Brodnax v. Groom

• Decision Date: 31 January 1870
• Citation: 64 N.C. 244
• Parties: E. T. BRODNAX and others v. ZACHARIAH GROOM and others, Comm'rs. .
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court

64 N.C. 244

E. T. BRODNAX and others

v.ZACHARIAH GROOM and others, Comm'rs. .

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

January Term, 1870.

*1 The act of 1868-'69, c. 102, “To authorize the Commissioners of Rockingham County to levy a special tax” &c., is constitutional.

By comparing the Act of 1864-'65, c. 32, with that of 1868-69, c. 74, s. 20, as well as from the principle involved therein,--injunctions to restrain the collection of taxes, will be allowed only where a question of the existence of Constitutional power is involved, and not where the question is as regards matters only of detail, ex. gr. the valuation of property, the sufficiency of a Sheriff's bond, &c.

Whether a law authorizing the Commissioners of a particular County to levy taxes for the purpose of building bridges, is a Private or a Public-local law, quaere?

If a Private act be certified by the presiding officers of the two branches of the Legislature as duly ratified, it is not competent for the judiciary to go behind such record, and enquire collaterally ( ex. gr.) whether the thirty days notice of an application therefor, required by the Constitution, have been given.

An act giving the special approval of the Legislature to county taxation for special purposes (Const. Art. V, Sect. 7,) need not specify the sum to be raised by such taxation, nor a limit beyond which it cannot be carried; details are not proper in such statutes,--these should be left to the Commissioners.

It is doubtful whether it be practicable for the Courts to give effect to regulations imposed by Constitutions upon the exercise of the taxpower: Whether the power to tax do or do not exist, is a proper subject of judicial enquiry: Whether the exercise of a conceded power in any particular case were proper, is to be left to the constituents of the body which imposed the tax?

Where an injunction was sought against levying a tax, on the alleged ground that it was to be applied to build a particular bridge which was to be constructed at an inconvenient place, was connected with no public road, was upon a plan too costly, and was therefore, unconstitutional: Held, that, as the general head of repairing and building bridges came under “the necessary expenses” of the county, it was not competent for the Court to review a decision of the County Commissioners, as to what particular bridge, as regards either location or description, is, or is not necessary.

( Worth v. Commissioners of Fayetteville, Win. Eq. 70, cited and approved.)

INJUNCTION, before Tourgee, J., November 27th 1869, at Chambers, ROCKINGHAM Court.

An order of restraint had been made in the action by Watts, J., October 5th 1869, and the matter came before Judge Tourgee, upon a motion to vacate, made after due notice &c.

The plaintiffs were tax payers, who sued for themselves and all other tax payers of the county of Rockingham, and the defendants were the commissioners of that county.

The complaint sought an injunction against a tax alleged to have been levied by the defendants under an Act (1868-'69, c. 102, ratified April 1st 1869,) which provided, “That the commissioners of the county of Rockingham be and they are hereby authorized to levy and collect a special tax for the purpose of building and repairing bridges in said county.'

*2 The objections were as follows:

1. That the said Act was Private, and was passed without the thirty days notice of application required by the Constitution, Art. 2, Sec. 4.

2. That the Act did not specify the amount to be collected, or the particular bridges to be built.

3. That the tax had not been approved by a majority of the voters in the county, as required by the Constitution, Art. 7, Sec. 7.

4. That the Revenue Act of March 13 1869, required the Assessors to value the property of the tax payers, and provided that such valuations were to be revised by the commissioners, but that, in violation thereof, the commissioners had made new valuations, by taking the valuations of 1860, and, in every case, subtracting 25 per cent. from them.

5. That of the $12,000 levied, the commissioners had appropriated $10,000 to build a bridge, where none had ever been before, connected with no public road, and otherwise unnecessary, inconvenient and extravagantly expensive.

6. That the Sheriff who was to collect the tax, was insolvent, and that the bond he had given had no condition covering the collection of this tax.

Upon the application before Judge Tourgee the defendants filed an affidavit in reply to the above objections, in which they denied the truth of the allegations numbered above 4 and 5, and stated that the mistake in regard to the Sheriff's bond referred to in 6, had been corrected before the serving of the injunction in this case; &c.

The Judge, after consideration, vacated the order theretofore made; and the plaintiffs appealed.

Battle & Sons, Graham and Bragg for the appellants .

Phillips & Merrimon, contra .

PEARSON, C. J.

*3 This is a proceeding by the plaintiffs, who are tax-payers, in behalf of themselves, and of the other tax-payers of the County of Rockingham, to call in question the validity of an Act of the General Assembly, which authorizes the County Commissioners so levy a tax for “repairing and building bridges.”

His Honor, in the court below, discharged the order of restraint, and the case is before us, by appeal from that ruling.

In Worth v. Comm'rs of Fayetteville, Win. Eq. 70, while entertaining a bill in the name of a few, for all, of the taxpayers, to enjoin the collection of the taxes of a municipal corporation, the court felt it to be a duty to intimate a doubt as to whether bills of this kind could be allowed in respect to State and county taxes, because of the public mischief that might ensue by suspending the means of support upon which the governments of the State and of the county depend for existence.

Therefore, an act of the Legislature was passed, by which the “writ of injunction is allowed in all cases against the collection of taxes illegally imposed or assessed” Acts 1864-5, ch. 32.

Special legislation is objected to by many; but at all events, in construing the statute, the courts are to take into consideration the supposed mischief which the act was intended to remedy, and to construe it in reference to the mischief.

Upon this rule of construction, we think the act includes only cases which involve the...