Ex Parte Roach’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

19 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 21 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““The power to make these regulations is by this section conferred upon the city as well as upon the county, and must be held to be equally authoritative in each. It is a portion of the law-making power which the people through their constitution have conferred upon these respective bodies, and its exercise is entitled to the same consideration and to receive the same obedience as that portion of the same power which by the same instrument has been conferred upon the legislature. The regulations made under this authority are none the less a part of the law because the authority to make them is conferred immediately by the constitution, than if it had been conferred mediately through an act of the legislature. The only limitation upon the exercise of the power is that the regulations to be made under it shall not be ‘in conflict with general laws.’ As this limitation applies equally to. regulations of the county and the city, it cannot be held by the terms of the limitation that the regulation of either of these bodies is a general law for the other, and it is held that an ordinance passed by a county is not a ‘general law’ within the meaning of this section of the constitution. (Ex parte Campbell, 74 Cal. 25 [ 5 Am. St. Rep. 418 , 15 Pac. 318 ].)””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 55 Cal. App. 511 - In Re Knight

2. ““It is not to be supposed that it was the intention of the people through their constitution to authorize a county to exercise the same power within the territory of the city as the city itself could exercise, or to confer upon the county the right to interfere with or impair the effect of similar legislation by the city itself. Mr. Dillon says (1 Dillon on Municipal Corporations, sec. 184) : ‘There cannot be at the same time within the same territory two distinct municipal corporations exercising the same powers, jurisdictions, and privileges.’ Full effect can be given to the section by holding that each has been given the exclusive right of legislation within its own particular boundaries. By the organization of a city within the boundaries of a county the territory thus organised is withdrawn from the legislative control of the county upon the designated subjects, and is placed under the legislative control of its own council; and the principle of local government which pervades the entire instrument is convincive of the intention to withdraw the city from the control of the county (italics ours), and to deprive the county of any power to annul or supersede the regulations of the city upon the subjects which have been confided to its control.””

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 55 Cal. App. 511 - In Re Knight