Graham v. Charleston County School Bd., 19801
| Decision Date | 03 April 1974 |
| Docket Number | No. 19801,19801 |
| Court | South Carolina Supreme Court |
| Parties | Mattie GRAHAM, Administratrix of the Estate of Adrianne Graham, Appellant, v. CHARLESTON COUNTY SCHOOL BOARD et al., Respondents. |
Fred Henderson Moore and Daniel E. Martin, Moore & Martin, Charleston, for appellant.
Joseph W. Cabaniss, Grimball & Cabaniss, Charleston, for respondents.
This action for the wrongful death of plaintiff's intestate, an eight-year-old school girl, who was killed by a truck in a heavily congested area of the City of Charleston while walking home from school, was brought against the truck driver and against the Charleston County School Board, Howard F. Burky, as chairman of the Charleston County School District, Alton C. Crews, as Superintendent of Education for Charleston County, Malcolm C. Hursey, as Superintendent of Cooper River Constituent School District Number 4, and William Mayer, as Principal of Chicora Elementary School.
The complaint alleges that the action is brought against the school board and school officials listed above in their official capacities; and that the child's death was caused by their negligence, recklessness, heedlessness and wantonness in wrongfully keeping her after school until bus transportation was no longer available, and in thereby subjecting her to extremely hazardous traffic conditions, which could have been avoided by releasing her in time to ride home on the school bus.
The defendants, other than the truck driver, demurred to the complaint upon the ground that the action is brought against the Charleston County School Board, an agency of the State of South Carolina, and other named school officials in their official capacities as agents and officers of South Carolina, and that the action, not having been authorized by statute, is barred under the doctrine of sovereign immunity.
The circuit court sustained the demurrer, and the plaintiff has appealed on five exceptions. The first and second exceptions rest upon alleged facts extraneous to the complaint, the demurrer and the order of the circuit court; hence, they raise no issue for decision on this appeal. The so-called fifth exception is a mere argument in support of the fourth exception. The third exception is to an immaterial finding of the circuit court not affecting the merits of the issue arising on the demurrer. 1 Only the fourth exception, which challenges the court's conclusion that the complaint does not state a cause of action because of the doctrine of sovereign immunity, need be considered. We quote.
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...courts have long recognized a right of persons to sue the State for unconstitutional takings. See Graham v. Charleston Cnty. Sch. Bd., 262 S.C. 314, 204 S.E.2d 384, 386 (1974) (“In this jurisdiction neither the State nor any of its political subdivisions is liable in an action ex delicto un......
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Hutto v. S.C. Ret. Sys.
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