Kline v. Jefferson County

• Decision Date: 18 April 1907
• Citation: 101 S.W. 356
• Parties: KLINE ET AL. v. JEFFERSON COUNTY.
• Court: Kentucky Court of Appeals

101 S.W. 356

KLINE ET AL. v. JEFFERSON COUNTY.

Court of Appeals of Kentucky.

April 18, 1907

Appeal from Circuit Court, Jefferson County, Common Pleas Branch Third Division.

"Not to be officially reported."

Action by O. S. Kline and others against Jefferson county. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiffs appeal. Affirmed.

Kohn Baird & Spindle and Greene & Van Winkle, for appellants.

R. W Bingham and R. L. Page, for appellee.

LASSING J.

In compliance with an act of the Legislature, the fiscal court of Jefferson county purchased an improved parcel of land in the city of Louisville for the purpose of erecting an armory thereon. They received bids from property owners, and among them the following: "April 12, 1904. Fiscal Court of Jefferson County, Ky.--Gentlemen: We herewith submit for the consideration of your honorable body the following piece of property for an armory site, viz.: 201 X370 feet of ground or about, on the north side of Walnut street, and extending back northwardly, facing both Sixth and Center streets, with all improvements thereon, for $89,750.00, the amount payable in county warrants; the title to said property to be good and free of all incumbrances and taxes, but state and county taxes for 1904, which must be assumed. We will, at our expense, have one of the title companies of this city examine and insure all titles included in the above described lot of ground. Respectfully submitted, O. S. Kline, Bayse & Co., by O. S. Kline, President." On April 26, 1904, this proposition was accepted by the fiscal court, and on the 19th day of July following two warrants, aggregating $89,750, were issued to R. Percy Bayse for said property. On August 5th following a deed acceptable to the county was delivered to the county, and the warrants issued in payment thereof were delivered to the grantor, and the transaction closed. It seems the buildings on the property had been rented out, and the rents collected by O. S. Kline, as agent for the county or fiscal court, and on October 4, 1904, the following resolution was passed: "Moved by Squire Shadburn, seconded by Squire Shively, that the rents collected by O. S. Kline, agent for the fiscal court, be credited upon the money paid as difference between the warrants paid for the armory site and cash. There shall be no money appropriated out of the treasury, or interest on said warrants, only the money collected as rents on said site." The county attorney and the county judge opposed the passage of this resolution, and the county attorney prayed an appeal to the circuit court, and, upon a hearing in the circuit court, the trial judge held that the order entered on the record of the fiscal court October 4, 1904, was void. To test the validity of this ruling, O. S. Kline prosecutes this appeal.

The question involved is the power or right of the fiscal court to pay interest on the warrants in question. As a general proposition, claims against the county, which is an arm of the government, a part of the state, do not bear interest, in the absence of an express agreement to the effect that they shall. The proposition on the part of the appellant and his associates to sell the property in question to the county shows on its face that they were not expecting to be paid cash for the property; but, from the wording of the proposal, they evidently at that time knew and understood that the money which was to be expended in the purchase of this property would have to be raised by the levy and collection of a tax, and hence they stated in their proposal that the full purchase price for the property should be paid in county warrants, and that the property should be clear of all incumbrance save the state and county taxes for the year 1904, which must be assumed by the county. No mention is made of an interest charge in the proposal, and, as the proposition was accepted in terms, we take it that neither the appellant nor the fiscal court, as the representative of the county, contemplated at that time that the warrants should bear interest. In fact, appellant could not have helped but know that the warrants would not bear interest, at least, until after the revenue for the year 1904 had been collected. As neither party to the contract, at the time that it was made and entered into, understood or expected that there was to be any interest charged upon the warrants, the consideration for the sale and transfer of the property in question was fully met and satisfied by the delivery of the warrants for the purchase price as called for in the proposition made by appellant on April 12, 1904.

This being true, what was the consideration, if any, for the execution or passage of the order of October 4, 1904, whereby the fiscal court undertook to pay out of the public funds a considerable sum as interest? We must confess that we are unable to discover, from the record before us, any consideration for the passage of this order. Appellant had been appointed, soon after the delivery of the deed, agent for the court to rent out the buildings on the property in question for a short interval, and as early as September, 1904, at a meeting of the fiscal court, a motion was made to appropriate the sum realized from rents to the discharge of interest due on the warrants in question.

At this meeting the motion was lost. At the October meeting following a motion to reconsider was entered, and, upon being again considered by the court, the order directing the application of the sum realized as rents upon the payment...