King v. Jefferson City Sch. Bd.

• Decision Date: 30 April 1880
• Citation: 71 Mo. 628
• Parties: KING, Appellant. v. JEFFERSON CITY SCHOOL BOARD.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

71 Mo. 628

KING, Appellant.

v.JEFFERSON CITY SCHOOL BOARD.

Supreme Court of Missouri.

April Term, 1880.

Appeal from Cole Circuit Court.--HON. E. L. EDWARDS, Judge.

REVERSED.

M. J. Leaming for plaintiff in error, cited Sewell v. Board of Education, 29 Ohio St. 89; Spiller v. Woburn, 12 Allen 127; Burdick v. Babcock, 31 Iowa 562; Ferriter v. Tyler, 48 Vt. 444; Stephenson v. Hall, 14 Barb. 222; Dritt v. Snodgrass, 66 Mo. 286.

E. L. King for defendant in error, cited Ex parte Frank, 52 Cal. 606; s. c., 7 Cent. Law Jour. 16; State ex rel. Kennedy v. Union Merch. Exchange, 2 Mo. App. 96; s. c., 3 Cent. Law Jour. 290.

NAPTON, J.

The only question in this case is whether rule 11, adopted and enforced by the board of the Jefferson City school district, in the case of the plaintiff's son, is a legal one. The question arose on a demurrer to defendant's answer, which set up a breach of this rule by plaintiff's son as a justification for his suspension. The circuit court sustained the demurrer. The rule is as follows: “Any pupil absent six half days in four consecutive weeks, without satisfactory excuse, shall be suspended from school.” The statute provides, (R. S. 1879, § 7045,) that “the board shall have the power to make all needful rules and regulations for the organization, grading and government of the schools in their district.” It is clear that the legislature have intrusted to this school board the duty of making regulations touching the government of the school, of the necessity and propriety of which they are primarily the judges. They are elected by the people of the district, and must be presumed to be conversant with the subject, and have no motive to make any rules except such, as in their best judgment, are necessary and proper to promote the objects of our common school system.

That the judiciary might intervene in case of rules manifestly reaching beyond their sphere of action and relating to subjects nowise connected with the management or successful operation of the school, was decided by this court in Dritt v. Snodgrass, 66 Mo. 286, and that the courts might interfere also in cases where the rule was calculated to subvert or retard the leading object of our legislation on this subject, may also be conceded. But I apprehend that the case should be a plain one. It is said that occasional absences from school, on the part of the pupil, or truancy as it is familiarly termed, is of no importance to any one except the pupil or his parents, and its indulgence is, therefore, not to be attended with such punishment as suspension or expulsion from the school entirely; that every child has a right to go to the public school, and that right cannot be...