* Betterment laws, then, recognize the existence of an [* 389] equitable right, and give a remedy for its enforcement where none had existed before. It is true that they make a man pay for improvements which he has not directed to be made; but this legislation presents no feature of officious interference by the government with private property. The improvements have been made by one person in good faith, and are now to be appropriated by another. The parties cannot be placed in statu quo, and the statute accomplishes justice as near as the circumstances of the case will admit, when it compels the owner of the land, who, if he declines to sell, must necessarily appropriate the betterments made by another, to pay the value to the person at whose expense they have been made. The case is peculiar; but a statute cannot be void as an unconstitutional interference with private property which adjusts the equities of the parties as near as possible according to natural justice.1

Zeyer, 18 La. An. 407; Pope v. Macon, 23 Ark. 644; Marlow v. Adams, 24 Ark. 109; Ormond v. Martin, 37 Ala. 598; Love v. Shartzer, 31 Cal. 487. For a contrary ruling, see Nelson v. Allen, 1 Yerg. 376. Mr. Justice Story held in Society, &c. v. Wheeler, 2 Gall. 105, that such a law could not constitutionally be made to apply to improvements made before its passage; but this decision was made under the New Hampshire Constitution, which forbade retrospective laws. The principles of equity upon which such legislation is sustained would seem not to depend upon the time when the improvements were made. See Davis's Lessee v. Powell, 13 Ohio, 308. In Childs v. Shower, 18 Iowa, 261, it was held that the legislature could not constitutionally make the value of the improvements a personal charge against the owner of the land, and authorize a personal judgment against him. The same ruling was had in McCoy v. Grandy, 3 Ohio, N. s. 463. A statute had been passed authorizing the occupying claimant at his option, after judgment rendered against him for the recovery of the land, to demand payment from the successful claimant of the full value of his lasting and valuable improvements, or to pay to the successful claimant the value of the

land without the improvements, and retain it. The court say: "The occupying

claimant act, in securing to the occupant a compensation for his improvements as a condition precedent to the restitution of the lands to the owner, goes to the utmost stretch of the legislative power touching this subject. And the statute . . providing for the transfer of the fee in the land to the occupying claimant, without the consent of the owner, is a palpable invasion of the right of private property, and clearly in conflict with the Constitution."

In Harris v. Inhabitants of Marblehead, 10 Gray, 44, it was held that the betterment law did not apply to a town which had appropriated private property for the purposes of a school-house, and erected the house thereon. The law, it was said, did not apply "where a party is taking land by force of the statute,

Unequal and Partial Legislation.

In the course of our discussion of this subject it has been seen that some statutes are void though general in their scope, while others are valid though establishing rules for single cases only. An enactment may therefore be the law of the land without being a general law. And this being so, it may be important to consider in what cases constitutional principles will require a statute to be general in its operation, and in what cases, on the other hand, it may be valid without being general. We speak now in reference to general constitutional principles, and not to any peculiar rules which may have become established by special provisions in the constitutions of individual States.

The cases relating to municipal corporations stand upon peculiar grounds from the fact that those corporations are agencies of government, and as such are subject to complete legislative control. Statutes authorizing the sale of property of minors and other persons under disability are also exceptional, in that they are applied for by the parties. representing the interests of the owners, and are remedial in their character. Such statutes are supported by the presumption that the parties in interest would consent if capable of

doing so; and in law they are to be considered as assenting [*390] in * the person of the guardians or trustees of their rights.

1

And perhaps in any other case, if a party petitions for legislation and avails himself of it, he may justly be held estopped from disputing its validity; so that the great bulk of private legislation which is adopted from year to year, may at once be dismissed from this discussion.

Laws public in their objects may, unless express constitutional provision forbids,2 be either general or local in their application;

and is bound to see that all the steps are regular. If it did, the party taking the land might in fact compel a sale of the land, or compel the party to buy the school-house, or any other building erected upon it." But as a matter of constitutional authority, we see no reason to doubt that the legislature might extend such a law even to the cases of this description.

This doctrine was applied in Ferguson v. Landram, 5 Bush, 230, to parties who had obtained a statute for the levy of a tax to refund bounty moneys, which statute was held void as to other persons.

See ante, p. 128, note 1, and cases cited. To make a statute a public law of general obligation, it is not necessary that it should be equally applicable to

they may embrace many subjects or one, and they may extend to all citizens, or be confined to particular classes, as minors or married women, bankers or traders, and the like. The authority that legislates for the State at large must determine whether particular rules shall extend to the whole State and all its citizens, or, on the other hand, to a subdivision of the State or a single class of its citizens only. The circumstances of a particular locality, or the prevailing public sentiment in that section of the State, may require or make acceptable different police regulations from those demanded in another, or call for different taxation, and a different application of the public moneys. The legislature may therefore prescribe or authorize different laws of police, allow the right of eminent domain to be exercised in different cases and through different agencies, and prescribe peculiar restrictions upon taxation in each distinct municipality, provided the State constitution does not forbid. These discriminations are made constantly; and the fact that the laws are of local or special operation only is not supposed to render them obnoxious in principle. The legislature may also deem it desirable to prescribe peculiar rules for the several occupations, and to establish distinctions in the rights, obligations, duties, and capacities of citizens. The business of common carriers, for instance, or of bankers, may require special statutory regulations for the general benefit, and it may be matter of public policy to give laborers in one business a specific lien for their wages, when it would be impracticable or impolitic to do the same by persons engaged in some other employments. If the laws be otherwise unobjectionable, all that can be required in these cases is, that they be general in their application to the class or locality to which they apply; and they are then public in character, and of their propriety and policy the legislature must judge.

But a statute would not be constitutional which should proscribe a class or a party for opinion's sake,1 or which should select particular * individuals from a class or locality, and sub- [* 391] ject them to peculiar rules, or impose upon them special

all parts of the State; all that is required is that it shall apply equally to all persons within the territorial limits described in the act. State v. County Commissioners of Baltimore, 29 Md. 516.

The sixth section of the Metropolitan Police Law of Baltimore (1859) provided that "no Black Republican, or indorser or supporter of the Helper book,

obligations or burdens from which others in the same locality or class are exempt.1

The legislature may suspend the operation of the general laws of the State; but when it does so the suspension must be general, and cannot be made for individual cases or for particular localities.2

shall be appointed to any office" under the Board of Police which it established. This was claimed to be unconstitutional, as introducing into legislation the principle of proscription for the sake of political opinion, which was directly opposed to the cardinal principles on which the Constitution was founded. The court dismissed the objection in the following words: " That portion of the sixth section which relates to Black Republicans, &c., is obnoxious to the objection urged against it, if we are to consider that class of persons as proscribed on account of their political or religious opinions. But we cannot understand, officially, who are meant to be affected by the proviso, and therefore cannot express a judicial opinion on the question." Baltimore v. State, 15 Md. 468. See also p. 484. This does not seem to be a very satisfactory disposition of so grave a constitutional objection to a legislative act. That courts may take judicial notice of the fact that the electors of the country are divided into parties with well-known designations cannot be doubted; and when one of these is proscribed by a name familiarly applied to it by its opponents, the inference that it is done because of political opinion seems to be too conclusive to need further support than that which is found in the act itself. And we know no reason why courts should decline to take notice of those facts of general notoriety, which, like the names of political parties, are a part of the public history of the times.

It has been decided that State laws forbidding the intermarriage of whites and blacks are such police regulations as are entirely within the power of the States, notwithstanding the provisions of the new amendments to the federal Constitution. State v. Gibson, 36 Ind. 389. Compare State v. Hairston, 63 N. C. 451; Ellis v. State, 42 Ala. 525. It is also said colored children may be required to attend separate schools, if impartial provision is made for their instruction. State v. Duffy, 7 Nev. 342; s. c. 8 Am. Rep. 713. But some States forbid this. People v. Board of Education, 18 Mich. 400. And when separate schools are not established for colored children, they are entitled to admission to the other public schools. State v. Duffy, supra.

1 Lin Sing v. Washburn, 20 Cal. 534. There is no reason, however, why the law should not take notice of peculiar views held by some classes of people, which unfit them for certain public duties, and excuse them from the performance of such duties; as Quakers are excused from military duty, and persons denying the right to inflict capital punishment are excluded from juries in capital cases. These, however, are in the nature of exemptions, and they rest upon considerations of obvious necessity.

2 The statute of limitations cannot be suspended in particular cases while allowed to remain in force generally. Holden v. James, 11 Mass. 396; Davison v. Johonnot, 7 Met. 393. See ante, 365, note. cannot be varied for particular cases or localities.

The general exemption laws
Bull v. Conroe, 13 Wis. 238,

244. The legislature, when forbidden to grant divorces, cannot pass special acts

Privileges may be granted to particular individuals when by so doing the rights of others are not interfered with; disabilities may be removed; the legislature as parens patrice, when not forbidden, may grant authority to the guardians or trustees of incompetent persons to exercise a statutory control over their estates for their assistance, comfort, or support, or for the discharge of legal or equitable liens upon their property; but every one has a right to demand that he be governed by general rules, and a special statute which, without his consent, singles his case out as one to be regulated by a different law from that which is applied

* in all similar cases, would not be legitimate legislation, [* 392] but would be such an arbitrary mandate as is not within the province of free governments. Those who make the laws "are to govern by promulgated, established laws, not to be varied in particular cases, but to have one rule for rich and poor, for the favorite at court and the countryman at plough." This is a maxim in constitutional law, and by it we may test the authority and binding force of legislative enactments.2

1

authorizing the courts to grant divorces in particular cases for causes not recognized in the general law. Teft v. Teft, 3 Mich. 671; Simonds v. Simonds, 103 Mass. 572. See, for the same principle, Alter's Appeal, 67 Penn. St. 341. The authority in emergencies to suspend the civil laws in a part of the State only, by a declaration of martial law, we do not call in question by any thing here stated. Nor in what we have here said do we have any reference to suspensions of the laws generally, or of any particular law, under the extraordinary circumstances of rebellion or war.

1 Locke on Civil Government, § 142;. State v. Duffy, 7 Nev. 349.

2 In Lewis v. Webb, 3 Greenl. 326, the validity of a statute granting an appeal from a decree of the Probate Court in a particular case came under review. The court say: 66 On principle it can never be within the bounds of legitimate legislation to enact a special law, or pass a resolve dispensing with the general law in a particular case, and granting a privilege and indulgence to one man, by way of exemption from the operation and effect of such general law, leaving all other persons under its operation. Such a law is neither just nor reasonable in its consequences. It is our boast that we live under a government of laws, and not of men; but this can hardly be deemed a blessing, unless those laws have for their immovable basis the great principles of constitutional equality. Can it be supposed for a moment that, if the legislature should pass a general law, and add a section by way of proviso, that it never should be construed to have any operation or effect upon the persons, rights, or property of Archelaus Lewis or John Gordon, such a proviso would receive the sanction or even the countenance of a court of law? And how does the supposed case differ from the present? A resolve passed after the general law can produce only the same