Pack v. Greenbush Tp.

• Decision Date: 24 June 1886
• Citation: 28 N.W. 746,62 Mich. 122
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court
• Parties: PACK and others v. GREENBUSH TP.

28 N.W. 746

62 Mich. 122

PACK and others v. GREENBUSH TP.

Supreme Court of Michigan

June 24, 1886

Error to Iosco.

O.E.M Cutcheon, for plaintiff.

W.E Depew, for defendant and appellant.

SHERWOOD J.

This action was commenced by summons, issued out of the circuit court for the county of Iosco, and served by its sheriff on the supervisors of the defendant township, who happened to be in said county at the time the service was made. The defendant is one of the townships composing the county of Alcona. The suit was brought to recover taxes alleged to have been illegally assessed and collected against the plaintiff. The defendant pleaded in abatement the foregoing facts, and, upon the trial, the plea was overruled by the court. Defendant brings error.

The only question raised upon the record is whether the township can be sued in any other county than the one in which it constitutes a part. The court held in the affirmative. We think the circuit judge erred in his ruling in the case. Section 737 of Howell's Statutes provides "that the supervisor of each township shall be the agent for his township for the transaction of all legal business, by whom suits may be brought and defended, and upon whom all process against the township shall be served." The court held in Coldwater v. Tucker, 36 Mich. 474, the general doctrine to be that "a municipal corporation cannot usually exercise its powers beyond its own limits. If it has in any case, authority to do so, the authority must be derived from statute which expressly or impliedly permits it." Neither can its agents bind the township by their acts or doings beyond the limit of the township, unless expressly or impliedly authorized. The supervisor of a township is a public officer. His duties and functions are prescribed by the statute, and the localities in which he may exercise and perform them are limited by the boundaries of his township, and the county in which it is located, and nowhere outside of these can he occupy a position in his representative capacity as supervisor unless expressly authorized by the statute.

There is no provision of law that we are aware of, and certainly our attention has been called to none, making the right of service, and jurisdiction of the court, follow the persons of public officers, wherever they may go beyond the municipalities for which they were elected or chosen. Until the legislature shall otherwise direct, a...