Bowen v. Russell
| Decision Date | 07 April 1916 |
| Docket Number | No. 10468.,10468. |
| Citation | 111 N.E. 978,272 Ill. 313 |
| Parties | BOWEN v. RUSSELL et al. |
| Court | Illinois Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from Kane County Court; S. N. Hoover, Judge.
Election contest by George E. Bowen against John S. Russell and others. Decree for defendants dismissing the petition, and contestant appeals. Affirmed.
R. H. Kramer, Charles H. Fisher, and Ernest C. Luther, all of Elgin, for appellant.
Healy & Beverly and Russell & McNerney, all of Elgin, for appellees.
Appellant filed a petition in the county court of Kane county to contest the election of John S. Russell, William F. Hunter, Charles L. Kohn, and John O'Connell, appellees herein, to the office of commissioners for the city of Elgin, in said county, at the general municipal election held April 20, 1915; said city being under the commission form of municipal government. The county court held that it was without jurisdiction to hear said contest, and entered a decree dismissing the petition. From that decree, this appeal has been prayed.
Several questions are argued in the brief, but they all rest upon or are connected with the question whether the county court has jurisdiction to hear this contest. From the record before us it appears that the city of Elgin previous to 1911 was organized and governed under the general City and Village Act; that in 1911 the voters of said city adopted the commission form of government, as provided in said act (Hurd's Stat. 1913, pp. 295-320); that said appellees in that year were duly elected commissioners of said city, and held office until April 20, 1915, when they were, upon the canvass of votes, declared re-elected as commissioners. Appellant, Bowen, was also a candidate for said office at the April 20, 1915, election, and by the petition herein alleges that he was elected.
Counsel for appellant contend that under said act for a commission form of government the county court has jurisdiction to hear this contest, while counsel for appellees contend that the city council of said city is the proper body to hear contests of this kind, as is the city council under the general City and Village Act.
Section 1 of the Commission Form of Government Act provides, among other things, that:
All cities and villages in Illinois adopting said act shall, ‘in addition to all rights, powers and authority in them vested, under and by virtue of said acts [meaning the general City and Village Act and all acts amendatory thereto], have and they are hereby vested with the further and additional rights, powers and authority contained in this act,’ etc.
Section 23 of said act provides:
‘The council shall have and possess, and the council and its members shall exercise all executive and legislative powers and duties now had, possessed and exercised by the mayor, city council, president and board of trustees of villages, board of library trustees, city clerk, city attorney, city engineer, city treasurer, city comptroller and all other executive legislative and administrative officers in cities or villages now or hereinafter organized and incorporated under the general Incorporation law of the state of Illinois for the incorporation of cities and villages,’ etc., with certain exceptions which in no way touch upon the question of jurisdiction to hear this contest.
Section 58 of said act provides:
‘In the construction of this act the following rules shall be observed, unless such construction would be inconsistent with the manifest intent, or repugnant to the context of the statute: (a) The words ‘commissioner,’ or ‘alderman’ or ‘village trustees' shall be construed to mean commissioner when applied to duties under the act to which this is an amendment. (b) When an office or officer is named in any law referred to in this act, it shall, when applied to cities or villages under this act, be construed to mean the office or officer having the same functions or duties under the provisions of this act, or under ordinances passed under authority thereof. (c) The word ‘council’ shall be considered synonymous with ‘city council’ or ‘president and board of trustees.”
Unless there is something else in the Commission Form of Government Act that bears on this question, the conclusion would naturally be drawn from the provisions of these quoted sections that, if the city council and village trustees were authorized to hear contests under the general City and Village Act, the city council, under the Commission Form of Government Act, would still have that authority. We find no provision in this act that in any way tends to lead to the opposite conclusion. On the contrary, there are certain other provisions that tend strongly to support this conclusion. Paragraph (e) of section 18 of said Commission Form of Government Act provides:
‘All general and special municipal elections in said city or village shall be held, conducted and contested under the Election Law in force in such city or village, except as herein otherwise provided.’ Hurd's Stat. 1913, p. 303.
Beyond question, under the general City and Village Act for the incorporation of cities and villages, the city council of cities organized under the act had the sole authority to hear contests as to its members, and the village trustees of organized villages had the same authority as to members of the board of trustees. Brush v. Lemma, 77 Ill. 496;Linegar v. Rittenhouse, 94 Ill. 208;Foley v. Tyler, 161 Ill. 167, 43 N. E. 845;King v. Jordan, 198 Ill. 457, 64 N. E. 1072;Baker v. Shinkle, 249 Ill. 154, 94 N. E. 58. Clearly, therefore, under said paragraph (e) of section 18, the city council would have the authority to hear contests as to its own members unless the Commission Form of Government Act in some other provision provides otherwise. No such provision is found in the law, and any fair construction of the entire act, in the light of the decisions of this court, leads inevitably to the conclusion that the Legislature intended that a contest of this kind should be heard and conducted in the same manner as those under the general City and Village Act.
Counsel for appellant argue earnestly that the Legislature, by providing in said Commission Form of Government Act that contests for the primary nominations for commissioners should be held by the county or circuit court or county or circuit judge, must have intended that a contest for an election such as this must be held by the county or circuit court or the judge thereof. With this we cannot agree. The...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Sarlls v. State ex rel. Trimble
...since a person has no vested right to an office (Lyons v. Becker [1916] 272 Ill. 333, 111 N. E. 980, 983;Bowen v. Russell [1916] 272 Ill. 313, 111 N. E. 978), and where the commissioners are judges of the election and qualifications of their members they possess the exclusive authority to p......
-
Sarlls v. State ex rel. Trimble
... ... person has no vested right to an office, Lyons v ... Becker (1916), 272 Ill. 333, 111 N.E. 980, 983; ... Bowen v. Russell (1916), 272 Ill. 313, 111 ... N.E. 978, and where the commissioners are judges of the ... election and qualifications of their ... ...
-
Olson v. Scully
...to the person filling the office. It is erroneous to say that an incumbent owns an office or has any title to it. Bowen v. Russell, 272 Ill. 313, 111 N. E. 978;People v. Barrett, 203 Ill. 99, 67 N. E. 742,96 Am. St. Rep. 296;People v. Kipley, 171 Ill. 44, 49 N. E. 229,41 L. R. A. 775;Donahu......
-
Nesladek v. Kanka
...and the officers of any public corporation, whether municipal or quasi municipal, must be held to be ‘like officers.” In Bowen v. Russell, 272 Ill. 313, 111 N. E. 978, a petition was filed in the county court to contest the election of a commissioner of the city of Elgin, which was under th......