individuals and private corporations, and commit the traffic exclusively, as a mode of regulation, to counties and towns, without violating any inalienable or other right of the individual, and without impinging upon the rule against class and unequal legislation.

Section 13 of the act is as follows: "This act shall not be construed to repeal any law, local or general, that tends to prohibit, retard, restrain or restrict the traffic in spirituous, vinous or malt liquors, or intoxicating drinks of any kind." And section 15 provides that "all laws and parts of laws that conflict with the provisions of this act, except those referred to in the thirteenth section of this act, are hereby repealed." It is contended that under these provisions this act cannot apply to the town of Pinckard, in which appellant proposes to engage in the liquor traffic, because at the time of the passage of this act there was a local law in force in and upon said town which "tended to prohibit, retard, restrain or restrict the traffic in spirituous, vinous or malt liquors," and which was not repealed by this act. The local law referred to did not prohibit the sale of liquors in Pinckard, but it provided that, before license should be issued to engage in the liquor business there, the applicant therefor should file in the office of the judge of probate "a written recommendation of a majority of the legal electors and a majority of the bona fide householders who have resided in the corporate limits of said town of Pinckard twelve months next preceding such application, stating that they are acquainted with the person or persons to whom such license is to be issued, that such person or persons are possessed of good moral character and in all respects are proper and suitable persons to be licensed to sell malt or spirituous liquors, or other intoxicating drinks, within the corporate limits of said town." If this local act "tends to prohibit, retard, restrain, or restrict" the liquor traffic, within the meaning of section 13 of the dispensary act, in the same way the general law, which imposes heavy taxes upon liquor dealers, and requires that before a license to retail shall

be granted the applicant must produce to the judge of probate "a recommendation in writing, signed by twenty respectable householders and freeholders residing within the corporate limits of the town, or city, or precinct, in which he proposes to engage in the business of retailing, stating that they are acquainted with him, that he is of good moral character, and is in all respects a proper person to be licensed," and providing, further, that, "if there be not within the precinct twenty resident householders and freeholders, the recommendation must be signed by a majority of the householders and freeholders residing therein," tends to prohibit, retard, restrain, or restrict such traffic, the difference between the local statute applying to Pinckard and this general law in the respect under consideration is obviously a difference of degree merely, and not of kind; and, if the local law is saved from repeal by section 13 of the statute involved in this case, so, also, is the general law; and, if this be true, it is manifest at once that the statute is left without any field of operation, and is utterly emasculated. These considerations lead us to the conclusion-since, of course, it was the legislative intent to give the act some potency and operation, since it is our plain duty to find some field for its operation, and since effect may be given to section 13 short of holding the lawmaking power to have stultified itself-that it was not the legislative purpose to save either the general law applicable to the whole state, or the special law obtaining in the town of Pinckard, each having reference, it is to be noted, only to the certification of the fitness of the applicant for license to engage in the liquor business, from the general repealing clause embodied in section 15 of this act, or to provide that this act should not apply to localities in which theretofore licenses to engage in this business were issuable upon a certain prescribed recommendation of the applicant's moral character and fitness to carry it on. Whether this dispensary law is a wise and judicious exercise of the legislative power is no concern of the courts, and we have neither the right nor the inclination to so construe its several provisions as that they will be destructive of each other and of the statute as a whole; but, discharging the duty which is upon us to so construe what the general assembly has written down as to give effect to all they have said, we hold that, whatever may be the effect of section 13 of the act, it has no operation in respect of such special law as that which formerly obtained in the town of Pinckard, nor in' respect of the general provisions embodied in section 3520 of the Code.

We have considered all the points urged in argument against the validity of the statute in question, and against its application to the town of Pinckard, and we concur in the judgment of the circuit court that the act is constitutional and valid, and that it is of force

in respect of the liquor traffic in the town of Pinckard, and the judgment of that court must be affirmed. Affirmed.

(127 Ala. 157)

HUBBARD v. LANCASTER, Judge. (Supreme Court of Alabama. June 5, 1900.) INTOXICATING LIQUORS - LOCAL LAW DISPENSARY LAW-REPEAL.

The dispensary law (Acts 1898-99, p. 108), declaring that governmental subdivisions of the state might engage in the sale of liquor, and prohibiting its being dealt in otherwise in a dispensary district, included the county of Elmore, in which was the town of Wetumpka. The act was not to go into immediate operation, and at the time of its approval the sale of liquor in the county of Elmore was governed by Acts 1880-81 and Acts 1884-85. Three days after the passage of the dispensary law an act was passed prohibiting the sale of liquor in Elmore county, save in the town of Wetumpka, and it was provided that in such town liquor should be sold under the restrictions then provided by the laws applicable to that town. Held, that the latter act did not repeal the dispensary law as to the town of Wetumpka, since the provision as to the laws applicable should be held to include the dispensary law.

Appeal from circuit court, Elmore county; N. D. Denson, Judge.

Petition by William Hubbard for mandamus to H. J. Lancaster, probate judge of Elmore county, to compel the issuance to petitioner of a license for the sale of liquor. From an order denying the writ, petitioner appeals. Affirmed.

On January 22, 1900, the appellant, William Hubbard, who was a citizen of Elmore county, applied to the judge of probate of said county for a license to sell spirituous, vinous, and malt liquors in the town of Wetumpka. In making this application, he complied with the law as it existed prior to the passage of the act approved February 18, 1899, known as the "Dispensary Law" (Acts 1898-99, p. 108). The probate judge declined to issue said license, and based his refusal upon the ground that the said dispensary act approved February 18, 1899, governed the sale of spirituous, vinous, and malt liquors in Elmore county. Thereupon the said William Hubbard filed a petition addressed to Hon. N. D. Denson, judge of the Fifth judicial circuit, in which he set out said facts as stated above, and asked for the rule nisi to the judge of probate of Elmore county, requiring him to issue the license to the petitioner. On the hearing of the petition the judge declined to issue the rule nisi, and ordered the petition dismissed. From this judgment the petitioner appeals, and assigns the rendition thereof

as error.

J. M. Fitzpatrick, for appellant. Wm. L Martin, for appellee.

MCCLELLAN, C. J. The act "to authorize municipal and other subdivisions of the state to buy and sell spirituous, vinous and malt

liquors, and to further regulate or prohibit the sale of such liquors," known as the "Dispensary Act," embraces Elmore county, of which Wetumpka is the seat. It was approved February 18, 1899, and was to go into complete operation on January 1, 1900, though the organization of the dispensaries for which it provided was to be perfected before that time. On February 21, 1899, three days after the enactment of said statute, another act was approved, having reference to the sale of liquors in said county. Its first section is as follows: "That it shall be unlawful for any person to sell, give away, deliver, barter, or exchange vinous, spirituous, or malt liquors, or intoxicating bitters or drinks within the limits of Autauga county, within the limits of Chambers county, except in the towns of Lanett and La Fayette, as now provided by law; within the limits of Coosa county, except in the town of Goodwater, and in the county of Elmore, except in the town of Wetumpka. In the said towns above named, such liquors, bitters and drinks may be sold under the restrictions now provided by the laws applicable to those towns." Under Acts 1880-81 and Acts 1884-85, of force as to Elmore county at the time of the passage of the dispensary act, and not repealed thereby until after January 1, 1900, licenses to engage in and carry on the liquor traffic were issuable throughout Elmore county to persons who should be recommended as suitable to be licensed by a majority of the householders and freeholders residing in the election precincts in which it was proposed to carry on the business. Upon this state of legislation applicable to the sale of intoxicating liquors at Wetumpka, in said county, appellant insists that he is entitled to license to sell liquors there, under the acts last above referred to, upon securing the recommendation required thereby; and this insistence is based upon the further contention or assumption that the dispensary act was repealed so far as it applied to Wetumpka by that clause of the act of February, 1899, to the effect that, notwithstanding the prohibition therein tained as to Elmore county generally, with an exception as to the town of Wetumpka, intoxicating liquors might be sold in Wetumpka' under the restrictions then provided by laws applicable to said town. We do not so construe the clause in question. There were two sets of restrictions provided by law in respect of the liquor traffic in Wetumpka at the time of the passage of the act of February 21, 1899. One set were those imposed by the act of 1880-81 as amended by the act of 1884-85. The other set of restrictions were those imposed by the dispensary act of February 18, 1899. The restrictions of the former acts were continued in force by the latter act until January 1, 1900, and the restrictions of the latter act were to become effective on January 1, 1900. But both sets of restrictions were "provided by the laws applicable" to Wetumpka at the passage of

con

the act of February 21st, though both were not then in actual operation, and both sets are referred to by the legislature in saying that liquors "may be sold under the restrictions now provided by the laws applicable to" Wetumpka. The purpose of the clause manifestly was to exclude any possibility of a conclusion, from what had gone before in the section, that either the act of 1880-81, as amended by the act of 1884-85 (to the extent it continued of force after February 18, 1899), or the act of February 18th, was repealed by the act of February 21st; and we accordingly hold that the only law relating to the liquor traffic in Wetumpka, of force on and after January 1, 1900, was and is the dispensary act of February 18, 1899. The other questions presented by this record were all determined adversely to this appellant in the case of Sheppard v. Dowling (present term) 28 South. 791. The judgment of the circuit court must be affirmed. Affirmed.

1. Code, 1272, which provides a penalty for getting on or off a moving train, especially excepts passengers and train employés from its operation. Plaintiff, a passenger on defendant's train, stepped from the train while it was moving, and was thereupon arrested, tried, and convicted before a justice of the peace, on complaint of an employé of the defendant, at the instance of its superintendent, charging him with willfully jumping from a moving train. He was deprived of his liberty about 11⁄2 hours, and the fact of his arrest was published in the newspapers. On appeal the case against him was dismissed. Held, in an action for false imprisonment for such arrest and detention, that the court properly charged the jury to find for the plaintiff.

2. A verdict assessing plaintiff's damages at $500 was not excessive.

Appeal from circuit court, Warren county; O. W. Catchings, Special Judge. "To be officially reported."

Action by Simon Kuhn against the Alabama & Vicksburg Railway Company for false imprisonment. From a judgment for plaintiff, defendant appeals. Affirmed. McWillie & Thompson, for appellant. Dabney & McCabe, for appellee.

CALHOON, J. Code, § 1272, which denounces a penalty for getting on or off a moving train, especially excepts passengers and train employés from its operation. The plain and uncontradicted facts of this record are that Mr. Kuhn was a passenger on a train of appellant to his destination, the city of Vicksburg. While the train was in motion in that city, Mr. Kuhn, who was a traveling man, according to his custom, at a point convenient to him, stepped off. On the same train was an employé of appellant named