Loftin v. George County Bd. of Ed., 43797

• Decision Date: 28 February 1966
• Docket Number: No. 43797,43797
• Parties: Sam H. LOFTIN, Jr., et al. v. GEORGE COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION et al.
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

Page 621

183 So.2d 621

Sam H. LOFTIN, Jr., et al. v. GEORGE COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION et al.

No. 43797.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

Feb. 28, 1966.

M. M. Roberts, Hattiesburg, W. S. Murphy, Lucedale, for appellants.

Darryl A. Hurt, Lucedale, for appellees.

GILLESPIE, Presiding Justice.

In 1956 the school districts in George County, Mississippi, were consolidated and reconstituted into one school district, known as the George County School District. This order was entered pursuant to due notice and consistent with the provisions of Chapter 12, Laws Extraordinary Session 1953, Mississippi Code Annotated section 6328-01 to 6328-68 (Supp.1964). Prior to the consolidation of the county into one school district, there were four high schools in the county, the Lucedale High School, Agricola High School, Rocky Creek High School and Basin High School. After the reorganization these four high schools were designated as attendance centers of the George County School District, and each high school continued to operate thereafter until July 6, 1964, when the School Board at a regular meeting entered an order or resolution finding that it was to the best interest of the students and all persons concerned that the high schools at Agricola, Basin and Rocky Creek be discontinued as attendance centers, and providing that the high school children previously attending said attendance centers should attend the Lucedale High School Attendance Center for the 1964-1965 school term, and in the future. An appeal was prosecuted from this order to the Circuit Court of George County, Mississippi, by the trustees of the Agricola High School Attendance Center and the trustees of the Rocky Creek Attendance Center, and various other interested parties.

On appeal to the circuit court, the order of the George County Board of Education was affirmed. From that judgment appellants appealed to this Court.

When the appeal came on for hearing in circuit court, appellants demanded a trial de novo before a jury. The circuit court denied a trial by jury and declined to permit appellants to introduce evidence. The denial of a jury trial and the denial of a trial de novo are the subjects of separate assignments of error. We consider these together since they are closely related questions. We hold that the circuit court was correct in both instances.

The order of the George County School Board was legislative in nature. The school board is an administrative agency to which certain powers have been delegated by the legislature which are either administrative or legislative in nature. County Bd. of Educ. of Alcorn County v. Parents & Custodians of Students, 251 Miss. 195, 168 So.2d 814 (1964); County Bd. of Educ. of Jones County v. Smith, 239 Miss. 53, 121 So.2d 139 (1960).

The scope of review by the courts of the orders of administrative agencies performing executive or legislative functions of government is a limited one. In reviewing the order of a county board of education upon appeal to the circuit court the power of the court is limited to determining whether the order (1) was supported by substantial evidence; (2) was arbitrary or capricious; (3) was beyond the power of the board to make; or (4) violated some statutory or constitutional right of the complaining party. County Bd. of Educ. of Jones County v. Smith, supra.

The essential nature of such review is such that it must be of what the board had before it at the time it made its order. If the circuit court granted appellants a trial de novo, the review would not be of what the board of education had before it, and would result in the court exercising original authority to perform a legislative function contrary to constitutional limitations. California Co. v. State Oil & Gas Bd., 200 Miss. 824, 27 So.2d 542, 28 So.2d 121 (1946). The trial court in the instant case correctly held that appellants were not entitled to a trial de novo. This proposition was set at rest in City of Meridian v. Davidson, 211 Miss. 683, 53 So.2d 48 (1951), and in California Co. v. State Oil & Gas Bd., supra. The Davidson case involved an order of a civil service commission which had approved executive action of the City of Meridian in discharging a policeman, and it was held that the legislature was without power to provide for a trial de novo before a jury because there was no proper function for a jury to perform.

The limitations on the scope of judicial review of the orders of administrative agencies require this Court to hold that the provisions of Mississippi Code Annotated section 6334-05 (Supp.1964), providing for a trial de novo before a jury, are unconstitutional and invalid. The remaining part of this statute providing for appeals is valid. California Co. v. State Oil & Gas Bd., supra. Our ...