People ex rel. Quisenberry v. Ellis

• Decision Date: 23 February 1912
• Parties: PEOPLE ex rel. QUISENBERRY, County Collector, v. ELLIS.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

253 Ill. 369

97 N.E. 697

PEOPLE ex rel. QUISENBERRY, County Collector,

v.ELLIS.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Feb. 23, 1912.

Appeal from Logan County Court; James T. Hoblit, Judge.

Application by the People, on relation of Clifford Quisenberry, county collector, for a judgment against real estate of William S. Ellis for delinquent city taxes. Judgment for ralator, and defendant appeals. Reversed and remanded.Beach & Trapp, for appellant.

C. Everett Smith, State's Atty., Milton M. Hoose, City Atty., Frank S. Bevan, and King & Miller, for appellee.

CARTWRIGHT, J.

[1] To the application of the county collector to the county court of Logan county for judgment against real estate of the appellant, William S. Ellis, for delinquent city taxes of the city of Atlanta for the year 1910, and city taxes which it was alleged ought to have been extended against the same property for the years 1902 to 1908, inclusive, the appellant filed objections on the ground that during said years the real estate was not within the corporate limits of the city and had been disconnected therefrom on March 4, 1901. To prove the disconnection, appellant testified that he filed a petition prepared for him by a practicing attorney in the city of Atlanta, asking the city council to disconnect the real estate from the city, and he offered in evidence the minutes of the meeting of the city council held on January 11, 1901, as follows: ‘Petition of W. S. Ellis relative to property in the city limits was granted.-J. E. Foltz, City Clerk.’ The act then in force authorizing the city council to disconnect real estate from the city was entitled ‘An act in relation to the disconnection of terrirory from cities and villages,’ in force May 29, 1879 (Laws of 1879, p. 77), which required the passage of an ordinance by the city council, so that the entry in the minutes was not effective to disconnect the real estate. It was only relevant to show that there was a petition of the appellant relative to property which was then in the city limits. Appellant then offered in evidence the minutes of a meeting of the city council held on March 4, 1901, as follows: ‘The following ordinance, No. 75, relative to disconnecting William Ellis' land from corporate limits of the city of Atlanta, was read and passed by nay and aye vote, in sections and as a whole, on passage’-and the names of the aldermen voting were given. The ordinance was then offered in evidence and is as follows: ‘An ordinance disconnecting certain lands.

‘Be it ordained by the city council of Atlanta, Illinois:

‘Section 1. That the petition of William Ellis for disconnecting of the following described lands, to wit: Commencing thirty and two-thirds rods west of the southeast corner of the southwest quarter of section 20, in township 21, north, range 1, west of the third principal meridian; running thence north to lot 1, in Downey's addition to Atlanta; thence west to the right of way of the Chicago & Alton Railroad Company; thence southwesterly along the east side of said right of way to the west line of said section 20; thence south to the southwest corner of said section, and thence east to the place of beginning; that as the taxes on the said lands have been fully paid and none of the lands ever having been laid off in lots, it is hereby declared that the said lands heretofore described are hereby disconnected from the corporate limits of the said city of Atlanta, as requested by the said petition, and that it take effect from and after its passage.

‘Sec. 2. It is further provided that the city clerk is hereby instructed to deliver a copy of this ordinance to the petitioner.’

The original petition could not be found by the present city clerk. After the passage of the ordinance, no city taxes were levied on the property in question nor extended against it, but the appellant and the city acted under the ordinance, and recognized it as having disconnected the real estate from the city. On September 6, 1909, the city council passed an ordinance repealing ordinance No. 75. The court refused to admit in evidence a certified copy of ordinance No. 75, recorded in the office of the recorder on February 15, 1911, after the passage of the repealing ordinance. The court entered a judgment finding that the proceeding to disconnect the real estate from the city was defective and insufficient because the evidence failed to show any sufficient petition filed by appellant with the city council, and also failed to show that any certified copy of the ordinance was filed with the recorder of the county and recorded, and also filed with the county clerk prior to the passage of the repealing ordinance, and ordered the real estate sold for all the taxes, together with interest and penalties. There was also a personal judgment against the appellant for costs.

[2] The application of the collector was for judgment against the real estate, subjecting it to the payment of the taxes, penalties, and any costs that might be incurred in the proceeding. There is in such cases no personal liability of the landowner for costs, and the court erred in rendering a personal judgment for the same against the appellant. Merritt v. Thompson, 13 Ill. 716.

[3] The court included in the judgment $84.91 for interest or penalties, which it is alleged was authorized by section 276 of the revenue act (Hurd's Rev. St. 1909, c. 120). That section does not apply, since the real estate in question was listed for taxation during all the years and was assessed and all taxes extended against it were paid. It was not property omitted in the assessment or defectively described or assessed, and it was error to enter judgment for the interest provided for by section 276, as penalties. Hayward v. People, 156 Ill. 84, 40 N. E. 287.

[4]The act under which the proceeding to disconnect appellant's property was had authorized the city council, upon the presentation of a petition by him praying for such disconnection and filed with the city clerk at least 10 days before the meeting of the city council, together with a certificate of the county clerk showing that all city taxes or assessments due had been fully paid, to disconnect, by ordinance, the territory described in the petition from the city. The city council, being authorized to act upon such a petition as complid with the statute, was necessarily authorized to determine the sufficiency of the petition, and whether there had been such a compliance with the statute as authorized the passage of the ordinance. The rule of law is that where any official body or tribunal, such as a city council is given authority to hear and determine any question, its determination is, in effect, a judgment having all the properties of a judgment pronounced by a legally created court of limited jurisdiction. When a petition was filed, the city council acquired jurisdiction to decide all preliminary questions concerning the sufficiency of the petition and the steps required by the statute to authorize the passage of the ordinance, and, if it committed an error, its action and decision could not be attacked...