People ex rel. Little v. St. Louis Merchants' Bridge Co.

• Decision Date: 20 February 1918
• Docket Number: No. 11767.,11767.
• Citation: 118 N.E. 733,282 Ill. 408
• Parties: PEOPLE ex rel. LITTLE, County Collector, v. ST. LOUIS MERCHANTS' BRIDGE CO.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

282 Ill. 408

118 N.E. 733

PEOPLE ex rel. LITTLE, County Collector,

v.ST. LOUIS MERCHANTS' BRIDGE CO.

No. 11767.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Feb. 20, 1918.

Appeal from Madison County Court; Henry B. Eaton, Judge.

Proceeding for judgment for taxes by the People, on relation of George E. Little, County Collector, against the St. Louis Merchants' Bridge Company. From an order sustaining objections and abating the tax, the collector appeals. Reversed and remanded, with directions.

Edward J. Brundage, Atty. Gen., and Joseph P. Streuber, State's Atty., of Highland, for appellant.

Hiles & Simpson, of Edwardsville, and Kramer, Kramer & Campbell, of East St. Louis (T. M. Pierce, of St. Louis, Mo., of counsel), for appellee.

CRAIG, J.

This was an application by the county treasurer and ex officio county collector of Madison county for judgment and order of sale against the property of the appellee, the St. Louis Merchants' Bridge Company, for delinquent taxes for the year 1916. Due notice of the application was given, and appellee appeared and filed objections, which were sustained, and an order entered abating the tax. This appeal followed.

The appellee, the St. Louis Merchants' Bridge Company, is the owner of a bridge which crosses the Mississippi river between St. Louis, Mo., and Venice, in Madison county, this state. The east half of the bridge and approaches belonging to appellee is situated in the town of Venice. In the year 1915 the local assessor for that town assessed the full value of the portion of the property in that township at $1,500,000 and the assessed value at $500,000. Objections were filed by appellee to the assessment with the board of review of Madison county, alleging the assessment as made by the local assessor was excessive. A hearing was had before such board at its quadrennial session for [282 Ill. 410]1915, and an order entered, revising and reducing the assessment, by which the full value of the property was fixed at $700,005 and the assessed value at $233,335. Thereafter, in the year 1916, complaint was filed before the board of review by Joseph P. Streuber, who has since been elected state's attorney of that county, representing that appellee's property was improperly and incorrectly assessed too low, and asking that a hearing be had upon the question of revising and correcting the assessment of the property. Due notice was given of the hearing, at which appellee appeared by its attorneys and protested against such hearing on the ground that the board of review had no jurisdiction to revise an assessment which had been made and fixed at the prior quadrennial session of the board of review, as no changes had taken place in the value of the property subsequent to the valuation as fixed at such quadrennial session. The protest was overruled, and the board of review proceeded with the hearing, at the conclusion of which it again fixed the full value of appellee's property at $1,500,000 and its assessed value at $500,000. The taxes were extended against the property of appellee accordingly.

It is conceded that appellee has paid all taxes assessed against its property based upon an assessed valuation of $233,335, as fixed by the board of review for the year 1915, and that it has refused to pay the balance of the tax assessed on its value as fixed by that board at the hearing held in 1916. The substance of the objections upon which it based its refusal to pay the balance of the tax is: (1) That its property was duly and legally assessed in the quadrennial year 1915; that no improvements have been made on the property since that date or change made in its value by reason of alterations in or additions to the improvements, and that the board of review for the year 1916 had no jurisdiction or authority to increase the assessment upon the complaint of the taxpayer after the same had been fixed by the board of review in the quadrennial year [282 Ill. 411]1915, and that the fixing of the value of its property at such time was a full and complete determination and adjudication of the value of the property for taxation for the year 1915 and the succeeding three years, unless some change was made in its value by reason of alterations or additions to the improvements; (2) that if the board of review had the right to change and revise the assessment in 1916, the revision was made in such an arbitrary manner as to amount to a fraudulent assessment of its property, and that the assessment as made was not based upon any reasonable valuation of its property, but upon an arbitrary and unreasonable valuation, and is so grossly excessive as to amount to fraud.

When the matter came on for hearing before the court the state's attorney moved the court for a change of venue from the county judge on the ground of the prejudice of said judge, and because his interest in the subject-matter involved in the suit was such as to disqualify him from hearing the cause. In support of his motion he filed his affidavit, from which it appears that the trial judge, Henry B. Eaton, and Christ H. Kunnemann, were indicted by the grand jury of Madison county, at the January term, 1917, of the circuit court of that county, for the crime of conspiracy in attempting to prevent the board of review of such county, in...