Effective 28 Aug 1957

1.140. Severability of statute provisions. — The provisions of every statute are severable. If any provision of a statute is found by a court of competent jurisdiction to be unconstitutional, the remaining provisions of the statute are valid unless the court finds the valid provisions of the statute are so essentially and inseparably connected with, and so dependent upon, the void provision that it cannot be presumed the legislature would have enacted the valid provisions without the void one; or unless the court finds that the valid provisions, standing alone, are incomplete and are incapable of being executed in accordance with the legislative intent.

­­--------

(1949 S.B. 1001 § 1.14, A.L. 1957 p. 587)

CROSS REFERENCE:

Revisor may omit severability clauses from statutes, 3.030

(1951) If by striking out a void part of the statute, the remainder by reason of its generality will have a broader scope as to subject or territory and its operation would not be in accord with legislative intent, the whole could be made void by the invalidity of such part. Preisler v. Calcaterra, 362 Mo. 662, 243 S.W.2d 62.

(1951) Sections 295.090, 295.180 and 295.200 are severable from the remainder of this law (§§ 295.010 to 295.210) so that the constitutionality of such sections need not be determined in mandamus proceedings to compel payment of compensation of members of state board of mediation. Remainder of law provides a complete, sensible and valid enactment consistent with the state and federal constitutions and federal labor legislation, and therefore capable of being carried into execution as intended by the legislature. State ex rel. State Board of Mediation, 362 Mo. 798, 244 S.W.2d 75.

(1961) Where severance clause in use tax law stated that the legislature declared that if any exemption from taxation contained in the act was invalid under the constitution it intended to and thereby imposed the same tax on the exempted use as was imposed on the use of other property subject to the tax, held to prevent the act containing invalid exemptions from being wholly unconstitutional. Missouri Pacific Railroad Co. v. Morris (Mo.), 345 S.W.2d 52; Southwestern Bell Telephone Co. v. M.E. Morris (Mo.), 345 S.W.2d 62.

(1966) The absence of a severability clause is of no significance in a determination of whether an entire statute must fall because of invalidity of a portion of the statute. St. Louis County v. City of Florissant (Mo.), 406 S.W.2d 281.

(1998) License fee provision of ordinance regulating tobacco product sales, adopted without voter approval in violation of Hancock Amendment, was not so essentially and inseparably connected with other substantive provisions in ordinance that ordinance would not accomplish its purpose if license fee was eliminated, therefore the fee provision was severable, and savings clause indicated legislative intent to retain any provisions not violative of the constitution. Avanti Petroleum, Inc. v. St. Louis County, 974 S.W.2d 506 (Mo.App. E.D.)