Milliken v. City Council of Weatherford

• Citation: 54 Tex. 388
• Decision Date: 11 March 1881
• Docket Number: Case No. 1337.
• Parties: JAMES H. MILLIKEN v. THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF WEATHERFORD.
• Court: Texas Supreme Court

54 Tex. 388

JAMES H. MILLIKEN

v.THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF WEATHERFORD.

Case No. 1337.

Supreme Court of Texas.

Mar. 11, 1881.

APPEAL from Parker. Tried below before the Hon. A. J. Hood.

McCall & McCall and B. G. Bidwell, for appellant.

Jasper N. Haney, for appellee.

I. The judgment and proceedings of the city council in removing appellant from office was in strict conformity to the statute providing for the removal from office of mayors, etc.; that judgment is not void--cannot be collaterally attacked, as long as it remains unreversed by a proceeding instituted for that purpose, and is a bar to this suit. R. S., arts. 3425-33 (also 342); Const. of Texas, art. V., sec. 1; High on Ex. Legal Rem., §§ 97, 152, 156, 189, 190.

II. A proceeding in the nature of quo warranto is the appropriate (and only adequate) remedy to restore one to a public municipal office from which he has been illegally ousted, and into which another may have illegally intruded himself. R. S., Appendix, p. 47; Brannan et al. v. The City of Weatherford, 53 Tex., 330;R. S., art. 342; High on Ex. Legal Rem., §§ 49, 77, 177, 188, 190; 22 Tex., 559; Dillon on Mun. Corp., §§ 678-80, 694, 713, 716, and note under sec. 380.

III. The city being a public municipal corporation, all the inhabitants thereof are interested in the office of mayor (see R. S., 342), and the city as such should have been made a party to this suit. There is no law for suing the ““city council,” and the suit at bar is neither a suit against the city nor can it affect the councilmen as such. Their act was the act of the city, and when questioned, the city itself must be sued. R. S., art. 342. There is great significance in the fact that the legislature has provided an adequate remedy, appropriate to such relief as appellant here claims, by statute in the nature of quo warranto.

BONNER, ASSOCIATE JUSTICE.

Appellant James H. Milliken, plaintiff below, being the mayor of the city of Weatherford, was in November, 1880, removed from office by the board of aldermen, sitting as a court, by virtue of the provisions of the Revised Statutes, arts. 3425-33.

Subsequently Samuel H. Milliken was elected and installed into office as his successor.

This suit is a proceeding by mandamus brought in the district court against Samuel H. Milliken and the board of aldermen composing the city council, to recover the office.

On the trial below a jury was waived, the cause submitted to the court on an agreed statement of facts, and judgment was rendered against the plaintiff, from which this appeal is prosecuted.

It is conceded that appellant, James H. Milliken, was the duly elected, qualified and acting mayor of the city of Weatherford at the time of his removal from office, and it is alleged and shown by the testimony that the office was of the value of $500.

Under the issues as presented, the district court had jurisdiction to try the right to the office, and to enforce its judgment by mandamus if in favor of appellant Milliken, unless his right thereto was res adjudicata by reason of the judgment of the board of aldermen. Bradley v. McCrabb, Dallam, 506; Banton v. Wilson, 4 Tex., 400;Lindsey v. Luckett, 20 Tex., 516;McKinney v. O'Conner, 26 Tex., 5; The State v. De Gress, 53 Tex., 387.

Revised Statutes, art. 3424, provides that “the mayor and aldermen of any incorporated town or city may be removed from office for official misconduct, willful violation of any of the ordinances of such town or city, habitual drunkenness, incompetency, or for such other cause as may be prescribed by the ordinances of such town or city.”

By article 3429, a majority of the aldermen constitute a court to try and determine the complaint against the mayor, one of their number to preside during the trial.

“If two-thirds of the members of the court present upon the trial of the case find the defendant guilty of the charges contained in the complaint, and find that such charges are sufficient cause for removal from office, it shall be the duty of the presiding officer of the court to enter judgment removing such mayor … from office, and declaring such office vacant; but should the party charged be not found guilty, judgment shall be entered accordingly.”

A comparison of article 3424 with articles 493 and 3393-4, will show that a mayor may be removed not only for “official misconduct” generally, as defined by the Revised Statutes, but also for additional causes; among others, a willful violation of any of the ordinances of the town or city.

No right of appeal is given from this action of the board of aldermen sitting as a court, and that none was intended to be given would, by a familiar rule of construction, seem evident, as by articles 3410 and 3416, under the same title, the right of appeal in the cases of county and certain district officers is expressly given.

Conceding that the legislature could lawfully confer this jurisdiction on the board of aldermen, and that there was no right to revive their action by appeal, writ of error or certiorari, then their judgment would be final, unless it was subject to be impeached for some cause which would render it absolutely void.

If such cause exists, it could be shown by proceeding by mandamus, as one of the great objects of this writ is in a proper case to prevent the failure of justice and a defect of police, where there is no established specific remedy, and where in justice there should be one. High on Ex. Legal Rem., § 1.

We are not prepared to say that appellant should have resorted to the proceeding in the nature of a quo warranto under our statute (Appendix Revised Statutes, 753), as by section 6 that remedy is declared to be cumulative only. This is a different case from that of Brannan v. The City of Weatherford, 53 Tex., 330, which involved the corporate existence itself of the city. The present case is in the nature of a private suit between individuals, the writ of mandamus being but the means to enforce the judgment if in favor of appellant. Griffin v. Wakelee, 42 Tex., 573.

The relief thus given by mandamus, where the judgment below is absolutely void, though not so urgent as when personal liberty is involved, is similar in principle to that granted by the writ of habeas corpus, which, though not designed as a writ of error or certiorari, yet will afford relief when the process under which the applicant is held is void for want of jurisdiction, or not warranted by the constitution. Holman v. Mayor of Austin, 34 Tex., 668;Perry v. The State, 41 Tex., 488;Bigby v. The City of Tyler, 44 Tex., 351;Darrah v. Westerlage, Id., 388;Ex parteCoupland, 26 Tex., 386;Ex parte Scwartz, 2 Texas Court Appeals, 75; Ex parte McGill, 6 Id., 498;Ex parteSiebald, 10 Otto, 371;Ex parteVirginia, Id., 339;Ex parteLange, 18 Wall., 163.

The provisions of the above art. 3431, Revised Statutes, that the board of aldermen may remove the mayor if they find him guilty of the charges preferred, and that there are “sufficient cause for removal from office,” should not be so construed as to give them this power in their unlimited discretion, without regard to whether he has in law been guilty of an offense or not. State v. Common Council of Watertown, 9 Wis., 254; High on Ex. Leg. Rem., § 69.

If the act which was made penal by the ordinance under which the appellant was tried, found guilty, and removed from office, was neither malum in se, nor of such character as could lawfully be made malum prohibitum, then the proceedings were without authority of law, consequently null and void, and this action in the district court was not barred by the plea of res adjudicata. If so, there would not be any relief against assumed...