| Show S APILI EFFECT + Failure of Printing Contractors De layedTime to June le t PUBLICATION IS REQUIRED r MEANING OF TH CONSTITUTION CONSTITU-TION IS QUESTIONED Excepting the Mining Law and the District Attorney Act All Measures Meas-ures Passed by the Legislature and Approved Whether Emergency Emergen-cy Laws or Not Were Delayed k All the laws enacted by the Third legislature of Utah became effective on June 1 more than three weeks later than would have been the fact had careless printing contractors kept faith two impor with the state However tant laws the new act relating to location lo-cation of mining claims and recording of notices and the act creating the office of district attorneys and defining their duties became effective at the dates Intended because of the fact that they were published in the manner deemed to required by the stats constitution con-stitution But there are very many laws known as emergency measures that is acts passing the legislature by a twothirds vote which were Intended to have effect upon executive approval but by reason of no publicity being given to them they must be considered to rank with the legislative measures which were to have gone into effect at the end of sixty days from the legislatures legis-latures adjournment which was March 9 Requirements of Constitution Section 25 of article 6 of the consti tution states that no law passed by the legislature shall take effect sooner than sixty days after adjournment unless both houses by a twothirds vote orders or-ders otherwise and in no case shall any law become effective until the same has been published This section does not provide the specific manner of publishing pub-lishing laws and much discussion has been had as to the Intent of the provision pro-vision Secretary of State Hammond who has posted himself fully on the question holds the opinion that the giving giv-ing out of printed copies of the session laws duly certified in the manner done by him since statehood is a substantial substan-tial compliance with the constitutions requirements Delinquent Contractors The contract for printing the last session laws required delivery of the work by May 1 a date amply early to give publicity to all acts that were not intended to be emergency measures June 1 came and no copies of the laws were in sight but by poking the contractors con-tractors up every few minutes the exasperated ex-asperated secretary of state managed to get fifty copies of the neW laws minus the index and to forward them by mail to county clerks state officers district attorneys and district judges before the day had entirely gone To the secretary of states regret there is no forfeiture clause in the contract Only Two Laws Safe As to the mining law Secretary of State Hammond stated last evening that it was published in pamphlet form over his signature for free distribution within a very few days after its approval appro-val on March 3 and he cannot see that I a question can arise as to the validity of such publication or as to the approximate ap-proximate date at which the law became be-came effective In the case of the district dis-trict attorney law it was officially published pub-lished prior to May 9 the intended effective ef-fective date Of this publication he believes be-lieves also there can be no question May be Serious Complications While the secretary of state confesses con-fesses that all other laws enacted by the recent legislature and approved by the governor whether It were intended I to have them become operative upon approval ap-proval or on May 9 did not take effect I ef-fect until June 1 the fact remains that because of the failure to give the required I re-quired pfficial publicity to the several enactments of varying importance they were of doubtful validity until the printing contractor finally delivered the first bound copies of the session laws I Even then the doubt has not been wholly removed The whole matter presents a question that may be fruit for the lawyer and no little trouble and needless expense to litigants until a remedy is devised for guarding against a recurrence of such breaches of contract and apparent neglect of duty in the future |
