February 28, 1876, the following legislative act was approved by the governor: —

By the census taken in the year 1880, Humboldt County was found to contain a population exceeding eight thousand and less than twenty thousand inhabitants. The county was organized as a county of the second class, and since July 1,1881, has had at all times a board of supervisors consisting of five members, and other officers prescribed for counties of the second class. (Pol. Code, §§ 4006,4007, 4025.)

The board of supervisors did not, at any time prior to the election of plaintiff as county clerk, as hereinafter mentioned, unite or consolidate the office of county clerk with those of *113 recorder or auditor, or either of them. The board of supervisors, by an ordinance duly adopted on the 8th day of July, 1882, united and consolidated the offices of recorder and auditor, and caused such ordinance to be duly recorded and published for three months before the general election held November 7,1882. (Pol. Code, § 4106.)

At such general election plaintiff was elected county clerk, and defendant recorder and ex-officio auditor of Humboldt County. Plaintiff entered upon the discharge of the duties of county clerk on the first Monday of January, 1883, and defendant commenced to act as recorder and auditor on the 8th day of January, 1883, and has ever since discharged the duties of said offices.

On the 8th of February, 1883, the board of supervisors of Humboldt fixed and determined the annual salary of the clerk at $2,700-

After plaintiff had served one month as county clerk, and on the 8th of February, 1883, he applied to defendant for a warrant on the treasury of the county in the sum of $416.66 as the amount of his salary for the preceding month. Defendant refused to draw the warrant for the amount demanded, or, as alleged in the complaint, “for any amount whatever.” There is, however, no averment in the complaint that plaintiff demanded a warrant for a less sum than $416.66, and in his answer defendant offers to draw a warrant for plaintiff’s salary at the rate of $2,700 dollars per annum.

The court below denied the writ of mandate, and dismissed plaintiff’s application therefor.

The cause was argued here, by counsel for both parties, on the assumption that the matters set forth in the answer as facts are true.

On the 18th day of March, 1876, the act following was approved:—

It is contended on the part of plaintiff that the statute of February 28, 1876, on which he relies, provides for a salary to be paid the county clerk “ in full for all services required of and to be performed by Aim," and that the specification of duties which precedes this provision cannot take from the language quoted any of its force or meaning. It is also argued that because some duty formerly performed by the clerk has, without the consent of that officer, b.een imposed by an inferior board upon another person, it does not follow that such board can deprive the clerk of any portion of his salary. That the law only authorizes the supervisors to fix the compensation of a county officer, not fixed by the Political Code, or by general or special laws. (Pol. Code, § 4046.)

On the part of defendant (respondent here) it is contended: —

We think the positions of defendant well taken. In 1810, the Congress of the United States passed an act fixing the salary of consul at Algiers at $4,000 a year. Algiers became a province of France, and most of the powers and duties of the consul at Algiers, as prescribed by the act which authorized his salary, ceased. In Mahoney v. United States, the Supreme Court *115 of the United States said: “When the act was passed Algiers was a part of one of the Barbary States of that name, and it is evident from an examination of its provisions, that the act was intended to apply to a consulate at that place, only so long as it belonged to one of the Barbary powers.” ( 10 Wall. 65 .)

Here, when the Act of 1876 ivas passed, there ivas a person who was discharging the duties of clerk, recorder, and auditor, and unless subsequent legislation should require otherwise, one person would continue to fill the three separate offices. It was to this condition of things that the law was made applicable, and the compensation provided by it Avas provided as compensation to the clerk, the recorder, and the auditor. The law did not determine Iioav much should be paid to each of the three officers —a matter of no consequence so long as the three offices were in one man. But Avhen the organization of the county government Avas changed, and the person who Avas clerk was not auditor nor recorder, it is clear that no one of the three officers Avas entitled to receive the compensation intended for the three; and as the Act of 1876 did not provide for the event, the act, by force- of its oavu expressions, became inoperative when the event occurred.

As there Avas no operative law fixing the compensation of the county clerk after Humboldt became organized as a county of the second class, the board of supervisors had authority to fix the compensation of that officer. (Pol. Code, § 4046, subd. 18.)

Judgment affirmed.

Morrison, C. J., Ross, J., Sharpstein, J., Thornton, J., Myrick, J., and McKee, J., concurred.