denounced the whole matter to the Corporation, and not to have touched Bayard's money. The speech of defendant, sworn to by Ferguson, goes to support the theory of defendant's having had 37, for he admitted having taken two stalls, but justified by saying that he took them for two deserving young men who had been a long time in his employment; that he made no money out of them, and let them have them for what they cost, or words to that effect. If defendant had two stalls, what ones could they have been but 37 and 38. Ferguson has not been contradicted. There is enough proof to fasten on defendant indirect lesseeship of 37; and as to 37 and 38, both of them plain violation by defendant of material conditions of both leases proved. He ought not to have sub-let the stalls but surrendered them to the Corporation if not meaning to use them. That was his duty. What claim had Ellen Dunn on the Corporators of this City? Defendant was bound to do the best for the interest of the Corporation. Defendant knowing of his father's use of his son's (defendant's son's) name, adopted the father's agency; and it had to be affirmed for the whole or repudiated. I find defendant to have had stalls 37 and 38. As to the late Mayor's cancellation of the lease of 38, and new lease to defendant's father, they were nullities, unauthorized, and not under seal. It would have been better not to have gone into them. No exigency of the Corporation required it, and to the new Mayor and Councillors this business might have been left. The Mayor and City Clerk, together, cannot give a release to any debtor of the Corporation for even five pounds. How then can they dissolve real property leases belonging to the Corporation. The City Clerk ought not to have signed this cancellation of lease, and new lease, knowing that they were unauthorized. But I cannot yield to the argument, that if these last deeds be null the original leases are null; so that the defendant is to go free, though continuing in possession; for, "if a tenant go into possession under a lease void for not being executed under the corporate seal, even if made by proper officers, it will be held that, though the lease be void, the tenant is to be deemed tenant from year to year under the Corporation; his payment of rent from time to time to its officers is proof of tenancy under the Corporation, on which it may distrain for rent in arrear."-(Wood & Tate, ch. 8, Angell & Ames.) In the case before us defendant took possession, he sub-let, and the rent to the Corporation, that defendant would have had to pay, had he himself been using the stalls, his tenants, the sub-tenants, pay for him, from time to time, to Kollmeyer, the Corporation collector. It is to be observed that the lease

"We

of 37 is not even nominally cancelled up to this time. cannot look in favor of defendant to see whether the contract is binding so as to support an action at law against the Corporation. It would be monstrous to hold that the disqualification does not attach because the Corporation cannot be compelled to perform the contract," said Lord Campbell in Reg. vs. Francis, where defendant was urging that his contract with the Corporation was null, being unsealed. I hold that defendant is still in possession of 37, by Bayard, who has paid him up to 1st of May. I find the defendant's pleas allegation that he never had any interest in stall 37, disproved. As to 38, I find defendant lessee of that also, and Fisher's six or seven payments to defendant were profits taken by defendant under a sub-lease, unduly, to the prejudice of the Corporation. But are leases "contracts," within the meaning of the 29 & 30 Vict.? I have no doubt of it. It is a rule that their common meanings are to be given to words. We see the Legislature every day, when the common meaning is not meant to be given to a word, ordering peculiar, qualified, technical meaning to be given to it. This word "contract", used in sec. 7 of 29 & 30 Vict., is used in many of our Canadian Acts, and has been for years, for instance, in the 24th chap. of the Consolidated Statutes of Lower Canada, sec. 31, sub-section three. Sub-section four orders, however, the common meaning not to be applied to the word "the said word contract in this seetion" (it says) "shall not extend to any lease." Then the Legislature, in the very Statute 29 & 30 Vict., uses the word again in another act, qualifying it. For instance, in the Upper Canada Municipal Act, chap. 51. Our City Incorporation Act uses the word "contract" without qualification, without limiting its meaning, as in the other act of the same legislature in the sune session. Surely we may presume that the Legislature knew what it was about. Controversy has been as to the extent of the word, when used largely or without qualification, for twenty five years, in England here. Yet the Legislature in our Montreal Act uses the word without qualification of it whatever. I therefore hold a lease from the Corporation to be a "contract" within the meaning of the word in the 29 & 30 Vict. So I would hold an agreement to rescind a lease of real property, if made in form by the Corporation to a Councillor, to be a "contract" within the meaning of the act referred to. According to the rule in such cases, if there were doubt about it, the most common and usual meaning would have to be given to the word. says the defendant's counsel, even if the leases of 37 and 38

But,

be held contracts, the Court must notice that these leases are of time, or date, long before the nomination day of the February last election, and, therefore, that they cannot be held to have operated (against defendant) disqualification for new election. A contract that could not have been opposed to defendant at his nomination as disqualifying from election, could not, on his being elected, oblige defendant to vacate his office, said Mr Cassidy. This is the last question in the case: Is the argument of defendant's counsel upon it well founded? Of course, I cannot disqualify anybody without law. Is it said in our City Acts that a contractor towards or with the Corporation is disqualified from being elected? The only disqualifications are those of the 14th and 15th Vict., and sec. 6 of the 29th and 30th Vict. The defendant is not in any of the cases of them. In the Quebec City Incorporation Act there is disqualification from being elected, from being interested in any contract. One law has been made for Quebec, but a different one for Montreal. There are only two disqualification clauses that can work against a councillor after his entry into office-one is the 14th and 15th Vict., and the other, sec. 7 of the 29th and 30th Vict. Undue influence by means of contracts entered into after their assumption of office by Councillors is what the 29th and 30th Vict. legislates against. The case of Reg. vs. Francis, Q. B., May, 1852, cited by Mr Perkins, I have looked at. It was upon the 5th and 6th Wm. IV, reading that nobody should be qualified to be elected Councillor while having any share or interest in any contract or employment with, by, or on behalf of, the Corporation. That is very different from our 29th and 30th Vict. law. It is different from our 14th and 15th Vict. too. Our clause disqualifying Councillors after their election, and while in office, reads in the future tense, "shall become" disqualified, it says, and the contract to disqualify must be one entered into while holding office. I interpret it as defendant's counsel do. The leases of 1870, I do not see to fall within its enactment so as to disqualify defendant from holding the office to which he has been recently elected; it might have been otherwise, perhaps, had defendant been continuing his councillorship (under his former election) say to March, 1872, instead of 1871, but this is a question that we have not to pass upon. In March, 1871, defendant ceased to be a Councillor under his former election. Since his present holding of office he has made no contract with the Corporation. The plaintiff himself asks me to hold the resiliation of lease of March 13 an utter nullity. To conclude: the

Requête of plaintiff cannot be maintained, seeing what I rule upon the last question; so it is dismissed, but without costs. (15 J., p. 203)

PERKINS and MONK, for the petitioner.

F. CASSIDY, Q. C., for the defendant.

T. W. RITCHIE, Q. C., counsel for defendant.

DISTRIBUTION OF LEGISLATIVE POWER.-LEGISLATURE OF QUEBEC.

PRIVY COUNCIL, July 8, 1874.

On appeal from the Court of Queen's Bench in Lower Canada, in the Province of Quebec. (Appeal side.)

Present: Lord SELBORNNE, Sir JAMES W. COLVILE, Sir BARNES PEACOCK, Sir MONTAGUE SMITH and Sir ROBERT P. COLLIER.

L'UNION ST. JACQUES DE MONTRÉAL, Defendant; and Dame JULIE BÉLISLE, Plaintiff.

Held: That the Act of the Provincial Legislature of Quebec (33 Vict., c. 58), which purported to relieve by legislation the appellant society, appearing on the face of the Act to have been in a state of extreme financial embarrassment, is within the legislative capacity, of that Legislature.

The Act related expressly to "a matter merely of a local or private nature in the province," which by the 92nd sect. of the British North America Act, 1867, passed by the Imperial Parliament, is assigned to the exclusive competency of the provincial legislature; and does not fall within the category of bankruptcy and insolvency, or any other class of subjects by the 91st section of the last mentioned act reserved for the exclusive legislative authority of the Parliament of Canada.

The question decided in this appeal was whether the Act of the provincial legislature of Quebec (33 Vict., c. 58) is repugnant to the provisions of an Act of the Imperial Parliament, viz. the British North America Act, 1867. The Provincial Act, 33 Vict., c. 58, is as follows:

"An Act to relieve L'Union St. Jacques de Montréal.

"Whereas there exists in the city of Montreal a benefit and benevolent society, duly incorporated, under the name of 'L'Union St. Jacques de Montréal;' whereas the contributions levied on the members of such society are too limited, and the benefits, especially those granted to the widows of deceased members, are by far too high; and whereas such disproportion between the contributions and the benefits has already reduced considerably the resources of the said society, remarkably encroached on its savings, and prevented the balancing of receipts and expenses, the latter

having exceeded the former for more than three years; whereas the half of the widows of deceased members, to wit, two out of four, have understood such state of affairs, and have come to the relief of the said society by agreeing to allow their weekly and life benefits to be lessened, and to exchange the same against the allowance of a sum to be once paid, and having not exceeded $200 except for such of them who had not already received as such an equal sum of $200; whereas it would be unjust and altogether injurious to the interests of the said society to continue to pay weekly and life benefits to the two widows having refused to comply with the terms offered to the other widows and by them accepted; and whereas the said two widows persisting in their refusal have already received in the way of ordinary benefits, a sum exceeding that of $200; whereas it has been shown that the financial condition of the said association does not permit of its continuing to pay to the two widows aforesaid their previous pensions, which, even if it were disposed, it could not do without entailing its own ruin; whereas the act incorporating the said society does not allow to decree that the terms accepted by the two widows aforesaid shall be binding for all the widows of its deceased members; and whereas it is expedient to remedy such unfavorable state of affairs, as prayed for by the petition of the said society, and whereas it is just that the prayer of the said petition be granted; therefore, Her Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Legislature of Quebec, enacts as follows:

"I. The said society, "The Union St. Jacques of Montreal," is hereby authorized to convert, in the ordinary manner and forms of its proceedings, the benefits of the said two widows, to wit: Dame Elizabeth Brunet, widow of the late Albert Tessier, and Dame Julie Bélisle, widow of the late Prosper Tourville, into the sum of $200 to be once paid to each and all of them." "II. If the said two widows, or one of them, refuse to accept such sum, instead of their or her prior benefit, it shall be lawful for the said society to keep such sum or sums in trust, and they shall only be bound to pay the said widows, for all the benefits to which they were previously entitled, the legal interest on the said sum of $200, that is to say, $12.00 to each of them, the said interest payable monthly and in advance up to their re-marriage or till their death, if they remain in a state of widowhood; it shall, nevertheless, be lawful for the said widows to draw the said allowance of $200 each, provided, of course, that they shall ask for it while in a state of widowhood. "III. But if the said association, 'L'Union St. Jacques de Montréal' sees