Robinson v. Magee

Burnett, J. This was an to the District Court for a mandamus to compel the defendant, as Treasurer of Calaveras county, to pay an auditor’s warrant, issued as evidence of county indebtedness, before the passage of the act of the Legislature of May 11, 1854, dividing that county, and organizing the county of Amador. The subsequent act of the Legislature, approved April 27, 1855, provided that “all persons holding orders or warrants upon the treasurer of Calaveras county, issued prior to the time of the organization of Amador county * * * * * shall present the same to the auditor of Calaveras county for registry, on or before the first day of July, 1855;” and in case any such person should fail to so present his claim, he should be forever thereafter barred from enforcing the payment thereof, and the same should be deemed canceled. The warrant in this case was issued to the County Judge for one quarter’s salary, and came to the plaintiffs by purchase. The warrant was presented, within the time limited, to the auditor, not at his office, but at the bar-room of a public hotel. The auditor received the warrant, promised to register it, and then placed it with the barkeeper, for safe custody, where it remained until after the expiration of the time mentioned in the act, and was never registered. Upon this state of facts, which is not disputed by either party, the District Court refused the writ, and the plaintiffs appealed.

The first point made by the plaintiff is, that the provision requiring pre-existing creditors of the county to register their warrants on pain of forfeiture of their claims, is unconstitutional and void, because it impairs the obligation of contracts. The Constitution of the United States provides that “ no State shall pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts." The [83]same provision, in substance, is contained in the Constitution of this State.

It must be conceded that the intention of the Constitution was to secure great practical results. It is equally true, that this provision was intended to protect individuals. The powers of government, among savage tribes of men, are mainly exerted to protect the particular community against other opposing communities. Individual rights arc mostly left to individual protection. Wrongs are redressed by the person injured, or by his relatives. But among civilized nations, the leading intent of government is to regulate and protect the rights of the individual. The individual surrenders up the natural rights of self-protection, and, in consideration of this surrender, he receives the protection of the State. Whatever the State, therefore, binds itself to do, or not to do, must be observed. If the Constitution of the State (as, for example, that of Great Britain,) merely distributes and classifies, but does not limit the powers of government, then its discretion is the only measure of its powers. But where a Constitution limits the powers of government, the State can only exercise the discretion given. It is, therefore, the-peculiar glory of our Constitution, that a single individual can successfully resist the claims of the whole community, when he is in the right.