Browning v. Hooper

• Citation: 46 S.Ct. 141,70 L.Ed. 330,269 U.S. 396
• Decision Date: 04 January 1926
• Docket Number: No. 256,256
• Parties: BROWNING et al. v. HOOPER et al
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

269 U.S. 396

46 S.Ct. 141

70 L.Ed. 330

BROWNING et al.

v HOOPER et al.

No. 256.

Argued Nov. 17, 1925.

Decided Jan. 4, 1926.

Messrs. Wm. R. Watkins, of Fort Worth, Tex., and C. K. Walsh, of Wichita Falls, Tex., for appellants.

[Argument of Counsel from page 397 intentionally omitted] Mr. John R. Moore, of Archer City, Tex., for appellees.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 398-399 intentionally omitted] Mr. Justice BUTLER delivered the opinion of the Court.

Appellants own taxable real and personal property in that part of Archer county, Texas, defined as road district No. 2. The appellees are the county judge and four commissioners (constituting the county commissioners' court), the tax assessor, and the sheriff of the county, who is the tax collector. Appellants brought this suit to restrain the issue or sale of bonds of the road district in the amount of $300,000 proposed to be sold to obtain money for the construction, operation, and maintenance of roads in that district and to restrain the levy or collection of any tax upon their property to pay any part of the interest or principal of the bonds. They seek relief on the ground that the creation of the road district and the enforcement of the proposed tax will deprive them of their property without due process of law in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. The District Court dismissed the complaint. 3 F.(2d) 160. The case is here on direct appeal. Section 238, Judicial Code (Comp. St. § 1215).

The Texas statutes (Complete Tex. St. 1920, or Vernon's Sayles' Ann. Civ. St. 1914, art. 627), provide: 'Any county * * * or any political subdivision or defined district, now or hereafter to be described and defined, of a county,' is authorized to issue bonds, not to exceed one-fourth of the assessed valuation of real property in the district, for the construction, maintenance and operation of macadamized, graveled or paved roads and turnpikes, and to levy and collect taxes to pay them. Upon the petition of 50 resident property tax paying voters of any defined district of any county, it is the duty of the commissioners' court to order an election in the district as described in the petition to determine whether its bonds shall be issued for such road purposes, and whether a tax shall be levied upon the property of the district for their payment. Complete Tex. St. 1920, or Vernon's Ann. Civ. St. Supp. 1918, art. 628. If two-thirds of the votes cast are in favor of the proposition, the commissioners' court is required to issue and sell the bonds. Complete Tex. St. 1920, or Vernon's Sayles' Ann. Civ. St. 1914, art. 631. But before they are put on the market, the court is required to levy a tax sufficient to pay the debt as it matures. The assessments are to be made on the same valuation, and they become liens and may be enforced in the same manner as state and county taxes. Articles 634, 2827, 2836. For the purposes of the act, any district accepting its provisions by such vote is thereby created a body corporate which may sue and be sued. Article 637.

Archer county is about 30 miles square, and has a population of between 5,000 and 6,000. The principal place is Archer City, the county seat, located about 5 miles south and 3 miles east of the center of the county. Road district No. 2 embraces approximately the northerly half of the county, including a part of Archer City. The Ozark Trail is a federal aided state highway, and about 20 miles of it extends diagonally across the northwesterly part. Dundee is located on it about 2 miles from the west line of the county. There is a highway extending from that place to Diversion Dam about 6 miles northwest. About 18 miles of the Southwest Trail lies between Archer City and a point on the north line of the county about 6 miles from its northeast corner. There is another highway extending from a point on the Southwest Trail about 2 miles south of the county line to Holliday on the Ozark Trail about 6 miles west. These roads are within the road district, and the bonds issued are to raise money to improve them.

January 17, 1924, there was presented to the commissioners' court a petition signed by 74 persons. It prayed an election to determine whether bonds of the territory, therein described by metes and bounds, and to be designated as 'Road District No. 2 of Archer County, Texas,' should be issued for road purposes in the amount of $300,000, and whether a tax should be levied upon the property therein to pay the bonds. The commissioners' court by order established the district within the metes and bounds and for the purposes set forth in the petition, and declared it to be a body corporate. On the same day the court fixed the time and place for an election. Its result was 303 votes for and 102 against the bond issue. Thereupon the court ordered the bonds to be issued, and levied the taxes. Before the election was called, the court determined that the proceeds of the bonds, if voted, or so much as might be necessary, should be expended for the roads above described.

The appellants' lands-24,900 acres in all-are in the northeasterly part of the county. All but one of the petitioners are residents of the part of Archer City that is within the road district. Archer City, Dundee, and Holliday furnished 252 votes for the bond issue-more than twice the number cast against it. Nearly all the votes cast in the northeasterly part of the county were negative. The taxable property in the district is assessed at $5,683,359, of which $257,080 belongs to appellants, and $111,388 to petitioners, and $60,500 of that amount belongs to one signer, leaving only $50,888 to the other 73. The part of the district in which appellants' lands are situated is tributary to Wichita Falls, which is outside Archer county, but near its northeast corner. The evi- dence persuasively supports appellants' contention that the improvements of the roads designated will not benefit their property. Moreover, the inclusion of their lands in that road district makes it impossible, until the last bonds mature, 30 years hence, to create another road district to raise money for the improvement of roads needed to serve the territory in which their lands are situated. Complete Tex. St. 1920, or Vernon's Ann. Civ. St. Supp. 1922, art. 637d.

Resort may be had to general taxes and to special assessments to raise funds for the construction or improvement of roads. Missouri Pacific Railroad v. Road District, 266 U. S. 187, 190, 45 S. Ct. 31, 69 L. Ed. 237. The proceedings in this case cannot be sustained as the levy of a general tax. The commissioners' court is authorized to levy general taxes for road purposes up to a stated maximum on each $100 valuation. Complete Tex. St. 1920, or Vernon's Sayles' Ann. Civ. St. 1914, art. 2242; Const. Tex. art. 8, § 9. The expenditure of the moneys so raised is not limited to any specified roads. And it is significant that, in the case of a road district, the court's duties in...