Page:North Dakota Reports (vol. 2).pdf/366

 Farmers’ Bank v. Com., 6 Bush 127; Mobile v. Insurance Co., 53 Ala. 570; Railroad Uo. v. Taylor Oo., 52 Wis. 37,8 N. W. Rep. 833. And the supreme court of this state, in the recent case of Trust Oo. v. Whithed, ante, held that the power to classify was extensive enough to permit the legislature to enact a statute exempting building and loan associations from the operation of the usury laws. As the reasoning upon which this conclusion was based applies particularly to the case at bar, we quote at some length from the opinion of BarTHoLomew, J., speaking for the court, who said: “This is a case which requires implicit adherence to that well established rule which requires courts to respect and enfore the will of the legislature, unless there has been a clear and unequivocal violation of the fundamental law of the state. ‘A statute relating to persons or things as aclass is a general law; one relating to particular persons or things of a class is special.’ Suth. St. Const. § 121. ‘Special laws are those made for individual cases, or for less than a class, requiring laws appropriate to its particular condition and circumstances.” Id § 127. An inspection of the statute under consideration at once discloses that it does not come within the above definition of a special law. Nor does it grant any privileges or immunities to any citizen that would not equally extend to any other citizen coming within the class to which the exception applies. It is a statute general in form and general in its nature. If its operation be in any manner special, or if it grant privileges or immunities to any citizen or class of citizens that are not granted to all, it is because the statute is vot literally uniform in its operation; and it becomes important to determine whether this lack of uniformity is of such a character as to violate the constitutional provision requiring all laws of a general nature to have a uniform operation. This provision is found in the constitution of a number of the states, and it has been before the courts in a large number of cases; and it has also been held that this provision was intended to prevent the granting to any citizen or class of citizens of privileges or immunities which, upon the same terms, should not belong to all citizens. McGill v. State, 34 Ohio St. 237; Suth. St. Const. ¢. 121; French v. Teschemacher, 24 Cal