Gordon v. Woodruff County

• Decision Date: 02 October 1950
• Docket Number: No. 4-9327,4-9327
• Citation: 217 Ark. 653,232 S.W.2d 832
• Parties: GORDON et al. v. WOODRUFF COUNTY.
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

Page 832

232 S.W.2d 832

217 Ark. 653

GORDON et al. v. WOODRUFF COUNTY.

No. 4-9327.

Supreme Court of Arkansas.

Oct. 2, 1950.

John D. Eldridge, Jr., Augusta, for appellant. W. J. Dungan, Augusta, for intervenor.

J. Ford Smith, Augusta, for appellee.

GRIFFIN SMITH, Chief Justice.

In 1928 E. E. Jeffries and his wife deeded to Woodruff County--'for county purposes only'--slightly more than 32 acres lying approximately a mile west of McCrory. If abandoned for county purposes the property would revert to the grantors. This is the third controversy involving use of the land. See Jeffries v. State, use of Woodruff County, 212 Ark. 213, 205 S.W.2d 194; Id., 216 Ark. 657, 226 S.W.2d 810.

The Quorum Court, in appropriating funds for 1950, allotted $2,500 for use in constructing buildings for a county fair, and $300 for expenses pertaining to the fair.

Woodruff County Fair Association was incorporated by order of the Circuit Court as a non-profit organization to promote the live stock, agricultural, horticultural and related interests of the people generally. It has $1,200 for use in supplementing construction costs. The Association and the County, acting together, expect to receive public subscriptions as an aid to the project.

C. S. Gordon, a taxpaying citizen, brought an injunctive action against George P. Eldridge as County Judge, and against the Fair Association. He cited the condition in the Jeffries deed, contending that use to which the property would be put would place the grantor ¹ in a position to invoke the reverter clause of his deed, and the County would lose its investment. Jeffries intervened. The Special Chancellor found that the appropriation was proper for county purposes, hence not contrary to the terms of the grant. The intervention was dismissed as premature. The appeal questions these determinations.

While the language of the Quorum Court appropriation must be looked to primarily in arriving at the contemplated purpose in authorizing the expenditure, it must not be presumed that there was an intent to violate Art. 12 Sec. 5, of the Constitution. It prohibits a county from becoming a stockholder in any company, association, or corporation. Neither may a county obtain or appropriate money for, or loan its credit to, any corporation, association, institution, or individual.

This provision of the Constitution was considered by the Court in an opinion written by Mr. Justice Wood in 1923, Bourland v. Pollock, 157 Ark. 538, 249 S.W. 360, 363. Cities, towns, and other municipal corporations are included in the constitutional restriction. In the Bourland-Pollock case a federated welfare association was involved. Pollock was treasurer of the association and received monthly from the Fort Smith board of commissioners the sum of $125 to be expended for activities the City itself had authority to engage in. While holding that the 'welfare association' did not come within the 'inhibitory words of the Constitution', and hence there was no express application of Art. 12, Sec. 5, the opinion stated that in contributing to the welfare association or committee to carry on governmental work which the city should have performed through some agency, the municipality in effect adopted the association as its own agency 'to do the character of government work which manifestly the city authorities conceived could be better * * * done as through some instrumentality which was exclusively of its own creation, and over which it had supreme control.' A strong dissenting opinion by Mr. Justice Hart was concurred in by Chief Justice McCulloch. They took the position that the money appropriated by the city was a gift for purposes the city had a right to engage in, but that in adopting the association as its agent (as expressed by the majority) the city lost control to such an extent that its duty of supervision was abdicated. It was also the view of the dissenting justices that the so-called 'association' came within the terms of Article 12, Sec. 5.

But should we agree with Judges Hart and McCulloch to the extent of impairing the majority holding that the Association was within the constitution's prohibitory language, that alone would not sustain the position of appellant and intervenor. It would be necessary to go further and say that the appropriation by Woodruff County was to the Fair Association, a contribution or gift over which the County lost its property rights and surrendered all control. Proof does not support this conclusion.

Gordon's complaint alleged that the Quorum Court's purpose in making the $2,500 appropriation was 'to assist the County Fair Association in erecting permanent fair buildings on the lands' and that the work was about to be undertaken. The intervener adopted all of Gordon's allegations, but also contended that use to which the property would be put was not a county purpose.

The County Judge testified that if not restrained the County Court would approve an allowance and direct issuance of warrants covering the appropriation but, said he, the condition would be...