Manistee Lumber Co. v. Township of Springfield

• Citation: 92 Mich. 277,52 N.W. 468
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court
• Decision Date: 10 June 1892
• Parties: MANISTEE LUMBER CO. et al. v. TOWNSHIP OF SPRINGFIELD et al.

52 N.W. 468

92 Mich. 277

MANISTEE LUMBER CO. et al. v. TOWNSHIP OF SPRINGFIELD et al.

Supreme Court of Michigan

June 10, 1892

Appeal from circuit court, Kalkaska county, in chancery; FRED H ALDRICH, Judge.

Suit by Manistee Lumber Company and others against township of Springfield and others to restrain defendants from a certain use of high way funds assessed upon and collected from plaintiffs, and for an accounting of the amount in hand and its return to plaintiffs. Judgment for defendants on demurrer to bill. Plaintiffs appeal. Reversed.

Dovel & Smith, for appellants.

Totten & Phelps, for appellees.

MONTGOMERY, J.

The complainants are owners of land lying within that portion of the township of Springfield, in the county of Kalkaska embraced within township 25 N. of range 6 W. They join in filing this bill, and pray that the defendant township and its officers be restrained from using the highway funds assessed upon and collected from the owners of lands in township 25 N. of range 6 W., for the purpose of improving the highways in town 25 N., range 8 W.; and also ask an accounting of the amount in hand, and of the several sums which equitably belong to the complainants, in case it is found inexpedient to expend it in the improvement of highways in town 25 N., range 6 W. The legislature of 1891, by Local Act No. 294, in terms authorized the township to expend as much as it may deem expedient of the sum of $8,000 belonging in the highway fund of said township, and heretofore raised by taxation upon lands within said township of Springfield and within the surveyed limits of township 25 N., range 6 W., upon the public highways of that portion of said township known as town 25 N., range 8 W. The laws in force when these taxes were assessed and collected were, at different periods, Act No. 243, Laws 1881; Act No. 57, Laws 1885; and Act No. 274, Laws 1889. The first of these acts provided that "all highway labor, and all money taxes assessed and collected within any township for highway purposes, shall be expended within the limits of the surveyed township in which the same may be assessed." This provision was substantially re-enacted in Public Act No. 57 of 1885. This act was repealed by Public Act No. 200 of 1887, which provided that, "all highway labor, and all money taxes assessed and collected within any township for highway purposes, shall be expended within the limits of the township on which the same may be assessed." This was re-enacted in the law of 1889, in the same language, except that the clause, "unless otherwise provided by law," was added thereto. The word "township," as used in the acts of 1887 and 1889, was evidently construed by the legislature as meaning surveyed townships.

The question presented is whether the act of 1891 is constitutional. If it would not have been competent for the legislature in the first instance to spread a tax on town 25-6 for the benefit of roads in 25-8, it is clear that the attempt to divert the fund after it was collected is likewise beyond the legislative power, as to hold otherwise would be to hold that the township can do indirectly what it cannot do directly. It appears to us to be too clear for controversy that the tax could not be levied upon the surveyed township six miles distant from the nearest point where any of the money was to be expended, for the benefit of another surveyed township, with an organized township intervening. If it be assumed that the taxing district for highway purposes...