Hall v. Slabaugh
| Decision Date | 20 April 1888 |
| Citation | 69 Mich. 484,37 N.W. 545 |
| Court | Michigan Supreme Court |
| Parties | HALL v. SLABAUGH, TREASURER. |
Error to circuit court, Ionia county, in chancery.
Bill by Joshua Hall against Peter M. Slabaugh, treasurer. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiff brings error.
The bill in this case was filed to set aside proceeding establishing a drain, under the law of 1881, and to restrain the collection of the tax levied for the construction of said drain against the property of the complainant assessed for benefits, and to remove the cloud from the title thereof created by such assessments. The drain in question runs through the townships of Ionia, Ronald, Orleans, and Easton in the county of Ionia. The petition was filed February 25 1884. It contains the signatures of six resident freeholders of the townships of Ionia and Easton. This number was sufficient. The complainant's objection to the proceedings of the commissioners, and the action taken subsequently for the collection of the tax against the property of the complainant, involves the consideration of the provisions of the drain law of 1885, as well as that of 1881. The taxes in question were first assessed in 1884, but by reason of the defective condition of the law under the act of 1881, as to the collection of drain taxes, those assessed against the complainant for the drain in question were returned uncollected, and were, by order made at the annual meeting in 1885 of the board of supervisors of Ionia county together with all others properly returned, charged back to the proper townships for reassessment in that year; and it is from the reassessment of taxes in question thus made that the complainant asks to be relieved in his bill. The grounds upon which the complainant bases his right to such relief are- First, that section 14, c. 6, act 227, Laws 1885, is unconstitutional by reason of defective title,-that it does not express the object of the act; second, if this shall be held otherwise, then it sufficiently appears that the commissioner laying out the drain never acquired any jurisdiction in the premises, by reason of irregularities in the proceedings.
We think the object of the act is sufficiently covered by the title, and that no one could be misled by anything appearing in the act not sufficiently indicated in its title. The title to the act reads: "An act to provide for the construction and maintenance of drains, and the assessment and collection of taxes therefor, and to repeal all other laws relating thereto." It is difficult to conjecture anything pertaining to a drain in anyway that would not come properly under this title if made the subject of legislation.
It is the petition, in this class of cases, which gives the commissioner jurisdiction, and, if that is sufficient, the other proceedings after that, if not in accordance with the statutes, become irregularities of more or less importance according to the extent of the injury resulting therefrom, and which not unfrequently is so great as to render the whole proceeding void. Such irregularities may be, however, and often are, waived by the party who is to be affected thereby, and when thus waived he cannot be heard to complain thereafter of such irregularity. In this case we think, after a careful inspection of the record, that, in view of the various things done and suffered to pass without protest or objection by the complainant, justice and equity require that he ought not to be allowed, under all the circumstances appearing, to make the complaint he now does and that the learned circuit judge was right in so holding. There are unquestionably some irregularities in the proceedings if the letter of the law is required to be observed. Still, in all material matters in the case of this complainant, he was not misled by them to his injury; and no other party interested, it appears, makes any complaint. The complainant...
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