In Re Newell

SHAW, C. J.

The petitioner, by a proceeding in

habeas corpus,

seeks release from custody on a charge that he has violated the provisions of an ordinance of the county of Los Angeles passed by the board of supervisors on January 22, 1922. •

The provision of the ordinance which he is charged with having violated declares it to be unlawful for any person to

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ship or offer for shipment ‘ ‘ citrus fruits in boxes or other containers or in bulk if the contents of any package or of the fruit in bulk contains fifteen per cent or more of citrus fruits showing in two or more segments of each fruit marked evidence of frost injury.”

The Political Code (sec. 4057) provides that, except as provided in section 4058, no ordinance “shall take effect within less than thirty days after its passage.” Section 4058 provides for a referendum and that such referendum may be initiated by a petition presented to the board of supervisors within thirty days after the final passage of the ordinance, with respect to all ordinances, except, among others, any “ordinance for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health or safety.”

The ordinance in question declares that it shall take effect immediately upon its passage, and that this declaration is made “because the adoption and the enforcement hereof is necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health and safety by reason of the fact that the public peace, health and safety is now being endangered by the transportation and sale of frozen citrus fruits.”

It is a settled rule applicable to such powers given to a board of supervisors by statutes of this character that the determination of the board that the facts exist which make it necessary for an ordinance to take effect immediately is not conclusive and that the court may, and when a ease requires it to do so must, inquire into and determine for itself the existence or nonexistence of the facts upon which the declaration of necessity is based.

(San Christina etc. Co.