Bennett v. Stutts

Decision Date10 March 1975
Citation521 S.W.2d 575
PartiesMrs. Joan BENNETT et al., Appellants, v. T. C. STUTTS et al., Appellees.
CourtTennessee Supreme Court

Joseph M. Boyd, Jr., Dyersburg, for appellants.

James O. Lanier, County Atty., Ralph I. Lawson, Dyersburg, for appellees.

OPINION

HENRY, Justice.

This suit seeking to vindicate a patent public wrong must fail for plaintiff's lack of standing to sue.

Eighteen citizens, residents and taxpayers of Dyer County, Tennessee, filed their complaint in the Law and Equity Court at Dyersburg seeking to invalidate the election of the defendant, Casey J. Vinson, as County Superintendent of Public Instruction. Among others the Chairman of the Dyer County Quarterly Court and the members thereof are named as parties defendant.

The complaint, as amended, alleges that the election of the County Superintendent was conducted by secret ballot in violation of the entirely mandatory provisions of § 5--518 T.C.A., which reads as follows:

In making all elections and appointments coming before the county courts, the vote of the justices present Shall be taken by ayes and nays, the clerk calling and recording the name of each justice, together with his vote, Aye or nay, as it is given, Which shall be entered on the minutes, together with the names of the persons elected or appointed. (Emphasis added)

Plaintiffs allege a pattern of persistent violation of this statutory requirement, and seek a declaration voiding the election and restraining and enjoining Vinson from taking office or performing any of the duties of office.

The defendants filed motions to dismiss, which, Inter alia, challenge the right or standing of plaintiffs to sue. These motions prompted the trial judge to render on January 24, 1973, what is designated as An Advisory Opinion 'The Right to be Heard'. The principal thrust of this opinion is that this action should have been filed as a Quo warranto proceeding or by a candidate in the aforesaid election.

Thereafter, on February 6, 1973, plaintiffs amended their complaint.

It appears from the record that the trial judge kept this case under advisement for 15 months. 1 On May 3, 1974 an order was entered in which the trial judge held that 'the plaintiffs in this case lack the capacity of standing to bring this action, either individually, as a class action, or otherwise . . .', and dismissed the suit.

We concur in the conclusion reached by the trial judge.

It is the settled law in this state that private citizens, as such, cannot maintain an action complaining of the wrongful acts of public officials unless such private citizens aver special interest or a special injury not common to the public generally. Patton v. City of Chattanooga, 108 Tenn. 197, 65 S.W. 414 (1901); Skelton v. Barnett, 190 Tenn. 70, 227 S.W.2d 774 (1950); Badgett v. Broome, 219 Tenn. 264, 409 S.W.2d 354 (1966).

Our research into this matter leads us to the conclusion that Tennessee jurisprudence, in this regard, comports with the overwhelming majority, if not all other jurisdictions.

In 59 Am.Jur.2d, Parties, § 30, it is said:

Public wrongs or neglect or breach of public duty generally cannot be redressed at a suit in the name of an individual or individuals whose interest in the right asserted does not differ from that of the public generally, or who suffers injury only in common with the public generally, and not peculiar to himself, even, it seems, though his loss is greater in degree, unless such right of action is given by statute.

The broad general principle is asserted that in the absence of a statute imposing liability, an action will not lie in behalf of an individual who has sustained a private injury by reason of the neglect of a public corporation to perform a public duty. When the duty of taking appropriate action for the enforcement of a statute is entrusted solely to a named public officer, private citizens cannot intrude upon his functions. In cases of purely public concern and in actions for wrongs against the public, whether actually committed or only apprehended, the remedy, whether civil or criminal, is as a general rule by a prosecution instituted by the state in its political character, or by some officer authorized by law to act in its behalf, or by some of those local agencies created by the state for the arrangement of such of the local affairs of the community as may be entrusted to them by law.

In Skelton v. Barnett, Supra, the action was brought to declare an election illegal in order to redress a public wrong. In affirming a judgment of dismissal this Court said:

. . . The present action is in the nature of a Quo warranto proceeding just as State ex rel. Weaver v. Maxwell, 189 Tenn. 183, 224 S.W.2d 832. It is not maintainable at...

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56 cases
  • Ezell v. Cockrell
    • United States
    • Tennessee Supreme Court
    • 5 Junio 1995
    ...Tenn.Civ.App. (Higgins) 399, 401-02 (1912). The most recent statement of the public duty doctrine by this Court was in Bennett v. Stutts, 521 S.W.2d 575, 576 (Tenn.1975), where we It is the settled law in this state that private citizens, as such, cannot maintain an action complaining of th......
  • State ex rel. Webb v. Cianci
    • United States
    • Rhode Island Supreme Court
    • 23 Mayo 1991
    ...to the public generally." The Brock court further stated, however, that an exception to this general rule is found in Bennett v. Stutts, 521 S.W.2d 575 (Tenn.1975). The court in Stutts stated as "We recognize that the requirement that suits in the nature of a quo warranto and those seeking ......
  • Owen of Georgia, Inc. v. Shelby County
    • United States
    • U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit
    • 17 Junio 1981
    ...of the wrongful acts of public officials if they aver a special interest or a special injury not shared by the public. Bennett v. Stutts, 521 S.W.2d 575, 576 (Tenn.1975); Badgett v. Broome, 219 Tenn. 264, 409 S.W.2d 354 (1966); Skelton v. Barnett, 190 Tenn. 70, 227 S.W.2d 774 (1950); Patton......
  • Jordan v. Knox County
    • United States
    • Tennessee Supreme Court
    • 12 Enero 2007
    ...is prima facie meritorious, the trial court shall permit the action to proceed in the name of the State of Tennessee. Bennett v. Stutts, 521 S.W.2d 575, 577 (Tenn.1975). 6. A variety of legal challenges to the metropolitan form of county government, or provisions thereof, were, like this on......
  • Request a trial to view additional results
1 books & journal articles
  • Tennessee. Practice Text
    • United States
    • ABA Antitrust Library State Antitrust Practice and Statutes (FIFTH). Volume III
    • 9 Diciembre 2014
    ...751, 765 (Tenn. 2007) (citing State ex rel. Wallen v. Miller, 304 S.W.2d 654, 659 (Tenn. 1957)). 548. Id. (citing Bennett v. Stutts, 521 S.W.2d 575, 577 (Tenn. 1975)). 549. State ex rel. Shriver v. Leech, 612 S.W.2d 454, 455 (Tenn. 1981). 550. Id. at 457-58. 551. Id. at 457. Tennessee 46-68......

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