Darwin v. Town of Cookeville

• Citation: 97 S.W.2d 838
• Parties: DARWIN v. TOWN OF COOKEVILLE et al.
• Decision Date: 17 October 1936
• Court: Supreme Court of Tennessee

Page 838

97 S.W.2d 838

DARWIN v. TOWN OF COOKEVILLE et al.

Supreme Court of Tennessee.

October 17, 1936.

Appeal from Chancery Court, Putnam County; A. F. Officer, Chancellor.

Suit by J. C. Darwin against the Town of Cookeville and others. From a decree dissolving an injunction and dismissing the bill, plaintiff appeals.

Affirmed.

Lewis S. Pope, of Nashville, and George B. Haile, of Cookeville, for appellant.

Finis E. Harris and Holladay & Clark, all of Cookeville, for appellee Town of Cookeville.

Keith Bohannon, of Cookeville, for appellee Putnam County.

Nat Tipton and W. C. Cook, both of Nashville, for appellee State Highway Department.

CHAMBLISS, Justice.

The Chancellor sustained a motion to dissolve an injunction in this cause on bill and answer, and dismissed the bill, filed to restrain the defendants, Town of Cookeville, County of Putnam, and State Highway Department, from proceeding with a certain described highway project, indicated by blueprints exhibited. Complainant appeals and insists that the Chancellor erred in (1) dissolving the injunction, and (2) dismissing the bill.

Complainant is (1) a taxpayer of the defendants town and county, and also (2) the owner of a bond of the town for $1,000, part of an aggregate issue of $885,000 of bonds alleged to be outstanding, and he sues in both capacities, charging that unless defendants are restrained by injunction touching the matters set forth in his bill he will suffer irreparable injury.

It appears that in the spring of 1936 representatives of the town, county, and State Highway Department together agreed that it was desirable and necessary for the convenience and safety of the public to re-route and relocate Highway No. 24 through the corporate limits of Cookeville and a short distance beyond, improving the grade surface, eliminating a dangerous grade railroad crossing, and avoiding a particularly congested business section, and circumventing a school zone. With this in view, these several representatives proceeded to enter into agreements among and between themselves for allocation of the expense incident to the proposed road project. Under the plan thus agreed upon, the State Highway Department would do this work, bearing the principal part of the expense incident to the improvement, the town and county assuming the obligation of furnishing and clearing the required rights of way, including any damages incident to changes in grade and width of the relocated roadway, this to be accomplished by agreements with or purchases from adjacent or affected property owners, or, where necessary, by condemnation. Having reached understandings and agreements mutually satisfactory to the representatives of the state, county, and municipality, the several parties proceeded with the project, and a considerable portion of the work had been done before the filing of this bill.

The complainant herein, Mr. J. C. Darwin, differing in judgment with these representatives and disapproving the project, and conceiving that his rights as a taxpayer and bondholder would be injuriously affected by the carrying out of this highway improvement as proposed, filed this bill, on the 16th of April, 1935, in the Chancery Court at Cookeville, seeking to enjoin the town, county and State Highway Department from proceeding further, naming as defendant along with the said bodies politic, the commissioners of the town, the county judge, and the county highway commissioner, and the Commissioner of State Highways and Public Works. A fiat was obtained from the Chancellor of the First Chancery Court of Davidson County, an injunction bond of $500 being required and given. Full and complete sworn answers were filed by the various defendants denying the allegations of the bill, and these answers were before the Chancellor on the motion to dissolve.

While the bill is lengthy and contains charges that the proposed project is wholly unnecessary, and involves a wasteful expenditure of public funds, we do not understand learned counsel to maintain that complainant can usurp the wide discretionary powers vested by law in the duly chosen representatives of the state, county, and municipality in the making of public improvements, particularly the matter of relocating a street or roadway through the territory within their jurisdiction; and it will not be denied that the views and judgment of a single individual of a given community are necessarily outweighed by the composite view and judgment of the chosen representatives of the Governmental agencies involved. But counsel rely to sustain their claimed right of injunctive relief on certain alleged illegalities which we proceed to specify and consider:

As to the county: It is charged that a resolution adopted by the county court, authorizing an agreement between the county and the State Highway Department for allocation between them of the expense of the proposed relocation is void, because it does not appear that certain detail requirements of the Public Acts of 1931, chapter 57 (Code, § 3252 (3), were fully complied with, particularly specifications of names, costs, etc. In the first place, as bearing on injunctive relief to prevent irreparable injury, the answer of the county shows that all of the needed rights had already been secured without cost, except only a small fraction of one acre, which had been condemned at a cost of $10. Moreover, disregarding the answers and considering the bill only as on demurrer, as is proper in reviewing the dismissal of the bill by the Chancellor (See Mengle Box Co. v. Lauderdale County, 144 Tenn. 266, 230 S.W. 963), as we read the copy of the proposal and resolution filed as Exhibit 2 to the bill, it contains on its face a substantial description of the new right of way lying in the county, 738.5 feet in length only. The damages or costs are to be shown only "if required." It may well be denied that the resolution is invalid, but conceding that it is, such invalidity could not affect the county or the complainant adversely. The act of 1931 relieves a county of condemnation costs incident to state highway construction, unless an agreement is made by the county to assume the burden. It is therefore obvious that the county can suffer no loss from proceeding under an invalid agreement to assume, and the alleged invalidity of this resolution affords no basis for an injunction restraining the county officers from proceeding under it, since no loss, irreparable or otherwise, could result from such proceeding. In this view the Chancellor was clearly justified in not only dissolving the injunction, but dismissing the bill as to the county. The other ground of attack directed to the county is that Code, §§ 10215-10217, providing how appropriations must be proceeded with, were not complied with, but we are not of opinion that these sections apply. No appropriation was made and none...