People ex rel. Cuff v. City of Oakland

The purpose for which this action is prosecuted is to determine the validity of certain proceedings under which the defendant claims that certain territory lying between the northerly charter line of said city and the southerly line of the town of Berkeley has been annexed to it, and that said territory is now a part of said city. Findings were filed and judgment entered in favor of the defendant,, and the plain *600 tiff appeals from the judgment and from an order denying a new trial.

There is no controversy as to the facts. Nearly all were stipulated, and are incorporated in the findings; nor is it questioned that the requirements of the statute under which the proceedings were taken, were complied with, hut, upon the grounds hereinafter stated, appellant contends that said proceedings were unauthorized and void, and that the judgment affirming that the annexation of said territory was accomplished thereby should be reversed.

1. The annexed territory includes the whole of Adeline sanitary district and part of Golden Gate sanitary district; and appellant contends that sanitary districts cannot be annexed to an incorporated town or city under the act of 1889 (Stats. 1889, p.…

I concur in the judgment and in the opinion of the court, with this exception: I do not think the constitutional amendment of 1896 affects the construction or validity of the annexation act of '1889, or in anywise limits its operation upon the Oakland charter. In other words, I do not think it has any retroactive operation. Under numerous decisions of this court the annexation act of 1889, as a general law, controlled all charters at the time it was passed, and the subsequent adoption of the amendment of 1896 did not have the effect of undoing what was then fully accomplished.