People ex rel. Bonar v. Kankakee & S.R. Co.

• Decision Date: 21 February 1917
• Docket Number: No. 11120.,11120.
• Citation: 115 N.E. 217,277 Ill. 93
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court
• Parties: PEOPLE ex rel. BONAR, County Collector, v. KANKAKEE & S. R. CO.

277 Ill. 93

115 N.E. 217

PEOPLE ex rel. BONAR, County Collector,

v.KANKAKEE & S. R. CO.

No. 11120.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Feb. 21, 1917.

Appeal from Grundy County Court; George Bedford, Judge.

Action by the People, on the relation of John L. Bonar, County Collector, against the Kankakee & Seneca Railroad Company. Judgment for relator, and defendant appeals. Reversed and remanded.

W. R. Hunter, of Kankakee, and Cornelius Reardon, of Morris, for appellant.

F. H. Hayes, State's Atty., of Woodstock, for appellee.

CARTER, J.

This was a proceeding in the county court of Grundy county to obtain judgment of $393.32 against appellant's property for a school tax in district No. 74, in said county. Appellant's objection to this tax, on the ground that the certificate of the board of education was not in accordance with the statute, was overruled and judgment entered. Thereafter this appeal was prayed and perfected from that judgment.

The certificate of the board of education objected to reads as follows:

‘We hereby certify that we require the sum of two per cent. dollars to be levied as a special tax for educational purposes, and the sum of $500 to be levied as a special tax for building purposes, on the equalized assessed value of the taxable property of our district for the year 1915.’

Section 190 of the School Law provides that the board of education of each district ‘shall ascertain as near as practicable, annually, how much money must be raised by special tax for educational and for building purposes for the next ensuing year,’ and provides further that the certificate may be in the following form, to wit:

‘We hereby certify that we require the sum of ..... dollars, to be levied as a special tax for educational purposes,’ etc. Hurd's Stat. 1916, p. 2388.

Manifestly this section intended that the certificate for tax levy should state the amount in dollars and cents, and not by a per cent., and in this case the board of education, in certifying the amount of the tax for educational purposes, inserted in the blank line, instead of the amount in dollars, ‘two per cent.’ This is conceded by counsel for appellee, but it is insisted that under the holdings of this court in Chicago & Alton Railroad Co. v. People, 155 Ill. 276, 40 N. E. 602, and Chicago & Alton Railroad Co. v. People, 205 Ill. 625, 69 N. E. 72, this very question was decided adversely to appellant's contention. We had occasion recently to consider and pass on these decisions with reference to this point in People v. Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis Railway Co., 270 Ill. 633, 110 N. E. 779, and there held, after a review of these and other authorities, that under the wording of the statute it was necessary to insert the amount in dollars and cents and not in rate per cent. To the same effect see People v. Chicago, Indiana & Southern Railroad Co., 265 Ill. 622, 107 N. E. 229;People v. Ross, 271 Ill. 67, 110 N. E. 819;People v. New York Central Railroad Co., 271 Ill. 231, 110 N. E. 848;People v. Illinois Central Railroad Co., 272 Ill. 116, 111 N. E. 522.

The argument of counsel for appellee that there...