City of Chicago ex rel. Schools v. City of Chicago

• Decision Date: 16 December 1903
• Citation: 69 N.E. 580,207 Ill. 37
• Parties: CITY OF CHICAGO, to Use of SCHOOLS, v. CITY OF CHICAGO.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

207 Ill. 37

69 N.E. 580

CITY OF CHICAGO, to Use of SCHOOLS,

v.CITY OF CHICAGO.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Dec. 16, 1903.

Appeal from Cook County Court; R. A. Russell, Judge.

Application by the city of Chicago for the confirmation of special assessment for street improvements. From a judgment confirming the assessment, the city of Chicago, in trust for the use of the schools, appeals. Affirmed.

James Maher and Angus Roy Shannon, for appellant.

Robert Redfield and Frank Johnston, Jr. (Edgar Bronson Tolman, Corp. Counsel, of counsel), for appellee.

WILKIN, J.

The city of Chicago sought to improve by special assessment California avenue, in said city, from Washington Boulevard to a point 378.8 feet north of the north line of Fulton street, by curbing, grading, and paving the same with asphalt. The board of education of said city was the owner of 10 lots abutting on the line of the improvement, and at the time of the application for a confirmation of said special assessment agaisnt said lots the board of education appeared in the county court of Cook county and objected to such confirmation upon the ground that said property was in fact the property of the state of Illinois, and a confirmation of the assessment would in fact be a judgment against the state of Illinois; also for the further reason that said property was exempt from general taxation and from special assessment, and that said board had no funds out of which to pay such special assessment, and that the same could not be enforced by a sale of the land assessed. A hearing was had as to these objections upon an agreed state of facts, and the objections were each overruled, and a judgment rendered confirming said assessment. From this judgment the board of education has appealed.

Upon the hearing in the county court it was agreed that of the 10 pieces of property six were actually occupied by said board of education for school purposes. Two pieces were vacant and unoccupied, and from them the board received no rents and profits. The other two were occupied by buildings from which rents and profits were received, which were used for the benefit of the schools. It was also agreed that none of the lots were a part of section 16, or acquired in any way from funds derived from that source. Upon the hearing many propositions of law were submitted to the court, some of which were given and others refused. We do not deem it necessary to pass upon each of these propositions, because the decision of the case, stripped of all technicalities, involves the sole question whether or not the lots assessed were subject to special assessment.

The right of taxation is essential to the very existence of the government, and all property, of every description, in the state, is subject to taxation, unless it has been specifically exempted. All laws exempting property must be subjected by the courts to a strict construction, and hence nothing will be held to be within the exemption which does not clearly appear so to be. People v. City of Chicago, 124 Ill. 636, 17 N. E. 56;In re Swigert, 119 Ill. 83, 6 N. E. 469. In the case of People v. Trustees of Schools, 118 Ill. 52, 7 N. E. 262, we were called upon to determine whether school property being a part of section 16, or derived therefrom, was subject to special assessment, and we there held as follows: ‘By the sixth section of the act of Congress enabling the people of Illinois to form a state constitution (Act April 18, 1818, c. 67 [5 Stat. 428]), it was enacted that ‘the section numbered 16 in every township shall be granted to the state, for the use of the inhabitants of such township, for the use of schools.’ Article 8, § 2, of the Constitution of 1870, provides that ‘all land, moneys or other property donated, granted or received for school, college, seminary or university purposes, and the proceeds thereof, shall be faithfully applied to the objects for which such gifts or grants were made.’ And we there held that the property, being a part of section 16, was exempt from special assessment for local improvements. We have also held that there is a distinction between general taxation and special assessment, and that property which was exempt from general taxation was not necessarily exempt from specialassessment. See Canal Trustees v. City of Chicago, 12 Ill. 403;Higgins v. City of Chicago, 18 Ill. 276;County of McLean v. City of Bloomington, 106 Ill. 209;County of Adams v. City of Quincy, 130 Ill. 566, 22 N. E. 624,6 L. R. A. 155.

In the case of Bloomington Cemetery Ass'n v. People, 139 Ill. 16, 28 N. E. 1076, we held that a clause in a charter of a cemetery association that the ground held for a burial place shall be exempt from general taxation and execution will not protect the lands so held against a special assessment or a special tax for local improvements. In the case of County of McLean v. City of Bloomington, supra, we said with reference to a special assessment for paving the courthouse square (page 213, 106 Ill.): ‘The contention is, such property is expressly exempt from taxation, and special assessments are included within the meaning of the word ‘taxation.’ We have been too long and too firmly committed to the doctrine that exemption from taxation does not exempt from special assessments to now admit that it is even debatable'-citing the cases.

The distinction between taxation and special assessment is also clearly made in our present constitution. Art. 9, §§ 1, 5, 9....