ate a marriage between the parties, it was insisted that it was void as to the rights of property affected by the marriage relation, because as to them it would have retroactive operation. The court, in disposing of the case, are understood to express the opinion that, if the legislature can have the power to make the marriage valid, still more clearly must they have power to affect incidental rights. "The man and the woman were unmarried, notwithstanding the formal ceremony which passed between them, and free in point of law to live in celibacy, or contract matrimony with any other persons at pleasure. It is a strong exercise of power to compel two persons to marry without their consent, and a palpable perversion of strict legal right. At the same time, the retrospective law thus far directly operating on vested rights is admitted to be unquestionably valid, because manifestly just." 1 It is not to be inferred from this language that the court understood the legislature to possess power to marry parties against their will. The complete control which the legislature possesses over the domestic relations can hardly extend so far. The legislature may perhaps divorce parties, with or without cause, according to its own good judgment; but for the legislature to marry parties against their consent, we conceive to be decidedly against "the law of the land." And the court must here be understood as speaking with exclusive reference to the case before them, where the legislature were merely, by retrospective act, removing a formal impediment to the marriage to which the parties had consented, and which they had attempted to form. In a case in Pennsylvania it appeared that certain assessments for the expense of grading and paving streets were void for the reason that the city ordinance under which the same were made was inoperative by reason of not having been recorded as required by law. The legislature then passed an act validating the ordinance, and declared therein that the omission to record the ordinance should not affect or impair the lien of the assessments against the lot owners. In passing upon the validity of this act, the court say: "Whenever there is a right, though imperfect, the constitution does not prohibit the legislature from giving a remedy. In Hepburn v. Curts, it was said, 'the legislature, provided it does not violate the constitutional provisions, may pass retrospective laws, 1 Goshen v. Stonington, 4 Conn. 224, per Hosmer, J.

2 7 Watts, 300.

such as in their operation may affect suits pending, and give to a party a remedy which he did not previously possess, or modify an existing remedy, or remove an impediment in the way of legal proceedings.' What more has been done in this case? . . . While [the ordinance] was in force, contracts to do the work were made in pursuance of it, and the liability of the city was incurred. But it was suffered to become of no effect by the failure to record it. Notwithstanding this, the grading and paving were done, and the lots of the defendants received the benefit at the public expense. Now can the omission to record the ordinance diminish the equitable right of the public to reimbursement? It is at most but a formal defect in the remedy provided, an oversight. That such defects may be cured by retroactive legislation need not be argued." 1

On the same principle legislative acts validating invalid contracts have been sustained. When these acts go no further than to bind a party by a contract which he has attempted to enter into, but which was invalid by reason of personal disability on his part to make it, or through neglect of some legal formality, or in consequence of some ingredient in the contract forbidden by law, they cannot well be obnoxious to constitutional objection.

By a law of Ohio, all bonds, notes, bills, or contracts, negotiable or payable at any unauthorized bank, or made for the purpose of being discounted at such bank, were declared to be void. While this law was in force, a note was made for the purpose of being discounted at one of these institutions, and was actually discounted by it. Afterwards the legislature passed an act, reciting that many persons were indebted to such bank, by bonds, bills, notes, &c., and that owing, among other things, to doubts of its right to recover its debts, it was unable to meet its own obligations, and had ceased business, and for the purpose of winding up its affairs had made an assignment to a trustee; therefore the act authorized the said trustee to bring suits on the said bonds, bills, notes, &c., and declared it should not be lawful for the defendants in such suits "to plead, set up, or insist upon, in defence, that the notes, bonds, bills, or other written evidences of such indebtedness are void on account of being contracts against or in violation of any statute

1 Schenley v. Commonwealth, 36 Penn. St. 29, 57. See also State v. Newark, 3 Dutch. 185; Den v. Downam, 1 Green (N. J.), 135; People v. Seymour, 16 Cal. 332.

law of this State, or on account of their being contrary to public policy." The law was sustained as a law "that contracts may be enforced," and as in furtherance of equity and good morals.1 The original invalidity was only because of the statute, and was founded upon a principle of public policy which the legislature had seen fit to abrogate. Under these circumstances the defendant could not be permitted to rely upon it.2

By a statute of Connecticut, where loans of money were made, and a bonus paid by the borrower over and beyond the interest and bonus permitted by law, the demand was subject to a deduction from the principal of all the interest and bonus paid. A construction appears to have been put upon this statute by business men different from that which was afterwards given by the courts; and a large number of contracts of loan were in consequence subject to a deduction. The legislature then passed a "healing act," which provided that such loans theretofore made should not be held, by reason of the taking of such bonus, usurious, illegal, or in any respect void; but that, if otherwise legal, they were thereby confirmed, and declared to be valid, as to principal, interest, and 1 Lewis v. McElvain, 16 Ohio, 347.

Trustees v. McCaughy, 2 Ohio, N. S. 155; Johnson v. Bentley, 16 Ohio, 97. See also Syracuse Bank v. Davis, 16 Barḥ. 188. By statute, notes issued by unincorporated banking associations were declared void. This statute was afterwards repealed, and action was brought against bankers on notes previously issued. Objection being taken that the legislature could not validate the void contracts, the Judge says: "I will consider this case on the broad ground of the contract having been void when made, and of no new contract having arisen since the repealing act. But by rendering the contract void it was not annihilated. The object of the [original] act was not to vest any right in any unlawful banking association, but directly the reverse. The motive was not to create a privilege, or shield them from the payment of their just debts, but to restrain them from violating the law by destroying the credit of their paper, and punishing those who received it. How then can the defendants complain? As unauthorized bankers they were violators of the law, and objects not of protection but of punishment. The repealing act was a statutory pardon of the crime committed by the receivers of this illegal medium. Might not the legislature pardon the crime, without consulting those who committed it? ... How can the defendants say there was no contract, when the plaintiff produces their written engagement for the performance of a duty, binding in conscience if not in law? Although the contract, for reasons of policy, was so far void that an action could not be sustained on it, yet a moral obligation to perform it, whenever those reasons ceased, remained; and it would be going very far to say that the legislature may not add a legal sanction to that obligation, on account of some fancied constitutional restriction." Hess v. Werts, 4 S. & R. 361.

bonus. The case of Goshen v. Stonington was regarded as sufficient authority to support this law; and the principle derived from that case is stated to be, "that where a statute is expressly retroactive, and the object and effect of it is to correct an innocent mistake, remedy a mischief, execute the intention of the parties, and promote justice, then both as a matter of right and of public policy affecting the peace and welfare of the community, the law should be sustained.1

By a decision in the State of Pennsylvania, it was held that the relation of landlord and tenant could not exist in that State under a Connecticut title. A statute was afterwards passed providing that the relation of landlord and tenant "shall exist and be held as fully and effectually between Connecticut settlers and Pennsylvania claimants as between other citizens of this Commonwealth, on the trial of any case now pending or hereafter to be brought within this Commonwealth, any law or usage to the contrary notwithstanding." In a suit which was pending and had been once tried before the statute was passed, the statute was sustained by the Supreme Court of the State, and afterwards by the Supreme Court of the United States, to which last-mentioned court it had been removed on the allegation that it violated the obligation of contracts. As its only effect was to remove from contracts which the parties had made a legal impediment to their enforcement, there seems no room for doubt, in the light of the other authorities we have referred to, that the decision was correct.2

In the State of Ohio, certain deeds made by married women were ineffectual for the purposes of record and evidence, by reason of the omission on the part of the officer taking the acknowledgment to state in his certificate that, before and at the time of the grantor making the acknowledgment, he made the contents known to her, by reading or otherwise. An act was afterwards passed which provided that "any deed heretofore executed pursuant to

1 Savings Bank v. Allen, 28 Conn. 97. See also Savings Bank v. Bates, 8 Conn. 505; Andrews v. Russell, 7 Blackf. 474; Grimes v. Doe, 8 Blackf. 371; Thompson v. Morgan, 6 Minn. 292. In Curtis v. Leavitt, 17 Barb. 309, and 15 N. Y. 9, a statute forbidding the interposition of the defence of usury was treated as a statute repealing a penalty. See also Wilson v. Hardesty, 1 Md. Ch. 66; Welch v. Wadsworth, 30 Conn. 149; Washburn v. Franklin, 35 Barb. 599.

3 Satterlee v. Matthewson, 16 S. & R. 169, and 2 Pet. 380. And see Watson v. Mercer, 8 Pet. 88; Lessee of Dulany v. Tilghman, 6 Gill & J. 461; Payne v. Treadwell, 16 Cal. 220.

law, by husband and wife, shall be received in evidence, in any of the courts of this State, as conveying the estate of the wife, although the magistrate taking the acknowledgment of such deed shall not have certified that he read or made known the contents of such deed before or at the time she acknowledged the execution thereof." It was held that this statute was unobjectionable. The deeds with the defective acknowledgments were regarded by the court, and by the statute, as sufficient for the purpose of conveying the grantor's estate, and no vested rights were disturbed or wrong done by giving them effect as evidence.1

Other cases go much further than this, and hold that, although the deed was originally ineffectual for the purpose of conveying the title, the healing statute may accomplish the intent of the parties by giving it effect.2 At first sight these cases might seem to go beyond the mere confirmation of a contract, and to be at least technically objectionable, as depriving a party of property

1 Chestnut v. Shane's Lessee, 16 Ohio, 599, overruling Connell v. Connell, 6 Ohio, 358; Good v. Zercher, 12 Ohio, 364; Meddock v. Williams, 12 Ohio, 377; and Silliman v. Cummins, 13 Ohio, 116. Of the dissenting opinion in e last case, which the court approve in 16 Ohio, 609, 610, they say: "That opinion stands upon the ground that the act operates only upon that class of deeds where enough had been done to show that a court of chancery ought, in each case, to render a decree for a conveyance, assuming that the certificate was not such as the law required. And that where a title in equity was such that a court of chancery ought to interfere and decree a good legal title, it was within the power of the legislature to confirm the deed, without subjecting an indefinite number to the useless expense of unnecessary litigation." See also Lessee of Dulany v. Tilghman, 6 Gill & J. 461. But the legislature has no power to legalize and make valid the deed of an insane person. Routsong v. Wolf, 35 Mo. 174.

* Lessee of Walton v. Bailey, 1 Binney, 477; Underwood v. Lilly, 10 S. & R. 101; Barnet v. Barnet, 15 S. & R. 72; Tate v. Stooltzfoos, 16 S. & R. 35; Watson v. Mercer, 8 Pet. 88; Carpenter v. Pennsylvania, 17 How. 456; Davis v. State Bank, 7 Ind. 316; Goshorn v. Purcell, 11 Ohio, N. S. 641. In the last case the court say: "The act of the married woman may, under the law, have been void and inoperative; but in justice and equity it did not leave her right to the property untouched. She had capacity to do the act in a form prescribed by law for her protection. She intended to do the act in the prescribed form. She attempted to do it, and her attempt was received and acted on in good faith. A mistake subsequently discovered invalidates the act; justice and equity require that she should not take advantage of the mistake; and she has therefore no just right to the property. She has no right to complain if the law which prescribed forms for her protection shall interfere to prevent her reliance upon them to resist the demands of justice." Similar language is employed in the Pennsylvania cases.