Page:North Dakota Reports (vol. 48).pdf/847

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STATE EX REL v. WALLACE
823

Compiled Laws of 1913, are hereby exempted from taxation other than that imposed by this Act, and shall hereafter be subject to an annual tax of two mills on each dollar of the fair cash value thereof. But nothing in this act shall apply to money and credits belonging to incorporated banks situated in this state.”‘

Again do we see that the legislature has disclosed the same plain policy and intent in harmony with that theretofore and thereafter continuously manifested. This chapter was likewise repealed by chap. 62. Its consideration here is for the same purpose as that of 230, to wit, to ascertain the policy and intent of the legislature in the enactment of 62.

We think it must be evident from a thorough examination of all of the chapters and sections above mentioned, that the legislature dealt with the taxation of the stock of companies and associations separately, from the taxation of the stock of banking corporations; that it is clear that it has enacted certain laws relative to the taxation of stock of companies and associations, and likewise has enacted certain other and distinct laws relative to the taxation of banking associations which have no application to other companies or associations, and that it was the clear intent of the legislature to deal with banking corporations, with reference to the taxation of their stock in a particular manner; in short, it would seem that it has continuously been the policy and intent of the Legislature to deal with the taxation of the stock of companies and associations and the taxation of stock and banks by entirely separate and distinct laws.

This being true, we think the same policy and intent was present with the legislature when it enacted chap. 62, and that, as there is no expressed intent in that act, and no particular language there used, which makes it applicable to banking corporations, in the light of its past clear purpose and intent to deal with the taxation of banking corporations and of their property separately, the act should be held to apply only to companies and associations other than banking, and this even though § 1 of chap. 62, hereinbefore set out in full, be considered in part an affirmative enactment.

If that section be affirmative legislation, it relates only to companies and associations other than banking, for, as the legislative policy and intent prior to the enactment of chap. 62 was to deal with the taxation of corporations, companies and associations in a separate and distinct manner than it dealt with the taxation of banking corporations, and