Jinkins v. Entzminger

• Decision Date: 24 June 1931
• Parties: JINKINS, Tax Collector v. ENTZMINGER et al.
• Court: Florida Supreme Court

135 So. 785

102 Fla. 167

JINKINS, Tax Collector v. ENTZMINGER et al.

Florida Supreme Court, Division B.

June 24, 1931

Suit by C. W. Entzminger and others against John D. Jinkins, as Tax Collector of Seminole County. From an adverse judgment defendant appeals.

Reversed and remanded. Appeal from Circuit Court, Seminole County; W W. Wright, judge.

COUNSEL

Shepard & Wahl, of Cocoa, for appellant.

H. S White and Wilson & Boyle, all of Sanford, for appellees.

OPINION

DAVIS J.

The appellees, as complainants in the court below, brought this suit to restrain the collection of a 1-mill tax which had been levied against all the taxable property in Seminole county, Fla., under authority of a levy made by order of the Upper St. Johns River navigation district. The court below overruled general and special demurrers to the bill of complaint, and the defendant tax collector appealed.

The Upper St. Johns River navigation district is a body corporate, created by chapter 11431, Acts of 1925 (Ex. Sess.), Laws of Florida. It constitutes a special taxing district consisting of the counties of Brevard and Seminole, and the object and purpose of the act as declared therein was to promote the maritime shipping and commercial interests of the Upper St. Johns River navigation district, particularly by improving and maintaining navigation on the Upper St. Johns river and connecting the same with the Indian river by a navigable canal or waterway. Such purpose was specifically declared in the act to be for the public convenience and welfare and for the public utility and benefit.

For the purpose of carrying the act into effect the commissioners of the district, provided for therein, were authorized to make and execute contracts, hire and discharge engineers, superintendents, mechanics, clerks, and other employees, and fix their compensation, and were empowered to levy a tax of not less than 3 nor more than 8 mills on all the taxable property within the district. This tax was required to be based upon the same assessment and general scheme of taxation provided for the general state and county taxes on the same property, and such taxes were required to be extended on the tax rolls in the same manner as the general state and county taxes are required to be extended. The appellant, as tax collector of Seminole county, was accordingly required to collect any taxes imposed by the Upper St. Johns River navigation district which had been placed upon his tax roll. For this reason it was sought to enjoin him in the particulars above specified when the commissioners of the district ordered a 1-mill tax to be levied on the property in Seminole county for the year 1928.

The complainants in their bill of complaint assigned forty reasons why the tax should be enjoined. Eleven grounds of unconstitutionality of the statute are set up. Conceding that it is reasonably probable that any one statute could have so many constitutional defects, it is not necessary to discuss each of them in detail in this opinion.

The first serious objection urged is that the Legislature had no authority to create a special taxing district of the kind and for the purposes mentioned in the acts under attack, and no authority to authorize it to assess and collect a district-wide ad valorem tax for its benefit.

In view of the nature of the enterprise contemplated by the act and the determination of the Legislature that the execution of such enterprise would be for the public convenience and welfare and for the public utility and benefit, it is obvious that the creation of such district was well within the legislative power under our previous decisions on the subject of creation of taxing districts. Pinellas Park Drainage District v. Kessler, 69 Fla. 558, 68 So. 668; Hunter v. Owens, 80 Fla. 812, 86 So. 839; Martin v. Dade Muck Land Co., 95 Fla. 530, 116 So. 449; Bannerman v. Catts, 80 Fla. 170, 85 So. 336. The Legislature in this instance fixed the object and character of the tax and prescribed a maximum rate of not exceeding 8 mills as being within the authority of the district commissioners to levy in any one year to meet the expenses of the district. That the levy of an ad valorem tax in the nature of a special assessment, and in consideration of the common and general benefits expected to accrue from the accomplishment of the purposes of the district is constitutional cannot be questioned, in view of the holding of this court in the cases of Richardson v. Hardee, 85 Fla. 510, 96 So. 290, and Martin v. Dade Muck Land Co., supra.

Historically, the power of the Legislature to establish taxing districts for particular public purposes is clear. It is only necessary that such districts be created directly by the Legislature, or that they be created by a proper proceeding under authorization by a valid statute, including notice and hearing in the latter instance. See Spencer v. Merchant, 125 U.S. 345, 8 S.Ct. 921, 31 L.Ed. 763. In particular cases a special taxing district should not be held invalid if the law itself (in the case of a district directly created by the Legislature) or the action authorized to be taken or threatened under a statute providing for the existence of the district is not illegal or palpably arbitrary or a plain abuse of power.

Taxing districts have generally been of two principal classes. The first of these is for the accomplishment of some particular public improvement where the character of the work necessary to realize the improvement is peculiarly temporary and special or where there is necessarily a particular improvement confined to some special work or construction. In such cases the taxing district itself is viewed as a mere instrumentality to distribute present cost according to assumed benefits, and if the effect is to impose a grossly unjust or unequal burden on some of the property taxed, though benefited, relief will be given in the special case. Consolidated Land Co. v. Tyler, 88 Fla. 14, 101 So. 280; Willis v. Road & Bridge District, 73 Fla. 446, 74 So. 495; Thomas v. Kansas City Southern Ry., 261 U.S. 481, 43 S.Ct. 440, 67 L.Ed. 758; Browning v. Hooper, 269 U.S. 396, 46 S.Ct. 141, 70 L.Ed. 330.

The second class of taxing districts is where the purpose of creating the district is clearly general and permanent in nature. In such a district the fact that one taxpayer's benefit to a particular piece of property may be remote or doubtful, or his burden heavy, will not entitle him to relief against an authorized tax levied to bring about common and general benefits to the district and property situated therein, considered as a whole. In this class of taxing district the common, general, or indirect benefit to the tax payer arising from ownership of property in the benefited district itself is deemed a sufficient constitutional benefit to support the levy and collection of an ad valorem tax spread over the entire district, particularly when the tax payer necessarily has a remoter local or political interest in the general public welfare of the locality as enhanced by the public improvement contemplated to be brought about by the instrumentality of the district. Martin v. Dade Muck Land Co., supra; Houck v. Little River Drainage, 239 U.S. 254, 36 S.Ct. 58, 60 L.Ed. 266; Valley Farms Co. v. Westchester, 261 U.S. 155, 43 S.Ct. 261, 67 L.Ed. 585; Milheim v. Moffat Tunnel District, 262 U.S. 710, 43 S.Ct. 694, 67 L.Ed. 1194; Miller & Lux v. Sacramento Drainage District, 256 U.S. 129, 41 S.Ct. 404, 65 L.Ed. 859; Spencer v. Merchant, 125 U.S. 345, 8 S.Ct. 921, 31 L.Ed. 763.

From a consideration of the foregoing, it appears that the district contemplated and created by the act constituting the Upper St. Johns River navigation district was of the second class. It was therefore within the power of the Legislature to authorize it to levy an ad valorem tax for its general purposes, provided it adopted a proper method of prescribing and collecting such tax and limited the maximum amount thereof, which appears to have been done by chapter 11431, as well as chapter 12446, which amended it. It was also within the power of the Legislature to anticipate and provide for the preliminary expenses of the district without making any improvement even if the proposed improvement should be found impractical, and to authorize the levy of a tax to pay the preliminary expenses incurred prior to abandonment. W. C. Road Imp. District v. Mo. Pac. R. R. Co., 157 Ark. 304, 248 S.W. 563.

It is next urged that chapter 12446, Acts of 1927, which amended the 1925 law, is unconstitutional because such amendatory act was not properly passed in the Legislature. The record shows that such act originated as House Bill 1389. There is no question raised that House Bill 1389 was duly passed by the House of Representatives in the first instance and thereafter properly passed by the Senate as required by the Constitution.

The ground of objection is that after the bill had once been properly passed by the House of Representatives and by the Senate and referred to the joint committee on enrolled bills of the House and Senate that, upon motion of Senator Parrish, such bill was recalled for reconsideration from the joint committee on enrolled bills, to which it had been referred, but not yet presented to the Governor.

In this connection the argument is that the Legislature having once duly passed such bill through the House and Senate, and having referred the same to its joint committee on enrolled bills to be presented to the Governor, the Senate lost control of the measure, and that it was no longer within the power of the Senate to have such bill recalled from the joint committee on enrolled bills or to order the final vote on the passage of same reconsidered, or to have the...