Morse v. Ashley

• Decision Date: 27 December 1906
• Citation: 193 Mass. 294,79 N.E. 481
• Parties: MORSE v. ASHLEY et al.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

193 Mass. 294

79 N.E. 481

MORSE v. ASHLEY et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Bristol.

December 27, 1906

COUNSEL

Dan'l T. Devoll, for petitioner.

J. L Gillingham, for respondents.

OPINION

HAMMOND, J.

This is a petition for a writ of mandamus to compel the respondents as they are the school committee of the town of Acushnet, to reopen the Bisbee School in that town. On October 7, 1905 the town voted to reopen the school, but the respondents refuse to comply with the vote. The question is whether the vote is binding upon the respondents.

It appears that at some time prior to the vote there had been maintained in the town an ungraded school called the 'Bisbee School,' which two children of the petitioner, each under 10 years of age, attended; that the committee had caused the school to be closed, 'and thereafter the said children of petitioner were required, by order of said committee, to attend the graded school, located three quarters of a mile distant from the 'Bisbee School,' and called the 'Long Plain School,' and for a few days they attended the latter school, the committee then and now furnishing transportation to and from the school.' It further appeared that the number of pupils in the Bisbee School was small, their ages varying from 4 years to 14 years, and that it was located about half a mile from the petitioner's residence.

It also appeared that there are no school districts in the town, the attendance of the pupils at the several schools being regulated by the respondents; that at the time of the vote the town maintained, in addition to the Bisbee schoolhouse, 'a sufficient number of schoolhouses, properly furnished, * * * in which houses schools were and are now maintained, to accommodate the total number of children who might legally attend the public schools therein, except that no high school is maintained'; and that 'such schools are under the direction of a superintendent employed by said town in conjunction with two other adjoining towns.'

The respondents in their answer aver that in their judgment the interests of the pupils who attended the Bisbee School required that 'they should be furnished the greater and systematic facilities for education which the [Long Plain School] offered in preference to reopening the * * * Bisbee School, and required the attendance of the pupils' at the graded school; and that the number of pupils formerly attending the...