Collier v. Cassady
| Decision Date | 20 January 1912 |
| Citation | 63 Fla. 390,57 So. 617 |
| Parties | COLLIER et al., Sumter County Com'rs v. CASSADY et al. |
| Court | Florida Supreme Court |
Rehearing Denied Feb. 5, 1912.
Appeal from Circuit Court, Sumter County; W. S. Bullock, Judge.
Bill in equity by W. F. Cassady and others against H. O. Collier and others, County Commissioners of Sumter County. From an order enjoining the removal of the county seat and overruling a demurrer to the bill, defendants appeal. Reversed.
Syllabus by the Court
A law is a general law which is potentially applicable to every county in the state, though at the time of its passage it applies to but some of the counties.
The Legislature may provide that there be no county seat elections in counties having built a courthouse until that courthouse be 20 years old.
A proviso to an act for the removal of county seats, that it 'shall not apply to any county having constructed a courthouse within the past twenty years,' is prospective and the period runs back, not from the passage of the act but from the date of the filing of the petition thereunder for a removal.
Objections specifically abandoned in the circuit court may not in general be renewed in the Supreme Court.
COUNSEL Hocker & Duval and J. B. Gaines, for appellants.
W. F Himes, for appellees.
This is an appeal from an order enjoining among other things, the removal of the county seat of Sumter county from the town of Sumterville, and overruling the demurrer to a bill filed to that end by certain resident taxpayers in or near that town. The whole case depends upon the constitutionality of chapter 6239 of the Laws of 1911, entitled 'An act to provide for the change and establishment of county sites, calling elections for, and prescribing the regulations under which such elections shall be held, and providing a penalty for the use of money, goods or chattels, to secure votes or influence for any place as county site in such elections, and specifying who shall be qualified to vote in the said elections.'
No objection is urged to the title to the act; but it was successfully insisted before the circuit judge that the tenth section of the act destroyed its dignity as a general law, within the inhibition of article 8, § 4, forbidding the Legislature to remove the county seat of any county, and commanding that it 'shall provide by general law for such removal.'
After general provision for change of the county seat in any county by a majority vote, upon application to the county commissioners by a petition signed by one-third of the qualified electors, a radical departure was made from the old law, in that provision is made where there is a failure of any place voted for receiving a majority over all other places; the provision being that a second election be promptly held, in which only the two places receiving the highest number of votes are placed upon the ballot.
Under the act, an election was held in Sumter county on September 1, 1911, at which election the vote was declared to be for Sumterville, 68 votes, for Bushnell, 282 votes, for Coleman, 269 votes, for Webster, 271 votes, for Wildwood, 305 votes, and a second election was called for the 29th of that month, at which the voters might choose between Wildwood and Bushnell.
The objectionable language in the tenth section of chapter 6239 reads: 'The provisions of this act shall not apply to any...
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In re Application of Crane
...or the municipal authorities of any incorporated city or village, conclude to avail themselves of its provisions. In Collier v. Cassady, 63 Fla. 390, 57 So. 617, it said that a law is a general law which is potentially applicable to every county in the state, though at the time of its passa......
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