Board of Sup'rs of Yavapai County v. Stephens

• Decision Date: 31 December 1918
• Docket Number: Civil 1647
• Citation: 177 P. 261,20 Ariz. 115
• Parties: THE BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF YAVAPAI COUNTY, ARIZONA, and WILLIAM STEPHENS J. A. JAEGER and C. C. STUKEY, Members of said Board, and R. T. BELCHER, Clerk of said Board, Appellants, v. WILLIAM STEPHEN and W. G. WINGFIELD, Appellees
• Court: Arizona Supreme Court

177 P. 261

20 Ariz. 115

THE BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF YAVAPAI COUNTY, ARIZONA, and WILLIAM STEPHENS J. A. JAEGER and C. C. STUKEY, Members of said Board, and R. T. BELCHER, Clerk of said Board, Appellants, v. WILLIAM STEPHEN and W. G. WINGFIELD, Appellees

Civil No. 1647

Supreme Court of Arizona

December 31, 1918

APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of the county of Yavapai. Frank H. Lyman, Judge. Reversed and dismissed.

Mr Wiley E. Jones, Attorney General, and Mr. F. L. Haworth County Attorney, Mr. Perry M. Ling, Deputy County Attorney Mr. Ward H. Wheeler, Messrs. Michell & Linney, and Mr. Neil C. Clark, for Appellants.

Messrs Norris, Spalding & Norris, Mr. A. H. Favour and Mr. John F. Ross, for Appellees.

OPINION

CUNNINGHAM, C. J.

The appellees commenced this action to prevent the board of supervisors from paying the county recorder, county treasurer, county attorney, county assessor and county superintendent of schools, officers of said county, their salaries as provided by chapter 61, laws of 1917. The plaintiffs contend that said officers' salaries were provided by chapter 2, title 26, Revised Statutes of Arizona of 1901, and laws amending same, at the beginning of said officers' terms of office, viz., on the first Monday of January, 1917, and that the legislature is prohibited, by section 17 of article 4, state Constitution, from enacting any law that will have the effect of increasing or diminishing said officers' salaries during their term of office. The defendants demurred to the complaint, and their demurrer was overrled, and judgment was rendered, restraining the said board from paying the said officers' salaries other than as provided by the territorial laws as they were continued in force by the Constitution as laws of the state. Section 17, article 22, Constitution, is as follows:

"All state and county officers (except notaries public) and all justices of the peace and constables, whose precinct includes a city or town or part thereof, shall be paid fixed and definite salaries, and they shall receive no fees for their own use."

This provision is a clear declaration of the policy of the Constitution to follow a system of paying official compensation by fixed and definite salaries alone. The words "fixed" and "definite," as used in said section 17, cannot be understood as having been used to convey the same meaning, because if so understood one or the other would become useless. The word "fixed" is defined by Webster: "Securely placed or fastened; settled; established; firm; immovable; unalterable." Hence, a "fixed" salary is one that is entirely placed or fastened with regard to its duration; is one that is settled to remain for a time.

The word "definite" is defined by the same authority as "a thing defined or determined; a definite thing." Hence, with such meaning, a definite salary is one defined or determined, a definite thing, and has reference, as used in said section 17, to the exact amount of the salary. Consequently the officers shall be paid salaries fixed, settled, firm for a period of time, and such salaries shall be exactly defined in amount during such period of time.

The intention of the framers of the Constitution, and of the people in adopting that instrument was therefore to enforce under statehood a uniform system of compensing all public officers by paying them salaries for fixed, settled periods of service, and during such periods of service the salaries payable to be definite in amounts.

As preliminary to providing the system of uniform salaries to govern from the date of statehood until the state legislature could act in the premises, in other words, to provide a temporary uniform system of definite salaries for the officers, effective until the legislature could provide fixed and definite salaries, the Constitution prescribed definite salaries for certain named state officers until otherwise provided by law. See section 13, article 5, state Constitution. Subordinate state offices were created by the Constitution without definite salaries being provided for the officers. For illustration, see sections 14 and 17, article 6. In such instances the officers are given such "compensation by salaries only as may be provided by law; and the supreme court shall have power to fix said salary until such salary shall be determined by law." The office of the clerk of the superior court is created by section 18, article 6, with "such compensation, by salary only, as shall be provided by law. Until such salary shall be fixed by law the board of supervisors shall fix such salary."

". . . The board of supervisors of each county is hereby empowered to fixed salaries for all county and precinct officers within such county for whom no compensation is provided by law, and the salaries so fixed shall remain in full force and effect until changed by general law." Section 4, art. 12, Constitution.

Certain territorial county offices were continued as offices under the state government. Under the territorial laws, certain of county officers holding such county offices were compensated by fees. After statehood no county officer could be compensated by fees. Section 17, art. 22, Contitution. We consequently held that officers holding offices, who had before statehood received fees as compensation, after statehood they became officers for whom no compensation is provided by law within section 4 of article 12, supra, and the board of supervisors were empowered to fix their salaries temporarily, until changed by general law.

The county offices of recorder, treasurer, attorney, assessor and superintendent of schools, as they existed under the territorial laws, were continued under the Constitution, subject to change by law. Section 3, art. 12, Constitution. Chapter 2, title 26, Revised Statutes of of Arizona of 1901, and amendments thereto, prescribed means by which the amounts of said officers' salaries were capable of determination. The existence of prescribed conditions within a county determined the amounts of the salaries of the said county officers. The condition, viz., equalized, assessed, valuation of property of the county, determined the class of the county, and the class determined the amount of the officers' salaries. These laws were not repugnant to the Constitution, but they were in harmony with the policy declaring for a system of compensating officers by fixed and definite salaries. such laws were therefore continued in force as laws of the state "until they expire by their own limitations or are altered or repealed by law." Section 2, article 22, state Constitution. The said territorial laws, so permitted to remain in force temporarily, "until they should expire by their own limitation or are altered or repealed by law," were not enacted pursuant to the Constitution, nor were they subject to the restrictions contained in the Constitution prohibiting their alteration or repeal. Such territorial laws, when enacted, were subject to general legislative alteration, amendment, and repeal at the discretion of the territorial, legislature, without regard to the effect such legislation might have on the salaries of county officers. See Harwood v. Wentworth, 4 Ariz. 378, 42 P. 1025; Dysart v. Graham County, 5 Ariz. 123, 48 P. 213; Williamson v. Gila County, 5 Ariz. 237, 52 P. 363; Harwood v. perrin, 7 Ariz. 114, 60 P. 891.

Such laws of the territory as were continued in force as laws of the state were continued as an entirety with their advantages as well as with their disadvantages. The statutes in question here were inherently subject to be altered at any time the legislature saw fit to alter them by general law, and such infirmity in these statutes remained in force as the law of the state after statehood as it was in force prior to statehood, and the Constitution expressly reserved to the legislature of the state the power to alter or repeal all laws of the territory continued in force as laws of the state without limitation on that power.

In the foregoing manner, a temporary system of compensating all state, county and precinct officers was provided by the Constitution. We said, in Patty v. Greenlee County, 14 Ariz. 422, 130 P. 757, with reference to the constitutional salary system, as follows:

"It [section 4, article 12, Constitution] is a provision of the Constitution that the Legislature shall fix, 'by general law,' the salaries of county and precinct officers; and it was not contemplated that that general scheme devised for uniformity, stability and regularity should be suspended or postponed or nullified for any length of time, except the interim between admission to statehood and action by Legislature."

We held in that case that a general law immediately superseded the orders or resolutions of the board of supervisors fixing the salary of a county officer for whom no compensation was provided by law. I adhere to the principles recognized in that decision as sound. I am of the opinion that the territorial laws fixing the salaries of county officers, which remained in force as the laws of the state, were no more sacred from the alteration than were the orders of the the board of supervisors fixing the salaries of officers for whom no compensation was provided by law. They stand upon an equal footing in every respect. Both means of fixing salaries were temporary, "and it was not contemplated that the general scheme devised for uniformity, stability and regularity should be suspended or postponed or nulified for any length of time, except the interim between admission to statehood and action by the legislature." Section 17, article 4, Constitution, provides that:

The Legislature shall never grant any extra compensation to any public officer, agent, servant, or...