Board of Tax Assessors of Decatur County v. Catledge

• Decision Date: 16 October 1931
• Docket Number: 8555.
• Citation: 160 S.E. 909,173 Ga. 656
• Parties: COUNTY BOARD OF TAX ASSESSORS OF DECATUR COUNTY v. CATLEDGE, Sheriff.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

160 S.E. 909

173 Ga. 656

COUNTY BOARD OF TAX ASSESSORS OF DECATUR COUNTY v. CATLEDGE, Sheriff.

No. 8555.

Supreme Court of Georgia

October 16, 1931

Syllabus by the Court.

Cardinal rule in construction of statutes is to ascertain true intention of General Assembly.

Use of plain unequivocal language in legislative enactment forbids judicial interpretation.

Court may decline to give legislative act such construction as will (attribute intention to pass unreasonable act or will) defeat purpose of General Assembly.

Court in exercising power to refuse such construction of legislative act as will defeat purpose of General Assembly may avoid portion of enactment and preserve remainder.

Statutory provision requiring service of notice upon taxpayers where change is made by board of tax assessors does not apply unless board increases assessment as whole or increases items of taxpayer's return (Laws 1913, p. 127, § 6).

Mandamus held not to lie to require sheriff to serve notices of hearing on taxpayers whose returns had been reduced by tax assessors (Laws 1913, p. 127, § 6).

The cardinal rule in the construction of legislative enactments is to ascertain the true intention of the General Assembly in the passage of the law. As a general rule, the use of plain and unequivocal language in a legislative enactment obviates any necessity for judicial construction, and indeed forbids an interpretation of the meaning of the words employed by the General Assembly.

An exception to the general rule just stated is presented when the use of words the meaning of which in general acceptation is apparently obvious, and yet the purpose of the Legislature would be defeated, were the words employed construed literally. Courts may construe the language employed in the act in connection with the context, and ascertain the legislative intent as derived from the old law, the evil, and the remedy, and will not defeat the intention and purpose of the General Assembly by giving effect to words which would render the purpose of the General Assembly in the passage of the enactment futile, unenforceable, or ineffectual.

In the construction of a statute a court may decline to give a legislative act such construction as will attribute to the General Assembly an intention to pass an act which is not reasonable, or as will defeat the purpose of the proposed legislation. In the exercise of this power a court may avoid a portion of the enactment and preserve the remainder.

Properly construed, the provision of section 6 of the act of 1913 (Ga Laws 1913, pp. 123, 127), requiring a notice to be served upon every taxpayer of a county where a change of assessment is made by the board of tax assessors, does not apply unless the board makes either an increase in the amount of the assessment as a whole, or an increase in some item of the taxpayer's return.

Under the principles stated in the foregoing headnotes, the court did not err in refusing to grant a mandamus absolute requiring the sheriff to serve the notices which required taxpayers whose returns, as submitted to the tax receiver had been reduced by the board of tax assessors of Decatur county, to personally appear before the board of tax assessors. The law never requires the doing of a vain thing.

Error from Superior Court, Decatur County; B. C. Gardner, Judge.

Petition by the County Board of Tax Assessors of Decatur County for mandamus to be directed to W. J. Catledge, Sheriff. Judgment for defendant and plaintiff brings error.

Affirmed.

W. V Custer & Son, of Bainbridge, for plaintiff in error.

A. B Conger and H. G. Bell, both of Bainbridge, for defendant in error.

RUSSELL C.J.

The board of tax assessors of Decatur county filed a petition for mandamus to compel the sheriff, W. J. Catledge, to serve upon a number of taxpayers of the county notices of changes made by the board of tax assessors in the returns as filed by the taxpayers. It is alleged that the changes made by the assessors will be invalid unless the notices are served upon the taxpayers, and that the sheriff refuses to serve the notices in question, which were returned by the sheriff to the board, accompanied by the following letter: "I am hereby returning notices you have placed in my hands to be served on taxpayers, for the reason the chairman of the board of commissioners refuses to pay me for the ones you have lowered the tax on, but he says he will pay for the ones in which you have raised the tax; so I am returning to you the ones you have reduced the tax on, as you know I can't serve them for nothing." The petition also set out that the board of tax assessors, on June 15, 1931, adopted a resolution employing W. V. Custer & Son as its attorneys to compel by legal process the faithful fulfillment of the duty of the sheriff; that the compensation of said attorneys is a necessary expense to be incurred by the board in the performance of its duty, and should be paid from the county treasury; and that the compensation required by said attorneys in bringing this suit is $250. They prayed for a rule absolute, compelling the sheriff to duly and faithfully perform the official duties laid upon him by statute; and that the reasonableness of the counsel fee be passed upon, and ordered paid if the court deemed it a proper charge. The answer of the defendant "shows that under the law he is not required to serve notices on...