People ex rel. Montgomery v. Wabash Ry. Co.

• Decision Date: 17 April 1935
• Docket Number: No. 22881.,22881.
• Citation: 195 N.E. 665,360 Ill. 173
• Parties: PEOPLE ex rel. MONTGOMERY, County Collector, v. WABASH RY. CO.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

360 Ill. 173

195 N.E. 665

PEOPLE ex rel. MONTGOMERY, County Collector,

v.WABASH RY. CO.

No. 22881.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

April 17, 1935.

Proceedings by the People, on the relation of H. C. Montgomery, County Collector, against the Wabash Railway Company for collection of taxes. From an adverse judgment, the Railroad appeals.

Reversed and remanded, with directions.Appeal from Scott County Court; T. J. Priest, Judge.

Bellatti, Samuell & Arnold, of Jacksonville, for appellant.

C. C. Carter, State's Atty., of Winchester, for appellee.

STONE, Justice.

This is an appeal from a judgment of the county court of Scott county for taxes against appellant's property for the year 1933. Appellant filed three objections. One was that the aggregate rate extended for county purposes for mothers' pensions rendered the county tax 4 cents per $100 in excess of the statutory maximum. This objection was sustained, and needs no further consideration here. The second objection concerned an item in the county tax levy ‘for payment of outstanding legal indebtedness due and unpaid at the close of the fiscal year, $31,500.’ The ground of this objection is that the levy is in definite and uncertain and did not sufficiently state the purpose of the tax, though it constituted 52 per cent. of the total tax levied for general county purposes. The third tax objected to was the village tax of the village of Bluffs. This objection is that there was, at the time the tax levy ordinance was passed, no valid appropriation ordinance of the village in effect. No questions of fact arise on the record.

It is said that the county tax is not sufficiently specific to comply with section 121 of the Revenue Act. Smith-Hurd Ann. St. c. 120, § 109. Under that section the county board is required to determine, at its September session, the amount of all taxes to be raised for all purchases, and when for several purposes the amount for each purpose shall be stated separately. In People v. Cincinnati, Indianapolis & Western Railway Co., 224 Ill. 523, 79 N. E. 657, it was held that a levy ‘for payment of county claims (janitor's services, supplies, repairs, improvements and current expenses) $12,000,’ did not comply with section 121 of the Revenue Act, for the reason that the purpose, ‘payment of county claims,’ would include claims of every kind which might be presented against the county, and that the levy was not aided by the statement in parenthesis, as it was still indefinite as to how much was levied for defraying the expense of each of the items and added nothing to the general statement that the tax was levied for the payment of ‘county claims.’ A case very like the one before us is People v. Toledo, St. Louis & Western Railroad Co., 231 Ill. 498, 83 N. E. 113, 114. There the levy was ‘for unpaid claims, $20,000.’ This was held to be indefinite and uncertain, as the payment of ‘claims' was not equivalent to specifying claims allowed and for which orders and warrants had been drawn, and that it included claims of every kind that might be presented against the county. It was also in these cases held that it is neither necessary nor practicable that each particular claim which the tax is levied to pay shall be specifically stated or itemized, but it is there declared to be the duty of the authorities to specify the various purposes with reasonable certainty.

Appellee argues that under the facts...