vision to the contrary. The granting by statute of the right of appeal or of action cannot create any liability where none existed in the first instance." 1351 § 495. Miscellaneous. In order to prevent collusion or improper conduct on the part of public officials, they are generally prohibited by law from "dealing in" or buying and selling either all claims generally as against a corporation of which they are an official or certain designated classes of claims or demands.1352 A violation of this prohibition may lead to the invalidity of the claim when presented and pressed as against the corporation. The general statutes of limitations may defeat the validity of claims by the application of the limit of time therein specified and within which they must be presented." Wis. 59, 62 N. W. 937. Laws 1891, c. 160, subc. 5, § 4, which requires the presentment of a "claim or demand to the common council for allowance," does not apply to actions caused by defective sidewalks. But see as construing a special charter and holding that a provision of a similar character includes claims in tort as well as those arising ex contractu, the case of Van Frachen v. City of Ft. Howard, 88 Wis. 570. Davis v. City of Appleton, 109 Wis. 580, 85 N. W. 515. Statutory provisions of this character do not apply to an action solely for actual relief. 1351 Denning v. State, 123 Cal. 316, 55 Pac. 1000, following Chapman v. State, 104 Cal. 690; Melvin v. State, 121 Cal. 16. 1352 Alston v. Yerby, 108 Ala. 480, 18 So. 559; Scruggs v. State, 111 Ala. 60, 20 So. 642. A grand jury ticket held a "claim within the 1353 meaning of criminal code, § 3931, 1353 Ames v. City & County of San Francisco, 76 Cal. 325. CHAPTER VII. GOVERNING BODIES. I. LEGISLATIVE. II. EXECUTIVE. (For Complete Analysis of this Subdivision see p. 1391.) III. JUDICIAL. (For Complete Analysis of this Subdivision see p. 1426.) IV. PUBLIC RECORDS. (For Complete Analysis of this Subdivision see p. 1444.) 508. Legislative proceedings; their character; review of motive. 509. Rules of order. 511. Limitations upon the power of appointment or election. 519. The power to pass peace ordinances, so called. 520. Limitations upon this power. 521. Limitations upon the general power to pass. 522. Form of ordinance. 523. Title. 532. Miscellaneous matters in connection with publication of ordinances. 533. Record. 534. Validity in respect to subject-matter and general characteristics. 535. Constitutional provisions. 536. Must not conflict with state laws or charters. 541. Definition of "to regulate." The taxing power of the state in connection with interstate commerce. 542. Commerce clause and the police power as exercised by the 547. Same subject; surrounding conditions. 548. Amendment or repeal of legislative action. 549. Agency and time of repeal or amendment. 550. Restrictions upon the power to amend or repeal. 551. Effect of repeal. Enforcement of ordinances Penalties for violation. 552. 553. § 496. Governing bodies. The three-fold division of the powers of a state based upon their character and nature, into legislative, judicial and executive, is carried out wherever possible in the organization and government of public corporations in the United States; the officials or official bodies exercising each of the powers, acting along well defined lines and independent of each other except as provided by fundamental law; judicial bodies or officers exercising judi1 Wilkinson v. Leland, 2 Pet. (U. tial nature of all free governments. S.) 628, where Mr. Justice Story observes: "That government can scarcely be deemed to be free where the rights of property are left solely dependent upon the will of a legislative body, without any restraint. The fundamental maxims of a free government seem to require that the rights of personal liberty and private property should be held sacred. At least no court of justice in this country would be warranted in assuming that the power to violate and disregard them-a power so repugnant to the common principles of justice and civil liberty-lurked under any general grant of legislative authority, or ought to be implied from any general expressions of the will of the people. The people ought not to be presumed to part with rights so vital to their security and wellbeing without very strong and direct expressions of such an intention." Citizens' Sav. & Loan Ass'n V. Topeka City, 87 U. S. (20 Wall.) 655. "The theory of our governments, state and national, is opposed to the deposit of unlimited power anywhere. The executive, the legislative, and the judicial branches of these governments are all of limited and defined powers. "There are limitations on such power which grow out of the essen Implied reservations of individual rights, without which the social compact could not exist, and which are respected by all governments entitled to the name. No court for instance would hestitate to declare void a statute which enacted that A and B who were husband and I wife to each other should be so no longer, but that A should thereafter be the husband of C, and B the wife of D. Or which should enact that the homestead now owned by A should no longer be his, but should henceforth be the property of B." Kilbourn v. Thompson, 103 U. S. 168. In this case the power of the House of Representatives as one of the co-ordinate parts of the legislative branch of the Federal government was very carefully and thoroughly considered. The court in the opinion of Mr. Justice Miller in speaking of the subject-matter of this section said: "It is believed to be one of the chief merits of the American system of written constitutional law, that all the powers intrusted to government, whether state or national, are divided into the three grand departments, the executive, the legislative and the judicial. That the functions appropriate to each of these branches of government shall be vested in a separate body of public servants, cial functions only; legislative bodies executing the law-making power without interference from other departments, except as above indicated, and executive officers performing their discre * and that the perfection of the system requires that the lines which separate and divide these departments shall be broadly and clearly defined. It is also essential to the successful working of this system that the persons intrusted with power in any one of these branches shall not be permitted to encroach upon the powers confided to the others but that each shall, by the law of its creation, be limited to the exercise of the powers appropriate to its own department and no other. In the main, however, that instrument (the Federal Constitution), the model on which are constructed the fundamental laws of the states, has blocked out with singular precision, and in bold lines, in its three primary articles, the allotment of power to the executive, the legislative, and the judicial departments of the government. It also remains true, as a general rule, that the powers confided by the Constitution to one of these departments cannot be exercised by another. "It may be said that these are truisms which need no repetition here to give them force. But while the experience of almost a century has in general shown a wise and commendable forbearance in each of these branches from encroachments upon the others it is not to be denied that such attempts have been made, and it is believed not always without success. The increase in the number of states, in their population and wealth, and in the amount of power, if not in its nature to be exercised by the Fed eral Government, presents powerful and growing temptations to those to whom that exercise is intrusted, to overstep the just boundaries of their own department, and enter upon the domain of one of the others, or to assume powers not intrusted to either of them." Taylor v. Beckham, 178 U. S. 548, 20 Sup. Ct. 890, 1009; Lindsay v. United States Sav. & Loan Ass'n, 120 Ala. 156, 42 L. R. A. 783; Penn v. Tollison, 26 Ark. 545. Construing and defining the source and extent of the powers of the state convention. Franklin Bridge Co. v. Wood, 14 Ga. 80; Busenbark v. Clements, 22 Ind. App. 557; Everett v. Deal, 148 Ind. 90; State v. Meadows, 1 Kan. 90; State v. Hitchcock, 1 Kan. 178; Gay v. Bradstreet, 49 Me. 580. Erroneous acts of a city council can only be vacated or set aside by certiorari. Prince v. Skillin, 71 Me. 361. Where there are two conflicting legislatures each claiming the sole and legal right to legislate for the state, it is for the courts to determine which has the lawful authority. Whitcomb's Case, 120 Mass. 118. To punish for contempt is a judicial function and it cannot be legally done by a legislative body. City of Red Wing, v. Chicago, M. & St. P. R. Co., 72 Minn. 240; Merrill v. Sherburne, 1 N. H. 199, 8 Am. Dec. 57. "It is well known and considered that "in the distinct and separate existence of the judicial power consists one main preservative of the public liberty;' that indeed 'there is no liberty if the power of judging be not separated from |