The Bank of The Republic v. the County of Hamilton

• Decision Date: 30 November 1858
• Citation: 1858 WL 6159,21 Ill. 53,11 Peck 53
• Parties: THE BANK OF THE REPUBLIC, Plaintiff in Error,v.THE COUNTY OF HAMILTON, Defendant in Error.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

21 Ill. 53
1858 WL 6159 (Ill.)
11 Peck (IL) 53

THE BANK OF THE REPUBLIC, Plaintiff in Error,
v.
THE COUNTY OF HAMILTON, Defendant in Error.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

November Term, 1858.

ERROR TO HAMILTON.

Corporations are artificial persons, created with limited powers and capacities, and subject to the general laws and legislation of the State, as natural persons are; rights secured to them by contract they cannot be deprived of without just compensation; but, like natural persons in the exercise of their rights of organization and existence, they are subject to the control of the legislature by general laws.

[21 Ill. 54]

If, by the act creating it, a corporation has, by express grant or necessary intendment, rights and powers secured to it, such rights and powers are its property, and are protected under the constitution like the property of an individual.

The general rights and powers of a corporation, and which are not intended to be secured to it as its property, are subject to legislative control in the same manner as the general rights of individuals.

Whenever a property is asserted in a right, whether the right is inherent in an individual, or has been conferred by grant upon an artificial person, if the legislature has relinquished the power to legislate further in reference thereto, the property is fixed and absolute.

In the construction of statutes it will never be presumed that the legislature intended to abandon its rights as to the mode of assessing and collecting the State revenues.

In submitting a plan for banking to the people, it was not intended thereby, to release any legislative power necessary for revenue purposes. The mode of assessing the property of banks for the purposes of taxation, was not required to be submitted to the people, and their vote did not confer any additional sanction upon that provision; the legislature still controls the mode of taxation.

Bonds deposited with the auditor to secure the redemption of the bills issued by the banks, are subject to taxation.

THIS cause was brought into the Circuit Court of Hamilton county by appeal from the County Court, from a hearing had in the County Court on application, by the Bank of the Republic, for a reduction of the assessment of the property of the said bank, as made by the assessor of Hamilton county for the year 1857, the County Court having refused to reduce said assessment.

In the Circuit Court the cause on appeal was heard before BEECHER, Judge, at the May term, 1858, of the Hamilton Circuit Court, without a jury, and the judgment of the County Court was affirmed.

On the trial in the Circuit Court, it appeared in evidence, from the assessment lists of Hamilton county, that the valuation of the personal property of said bank for the year 1857, was four hundred and forty-two thousand dollars, which valuation was entered in said lists in the column headed “ Bonds, Stocks;” there was not any noting on the said lists, of the words, “by assessor,” in any way connected with the bank.

That the assessor of Hamilton county called upon the agent of the bank, (the president, etc., being absent,) in June, 1857, for a statement of the property of the bank for taxation, when it was agreed that such statement should be furnished by the first of September. That the assessor did not leave with the agent of the bank any blank to be filled. That said agent, in August, 1857, mailed through the post office to said assessor a statement of the property of said bank, signed by the president thereof, which stated the capital stock of said bank paid in, at fifty thousand dollars.

That it appeared from the testimony of Charles H. Rockwell, the president of said bank, that the amount of capital stock thereof paid in at that time was fifty thousand dollars; that there was not any surplus profits, reserved funds, personal property, or real estate belonging to said bank, beyond said fifty thousand dollars; that said bank then had bonds and stocks deposited with the auditor, as a basis of issue for the circulating notes of said bank, to the amount of four hundred and six thousand dollars, and that the amount of circulating notes of said bank was four hundred and three thousand dollars; that the balance due upon the purchase of said bonds, when procured, was paid in the notes issued by said bank; that said bonds deposited draw interest; that said bank had, on the 1st April, 1857, thirteen thousand dollars in specie on hand. That after the passage of the act of 1857, amendatory of the general banking law, the auditor demanded proof of said bank that fifty thousand dollars of actual cash capital had been paid in, or secured to be paid in, to said bank. That there is no other or further cash capital paid in, or secured to be paid in, to said bank, than said fifty thousand dollars.

The Circuit Court fixed the valuation of the bank at four hundred and nineteen thousand dollars.

Thereupon the counsel on the part of said bank, and the counsel for the defendant (Hamilton county,) had the case certified to this court, upon the following agreement signed by them:

“We do hereby agree, in the case of The Bank of the Republic versus The People of Hamilton County, that the following questions and points of law arising in the said cause may be submitted to the Supreme Court of the State of Illinois, for final judgment and determination; and that no further action be taken or further proceedings had in the said cause, until the opinion of the said Supreme Court shall be first had thereon.

1st. Whether the said assessment of plaintiff's property for the year 1857 was not invalid, for the reason that the assessor did not comply with the provisions of the statutes of the State of Illinois, in not leaving the notice and blank required by law for the listing of property, and in not making any note or memorandum of the date and name as required in such cases, and not noting the words, ‘by assessor,’ in...