Galloway v. City of Memphis
| Decision Date | 25 April 1906 |
| Citation | 94 S.W. 75 |
| Parties | GALLOWAY et al. v. CITY OF MEMPHIS. |
| Court | Tennessee Supreme Court |
Suit by Robert Galloway and another against the city of Memphis. From a decree in favor of defendant, complainants appeal. Affirmed.
Metcalf, Minor & Metcalf, for appellants. Thos. H. Jackson and Jas. L. McRee, for appellee.
This cause was heard in the chancery court of Shelby county by Hon. Walter Malone, judge of the circuit court, sitting by interchange with the chancellor, who was disqualified, because of interest, upon an agreed state of facts, under the provisions of the Code (Shannon's Code, § 5206). The agreement of facts is, substantially, as follows:
That the city of Memphis has been incorporated as a municipality since 1826; that until 1869 it consisted of eight wards, when, by an act of the Legislature of that year, Wards 9, 10, and 11 were annexed "upon condition, as expressed in the act, that property therein embraced shall not be liable for the old debts of the city of Memphis."
That thereafter the suburbs adjacent to the city, having increased largely in population, the question was extensively mooted and discussed between the inhabitants of the city, and suburban territory as to whether or not the adjacent territory, in which was embraced the incorporated towns of Madison Heights and Idlewild, should be annexed, and whether the annexed territory should be made liable for the payment of the debts of the old city of Memphis then outstanding, with the result that three acts of the Legislature were passed and approved, each on the same day, at its session of 1899, one being an act annexing said territory, and the other two being acts repealing the charters respectively of Madison Heights and Idlewild.
That thereafter the Legislature, at its session of 1905, passed an act known in the pleadings as the "Boyle Act," same being chapter 345 (Acts 1905, p. 740).
That thereafter the city of Memphis, on the 16th day of February, 1906, adopted an ordinance fixing a general tax levy for the year 1906, at $1.78 on the $100 upon every species of taxable property within the limits of the city of Memphis, and in which levy was embraced a tax for the payment of interest, and a sinking fund upon the old indebtedness of the city of Memphis.
That at the time of the annexation of the Ninth, Tenth, and Eleventh Wards, and of said annexed territory under the act of 1899, the city of Memphis had outstanding a heavy bonded indebtedness, the amount thereof at the time of the last annexation act being approximately $3,000,000, and largely exceeding that amount at the time of the annexation of the Ninth, Tenth, and Eleventh Wards; that of this bonded indebtedness $474,000 will mature in 1907, $900,000 in 1915, and the balance in 1926.
That the complainants, Robert Galloway and W. A. Bickford, respectively, are the owners of real estate in the annexed territory of 1899, and of 1869, and that the city of Memphis, the defendant, claims and insists that they must each pay into the treasury of the city interest and sinking fund taxes so levied for 1906, the former the sum of $150 on the lands owned by him; the latter must pay $50 upon the lands owned by him in the annexed territory of 1899, formerly Madison Heights, and $100 upon the lands owned by him in the Ninth, Tenth, and Eleventh Wards, and that the city claims and insists that it has a lien upon their said lands for the payment of said taxes and is now threatening to proceed against them respectively by process of law for the collection of the same, as provided for the collection of taxes, and that the city will proceed to do so unless restrained by injunctive process or otherwise.
The agreed facts are, further, that the taxbooks of the city of Memphis for 1906, have been made up and extensions carried out, so that the interest and sinking fund tax aforesaid may be readily eliminated from the total tax of $1.78 without the impairment of or confusion in the levy and collection of the remainder of the taxes for the year 1906.
The agreement further stipulates that in order to save expenses, instead of the two complainants instituting separate suits, the same might be done in one cause, and that all questions of misjoinder and multifariousness are waived to the end that the constitutionality of the Boyle act and its construction and the validity of said ordinance and levy may be had in one cause without multiplicity of suits.
The complainants' contentions are:
(1) The Boyle act did not authorize or require that there should be levied a tax upon lands or property within the said annexed territory to pay the principal or interest upon the pre-existing indebtedness of the old city, and it did not authorize the passage of the ordinance to levy a tax upon their respective lands therefor.
(2) That section 2, c. 134, p. 221, of the Acts of 1899 (the annexation act of 1899) and the exemption in the act of 1869 are still in force.
(3) That the Boyle act is unconstitutional and void.
(4) That if the Boyle act shall be construed as repealing by implication or otherwise section 2, c. 134, p. 221, of the Acts of 1899, or the clause of the act of 1869, exempting the Ninth, Tenth, and Eleventh Wards from taxation for the payment of the old indebtedness of the city, then the Boyle act is unconstitutional and void in toto, or void to the extent that it repeals by implication or otherwise said section 2 of the act of 1899, and the exemption clause in the act of 1869.
(5) That by reason of the facts herein stated and the legislation in respect thereto whereunder said territories were annexed, an equitable estoppel has arisen against the imposition or levy of said tax upon complainants' property in the said annexed territory for the payment of said indebtedness.
(6) That an injunction be granted enjoining and restraining the collection of the same, and that said tax levy be canceled and for naught held in so far as it undertakes to make the property of the complainants liable for any part of the said indebtedness.
The court below dismissed complainants' bill, and held that complainants were liable to pay the tax so levied.
From the decree of the court complainants have prayed an appeal.
Complainants' assignments of error are as follows:
"The court below erred in refusing to maintain either one or all of the contentions insisted upon by complainants, and in holding the Boyle act constitutional, and the levy valid, and in refusing the injunction prayed for and relief sought, and in dismissing complainants' bill."
The act of 1869 provides, as stated in the agreement of facts, that the Ninth, Tenth, and Eleventh Wards were annexed "upon condition as expressed in the act of the Legislature that property within those wards was not to be liable for the old debt of the city of Memphis."
The annexation act of 1899, whereunder the towns of Madison Heights and Idlewild and adjacent territory were annexed, is as follows:
The Boyle act in question is as follows:
The city ordinance making the impeached levy is as follows:
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