Honaker v. Bd. Of Educ. Of Pocatalico Dist

• Decision Date: 08 April 1896
• Court: West Virginia Supreme Court
• Parties: HONAKER et al. v. BOARD OF EDUCATION OF POCATALICO DIST. et al.

24 S.E. 544

42 W.Va. 170

HONAKER et al.

v.BOARD OF EDUCATION OF POCATALICO DIST. et al.

Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia.

April 8, 1896.

Board of Education—Powers—How Exercised —Notice—School Appliances—What Constitutes—Interest of Commissioner in Contract —Effect—Principal and Agent—Liabilities —Equity Jurisdiction.

1. The board of education of a school district, composed of the president of the board of education and two commissioners, is a public corporation, created by statute (Code, § 7, c. 45), with functions of a public nature expressly given, and having no other; and therefore it can exercise no power not expressly conferred or fairly arising by necessary implication, and it can exercise its functions in no other mode than in that prescribed or authorized by the statute.

2. The members of the board, acting individually and separately, and not as a board convened for the transaction of business, cannot accept a proposal or make any contract whatever that will bind them as a corporation.

3. As a board it cannot incur any debt to be paid out of the school money of any subsequent year.

4. All who deal with the board of education are charged with notice of the scope of their authority, and that they can bind their district only to the extent and by such contracts as are expressly authorized by law.

5. The board of education may, under the head of "appliances, " provide for the school-houses maps and charts; but it must be made to appear that they are not mere school books in some other form or under some other name, but something of which a few will answer the needs of all, suitable to the school, and reasonably necessary to enable the teacher to impart instruction to the pupils more efficiently in such branches as are required to be taught.

6. The giving of anything of value to a commissioner of the board of education of a school district, intended to influence him in the discharge of a legal duty, or his receiving anything of value in corrupt payment of an official act done or to be done, renders void any contract to the making of which he was thus induced in whole or in part, directly or indirectly, and to the validity of which his vote or assent was necessary.

7. A school commissioner of a district is notified to attend an adjourned meeting of the board of education, set to pass upon a proposed contract for the purchase of certain charts for the public schools of their district at the price of $750. He refused to go until the agent selling the charts handed him $2.50 in money to pay him for his time and reimburse him for loss sustained by closing his place of business. Then he attended the meeting of the board at the time and place fixed, and he and the president of the board voted for making the purchase and signed the contract; but the third commissioner voted against it, and refused to sign the contract. Held, such contract, thus procured and made, is against public policy, and void, for want of the sanction of a competent majority of the board to make it.

8. Where a principal sends forth his agent to conduct his affairs and contract for his benefit, and the agent procures a contract by fraudulent or corrupt practices, although the principal may not have been privy in any way to such conduct of his agent, yet the principal claiming the benefit of the contract must take it, tainted as it may be with such practices.

9. A court of equity has jurisdiction of a suit by and on behalf of the resident taxpayers of a school district to set aside a contract made by and with the board of education, when the same is iUegal, as made in fraud of the rights ofsuch taxpayers, and so far as the same creates a debt to be paid out of the school money of any subsequent year, or is made for the purchase of things which the school board had no authority to buy; there being no other adequate remedy.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Appeal from circuit court, Putnam county.

Action by B. S. Honaker and others for themselves and others against the board of education of Pocatalico district and others for injunction. From a judgment for plaintiffs, defendants appeal. Affirmed.

J. H. Nash and J. B. Menager, for appellants.

Bowyer & Green, for appellees.

HOLT, P. On appeal from a decree of the circuit court of Putnam county, pronounced on the 28th day of February, 1894, perpetually enjoining the Caxton Company from collecting and the school board from paying a debt for $750, which the board contracted in the purchase of school charts. The bill of injunction is based on three distinct grounds:

1. That the members of the board of education, in mating this purchase in the year 1893, incurred the debt of $750, to be paid one-half out of the school money of the subsequent year; and that this was done in violation of section 45 of chapter 45 of the Code. The plain and commendable purpose of this provision of the statute is to make the available funds of each year pay the demands of that year, and to protect the taxpayer from indebtedness beyond what each year's means will pay. Davis v. Board, 38 W. Va. 382, 385, 18 S. E. 588. And a court of equity has jurisdiction of a suit by and on behalf of the resident taxpayers of a school district brought to set aside and hold for naught a contract made by the board of education, so far as the same creates and incurs a debt to be paid out of the school money of subsequent years, there being no other plain, adequate, and complete remedy. Shinn v. Board, 39 W. Va. 497, 20 S. B. 004. This could hardly have been the ground on which the circuit court based its decree, for the written contract for the purchase of the charts as amended and finally executed was entered into on the 15th day of July, 1893. One-half of the $750—the purchase money—was to be paid on the 1st of December, 1893, and the other half on the 1st of April, 1894, and provision was made for payment out of the school levy of the current fiscal year, that day laid by the board. But there is no question that the contract as first made did create a debt with one-half of it to be paid out of the school money of the subsequent year.

Ground No. 2 is that the school law (chapter 45 of the Code) does not confer upon the board of education the power to buy such things; that they do not come within the meaning of the term "appliances, " as used in the statute. The board of education of a school district is a corporation created by statute (section 7 of chapter 45), with func tions of a public nature, expressly given, and no other; and it can exercise no power not expressly conferred or fairly arising from necessary implication; and in no other mode than that prescribed or authorized by the statute. Shinn v. Board, 39 W. Va. 498, 20 S. E. 604. It is a public corporation, created for public educational purposes (1 Thomp. Corp. § 25), laying throughout the United States annual levies of more than $160,000, 000. All who deal with the board of education are charged with notice of the scope of their authority, and that they can bind their district only to the extent and by such contracts as are authorized by law. See School Tp. v. Barnes, 119 Ind. 213, 21 N. E. 747. And the members of the board, acting individually and separately, and not as a board convened for the transaction of business, cannot make a contract that will bind them as a corporation. Pennsylvania L. R. Co. v. Board of Education, 20 W. Va 360. The evidence shows that this contract of sale as just made was in plain violation of this important rule of law, but was afterwards called in, and the present one was put in its...