Hicks v. Krigbaum

• Decision Date: 02 April 1910
• Docket Number: Civil 1142
• Citation: 13 Ariz. 237,108 P. 482
• Parties: C. W. HICKS, as County Treasurer of Cochise County, and C. J. McCABE, J. J. BOWEN and J. SCHEERER, Members of the Board of Supervisors of Cochise County, Defendants and Appellants, v. J. G. KRIGBAUM, Plaintiff, and J. M. O'CONNELL, Intervener, Appellees
• Court: Arizona Supreme Court

108 P. 482

13 Ariz. 237

C. W. HICKS, as County Treasurer of Cochise County, and C. J. McCABE, J. J. BOWEN and J. SCHEERER, Members of the Board of Supervisors of Cochise County, Defendants and Appellants, v. J. G. KRIGBAUM, Plaintiff, and J. M. O'CONNELL, Intervener, Appellees

Civil No. 1142

Supreme Court of Arizona

April 2, 1910

APPEAL from a judgment of the District Court of the Second Judicial District, in and for Cochise County. Fletcher M. Doan, Judge. Reversed.

The facts are stated in the opinion.

J. S Williams and Attorney General, for Appellants.

Neale &amp Sutter and J. M. O'Connell, for Appellees.

OPINION

LEWIS, J.

-- This is an appeal from a judgment entered in favor of the plaintiff and the intervener, joined as appellees, against the defendants and appellants, enjoining and restraining the defendant C. W. Hicks, as treasurer of Cochise county, from delivering certain bonds of school district No. 2 within said county, in the aggregate sum of $92,000, to the purchaser thereof, and enjoining and restraining the defendants C. J McCabe, J. J. Bowen, and J. Scheerer, members of the board of supervisors of said county, from authorizing such delivery or proceeding further with the issuance, sale, or delivery of said bonds, and from the further levy of any taxes for the payment of the interest or redemption of said bonds, or any part thereof, and further decreeing said bonds void. J. G. Krigbaum, one of the appellees and a taxpayer of school district No. 2, commenced this action in the court below by his complaint, praying for the relief subsequently granted. Thereafter J. M. O'Connell, also a taxpayer of the district, upon leave granted filed his complaint in intervention, praying for similar relief. To these complaints the defendants interposed general demurrers, which demurrers were by the trial court overruled, and, the defendants electing to stand thereon, judgment was duly entered in favor of the plaintiff and intervener and against the defendants. The appellants assign error in the overruling of the general demurrers to the complaint, and to the petition in intervention, and error in rendering judgment in favor of the complainant and intervener.

The most important question presented is the validity of paragraph 2182 of the Revised Statutes of 1901, under which the school bond election at which these bonds were authorized was held. It reads: "Sec. 2182 (sec. 53). The board of trustees of any school district, may, when in their judgment it is advisable, and must upon petition of a majority of the heads of families residing in the district, call an election and submit to the taxpayers of the district whether the bonds of such district shall be issued and sold for the purpose of raising money for purchasing or leasing school lots, and for building one or more school-houses, and supplying the same with furniture, necessary apparatus, and improving the grounds, and for liquidating any indebtedness already incurred for such purposes." Appellees contend that this statute is void for the reason that, by the use of the phrase "taxpayers of the district," it permits the submission of the question to persons not qualified to vote under the organic act (U.S. Rev. Stats. 1878, sec. 1860), irrespective of age, residence, or citizenship, and for the further reason that it is ambiguous and uncertain, in that it does not appear whether taxpayers include only residents of the district, or whether it includes nonresidents who are taxpayers of the district, or whether it includes residents of the district who pay taxes on property outside the district.

If a meaning involving the conflict, as well as the absurdities and ambiguities thus suggested, must be adopted, then the law is void. We should, however, hesitate before accepting such an interpretation, and endeavor to discover an alternative consistent with the organic act and in itself reasonable. "It must not be lost sight of that the attitude of courts is not one of hostility to acts whose constitutionality is attacked. On the contrary, all the presumptions are in their favor, and courts are not to be astute in finding or sustaining objections." In re Sugar Notch Borough, 192 Pa. 353, 43 A. 985. "Where any particular construction which is given to an act leads to gross injustice or absurdity, it may generally be said that there is fault in the construction, and that such an end was never intended or suspected by the framers of the act." Peckham, J. (dissenting), in People v. Board etc. of Onondaga County, 129 N.Y. 395, 445, 29 N.E. 327, 14 L.R.A. 624. "Nothing is better settled than that statutes should receive sensible construction, such as will effectuate the legislative intention, and, if possible, so as to avoid an unjust or an absurd conclusion." Lau Ow Bew v. United States, 144 U.S. 47, 12 S.Ct. 517, 36 L.Ed. 340, and cases there cited. "Where any particular construction would lead to an absurd consequence, it will be presumed that some exception or qualification was intended by the legislature to avoid such conclusion." Commonwealth v. Kimball, 24 Pick. (Mass.) 366, 370; 1 Blackstone's Commentaries, 91. "All laws should receive a sensible construction. General terms should be so limited in their application as not to lead to injustice, oppression, or an absurd consequence. It will always, therefore, be presumed that the legislature intended exceptions to its language which would avoid results of this character. The reason of the law, in such cases, should prevail over the letter." United States v. Kirby, 74 U.S. 482, 19 L.Ed. 278. "Such construction ought to be put upon a statute as may best answer the intention which the makers had in view. . . . The intention . . . is sometimes to be collected from the cause or necessity of making a statute; at other times, from other circumstances. Whenever this can be discovered, it ought to be followed with reason and discretion in the construction of the statute, although such construction seems contrary to the letter of the statute. . . . A thing which is within the intention of the makers of a statute is as much within the statute as if it were within the letter. . . . A thing which is within the letter of a statute is not within the statute, unless it be within the intention of the makers." Bacon's Abridgment, Statute, 1, 5, and authorities there cited; People v. Insurance Co., 15 Johns. (N.Y.) 358, 380, 381, 8 Am. Dec. 243; Riggs v. Palmer, 115 N.Y. 506, 509-511, 12 Am. St. Rep. 819, 22 N.E. 188, 5 L.R.A. 340; State v. Boyd, 2 Gill & J. 365, 374; Chesapeake & Ohio Canal Co. v. Baltimore & O.R. Co., 4 Gill & J. 1, 152; City of Baltimore v. Root, 8 Md. 95, 105, 63 Am. Dec. 696; New England Car Spring Co. v. Baltimore & O.R. Co., 11 Md. 81, 90, 69 Am. Dec. 181; Oates v. Bank, 100 U.S. 239, 244, 25 L.Ed. 580. "A rigid and literal reading would in many cases defeat the very object of the statute. . . . Every statute ought to be expounded, not according to the letter, but according to the meaning. . . . And the intention is to govern, although such construction may not in all respects agree with the letter of the statute. The reason and object of a statute are a clue to its meaning, and the spirit of the law and the intentions of its makers are diligently to be sought after, and the letter must bend to these." Tracy v. Railroad Co., 38 N.Y. 433, 437, 98 Am. Dec. 54; Rutledge v. Crawford, 91 Cal. 526, 533, 25 Am. St. Rep. 212, 27 P. 779, 13 L.R.A. 761; In re Opinion of the Justices (1891), 66 N.H. 629, 33 A. 1076. "In the construction of a statute, it is the intent and purpose of the law, not the letter, that must control, and the whole statute must be considered." Leibes v. Steffy, 4 Ariz. 11, 32 P. 261.

Paragraph 2182, the one in question, occurs in title 19 of the Revised Statutes, treating the subject "Education." Paragraph 2183 provides the method of the calling of the bond election. Paragraph 2184 provides the form of notice of such election. Paragraph 2185 provides: "Such election shall be held, except as otherwise provided in this title, in conformity with the general election laws of the territory of Arizona." Conceding for the moment, that paragraph 2182 is in terms in conflict with the organic act, and so ambiguous and uncertain as to render the law void, we here have other matter which must be looked to in placing upon it a true construction. We have a right, in fact it is our duty to read into the paragraph such other portions of the act as properly explain and qualify it. If by so doing the general term "taxpayers of the district" be limited so as to free it from the intrinsic absurdity and ambiguity suggested, and to harmonize it with the requirements of the organic act, it is then a valid statute. Reading paragraph 2185 in connection with paragraph 2182, we are of the opinion that it furnishes a reference to other provisions of the statutes limiting and defining the expression "taxpayers of the district." The words "except as otherwise provided in this title," in paragraph 2185, exclude the application of the general election laws as the test of the qualification of voters at a school bond election. Paragraph 2176, title 19, restricts the general expression "taxpayers of the district." Paragraph 2176, in conjunction with paragraph 2182, prescribes the qualifications of voters at a school bond election. Thus interpreted, paragraph 2182 is not in conflict with the organic act. Nor have we in so determining lost sight of the argument of the appellees, to the effect that paragraph 2176 occurs in ...