Pennington v. Bonelli

PULLEN, P. J.

By this petition for a writ of mandate petitioner seeks to compel respondent to issue to petitioner a renewal certificate of registration as an optometrist.

It appears that Charles R. Pennington became a duly registered optometrist in 1923, and as evidence of that fact there was issued to him by the state board of examiners in optometry a certificate of registration, and each year thereafter, upon the payment of the fee therefor, there has been issued to petitioner a renewal of said registration certificate.

In 1935 the optometry law (Stats, of 1913, chap. 598) was amended by chapter 604 of the Statutes of 1935. Section 7 of this amended act provides, among other things, that each registered optometrist should annually pay to the Director of the Department of Professional and Vocational Standards a fee of $12 for a renewal certificate, and the failure to pay such license shall

ipso facto

work a forfeiture of the license which vrauld then be restored only upon certain terms and conditions. The law also provides that from each annual renewal license fee of $12 there shall be paid to the University of California by the Director of Professional and Vocational Standards, the sum of $8 to be used by the University of California solely for the advancement of optometrical research, and the balance of such renewal fee to be paid into the state treasury.

When the annual renewal license fee for 1936 became due, petitioner herein paid to respondent, as Director of the Department of Professional and Vocational Standards, the sum of $4 and demanded that he be issued a renewal certificate for the year 1936. This respondent refused to do, and petitioner seeks by this writ to compel the issuance to him of such renewal.

[319]

In support of his contention that all over and above the $4 which is paid into the state treasury is illegal, petitioner contends that the exaction of $8 for the support of the department of optometry of the University of California is an exercise of the taxing power of the state and not of the police power; that it is a violation of the state and federal Constitutions in that it denies to petitioner due process and equal protection of the law, and also further violates the Constitution of the state of California in that it makes an arbitrary discrimination between persons and classes of persons similarly situated, and lastly that it violates the state Constitution in that the optometry law embraces more than one subject.