The state attorney might well have expanded her argument, because if the statute violates article X, section 6 by authorizing eminent domain without the justification of a public purpose, such lack of public purpose also renders the sale of any bonds and the expenditure of any public funds on the project a violation of article VII, section 10, Florida Constitution, provided the project is not among those excepted from that section.See State v. Town of North Miami, 59 So.2d 779 (Fla. 1952). Certain kinds of projects are specifically allowed in article VII, section 10, which would have been held to violate that provision under case law antedating various constitutional revisions or amendments.

Before 1968, that section's predecessor, article IX, section 10 of the Florida Constitution of 1885, had been interpreted by this Court as generally proscribing industrial revenue bonds as an invalid lending of public credit for private purposes. See State v. Manatee County Port Authority, 193 So.2d 162 (Fla. 1966); State v. Town of North Miami, 59 So.2d 779 (Fla. 1952). It was only where the private benefit was strictly incidental to a paramount public purpose did the Court approve such financing.

TERRELL, Justice (dissenting). I concur with the dissent of Mr. Justice THORNAL wherein he says in effect that this is not a case where a unit of government proposes to employ public funds to acquire and develop an isolated tract of land for private benefit as was the case in State v. Town of North Miami, Fla., 59 So.2d 779; City of Clearwater v. Caldwell, Fla., 75 So.2d 765, and like cases. The chancellor, as did said dissent, pointed out that not one cent from the public treasury of the Authority was pledged to support the certificates in question; that no lien on the property was imposed to support them, but that their sole security was limited to rents derived from the building proposed to be constructed with the proceeds of the certificates.

We held that the issuance of the bonds was valid, and rejected the state's argument as follows: It [the State] cited State v. Town of North Miami, Fla., 59 So.2d 779; Adams v. Housing Authority of City of Daytona Beach, Fla., 60 So.2d 663; and City of Clearwater v. Caldwell, Fla., 75 So.2d 765. Each of these cases involved attempts of the city to use public funds to develop property for private benefit and gain and in each case the Court ruled such not to be proper public use. In each of these cases the private purpose was predominant, not incidental to a public purpose.

We held that the issuance of the bonds was valid, and rejected the state's argument as follows: It [the State] cited State v. Town of North Miami, Fla., 59 So.2d 779; Adams v. Housing Authority of City of Daytona Beach, Fla., 60 So.2d 663; and City of Clearwater v. Caldwell, Fla., 75 So.2d 765. Each of these cases involved attempts of the city to use public funds to develop property for private benefit and gain and in each case the Court ruled such not to be proper public use. In each of these cases the private purpose was predominant, not incidental to a public purpose.

Under case law, revenue bonds payable solely from capital project revenues (non-recourse bonds) were held to be pledges of the public credit and were prohibited unless it could be shown that the capital project served a predominantly or paramount public purpose. Contrast State v. Town of North Miami, 59 So.2d 779 (Fla. 1952), where non-recourse revenue bonds were held to be invalid because they served a predominantly private purpose with only incidental public benefit and State v. Board of Control, 66 So.2d 209 (Fla. 1953), where the bonds were validated because they served a predominantly public purpose with only incidental private benefit. In Town of North Miami, the trial court ruled that the non-recourse bonds for the construction of a private plant were valid because they did not involve a pledge of the public credit.

E.g., Green v. City of Mt. Pleasant, 256 Iowa 1184, 131 N.W.2d 5 (1964); State ex rel. Ferguson v. City of Pittsburgh, 188 Kan. 612, 364 P.2d 71 (1961); Carruthers v. Port of Astoria, Or., 438 P.2d 725 (1968); State v. Barezak, 34 Wis.2d 57, 148 N.W.2d 683 (1967); Powers v. City of Cheyenne, 435 P.2d 448 (Wyo. 1967). E.g., State v. Town of North Miami, 59 So.2d 779 (Fla. 1952); State ex rel. Saxbe Y. Brand, 176 Ohio St. 44, 197 N.E.2d 328 (1964). The judgment of the trial court holding the Industrial Development Act constitutional is affirmed.

In the past fifteen years this Court has rejected as violative of Section 10, Article IX, of the Florida Constitution many bond issues proposed by public bodies to finance various projects. In 1952 in State v. Town of North Miami, 59 So.2d 779, this Court rejected a proposal of the Town of North Miami to issue bonds to be used to purchase lands within the corporate limits to erect an aluminum manufacturing plant and to lease the same for a term of 20 years to a private corporation. In that same year in Adams v. Housing Authority of City of Daytona Beach, 60 So.2d 663, this Court held that Chapter 27072, Acts of 1945, authorizing a redevelopment project of the City of Daytona Beach, was violative of Section 10, Article IX, in that an attempt was there made to authorize the appropriation of public funds for private purposes and to loan the credit of the city to corporations, associations or individuals for purposes not public.

In the Cotney case relied upon by the Authority this Court made clear that public funds may not be used in this manner, saying at page 348 of 104 So.2d: "* * * It must, however, be taken as settled law under the Adams decision and the previous decision of this court in State v. Town of North Miami, Fla. 1952, 59 So.2d 779, that a public body cannot use its power and its funds to acquire property, either by purchase or by the exercise of the power of eminent domain, for the sole purpose of making such property available to private enterprises for private use." As we see it the Authority can, because of the difference in factual situations, draw no comfort whatsoever from the Cotney case or any others known to us.

In Florida, a scheme to finance an industrial enterprise through revenue bonds was disapproved in sweeping terms. State v. Town of North Miami, 59 So.2d 779, 785, 784 (Fla.). The court said: "The financing of private enterprises by means of public funds is entirely foreign to a proper concept of our constitutional system.