Scarbrough v. McAdams Consol. School Dist.

• Decision Date: 21 February 1921
• Docket Number: 21587
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
• Parties: SCARBROUGH v. MCADAMS CONSOL. SCHOOL DIST

87 So. 140

124 Miss. 844

SCARBROUGH v. MCADAMS CONSOL. SCHOOL DIST

No. 21587

Supreme Court of Mississippi

February 21, 1921

APPEAL from chancery court of Attala county, HON. J. G. McGOWEN Chancellor.

1 STATUTES. Consolidated school is "common school" controlled by general laws within provision as to local laws.

A consolidated school is a common school in the constitutional sense and is controlled by the general laws of the state.

2. STATUTES., Special act, authorizing bond issue for school building in particular district, violates Constitution.

A special act, authorizing the issuance of bonds, for building and equipping a consolidated school, violates section 90 (p) of the Constitution of 1890.

HON. J G. McGOWEN, Chancellor.

APPEAL from chancery court of Attala county, HON. J. G. McGOWEN Chancellor.

Suit by the McAdams Consolidated School District against Frank W. Scarbrough. From a judgment for the district, defendant appeals. Reversed and dismissed.

Reversed and dismissed.

J. A. Teat, for appellant.

Chapter 294, Laws 1918, purports to authorize the board of supervisors of Attala county, Mississippi, to levy taxes upon the McAdams public school district to aid in the building, equipping and establishment of an agricultural high school. It will be noted by the orders of the board of supervisors of Attala county, appearing of record page 23-25; R. 26-31 and R. 32-37, etc., that the board of supervisors of Attala county were undertaking to issue bonds in the sum of five thousand dollars upon the McAdams consolidated school district for the sole purpose of establishing an agricultural high school for Attala county.

In view of chapter 76 of Hemingway's Code, sections 3419-3433, providing for the establishment of County Agricultural high schools and for the provisions therein for the maintenance of the same by levying taxes on the entire county as provided in section 34020, we note a very marked difference in the private act under consideration, chapter 294, Laws 1918. In the first place it will be noted that said chapter 294 is a special and private act authorizing the unusual privilege of taxing a public school district for the purpose of establishing an agricultural high school. This special Act of 1918 is in conflict with the Code, chapter 76, Hemingway's Code, providing for the establishment and maintenance of agricultural high schools.

The purpose of counsel for appellee to differentiate in their briefs the agricultural high school from the ordinary public school is not in any measure borne out when said chapter 294, Laws 1918, is examined. It is the purpose and likewise the effect of said chapter to single out the McAdams consolidated school district from all of the territory of Attala county and impose upon it the burden of taxation for the purpose of establishing said agricultural high school.

This in no measure exempts this territory from taxation under section 3420, of Hemingway's Code, providing that the board of supervisors shall levy on all of the taxable property in the county to support and maintain such agricultural high schools.

The existence of such agricultural high school makes it compulsory upon the board of supervisors to levy the tax upon all of the property in the county to support and maintain it. It must be conceded that said chapter 294, Laws 1918, is an act providing for the management or support of a common school and granting it the privilege of taxing its citizens for the purpose of adding to its common school, the agricultural high school. It is a very distinctive privilege being granted to said McAdams consolidated school, that is, the granting to it the special authority to tax its citizenship upon a special tax for the purpose of adding to its common school, an agricultural high school. It is a very distinct privilege granted to such school to tax the property in its territory to maintain an agricultural high school for the entire county of Attala.

This is not a minor question or consideration in view of the fact that it is a direct effort to double the taxes on one school district for the establishment and maintenance of an agricultural high school for the county. We respectfully submit that the very principal here involved is shown in the cases of State Board of Education v. Pridgen, 106 Miss. 219, 63 So. 416, and in the case of Cage v. State, 105 Miss. 326, 62 So. 358.

It is perfectly manifest that the said act of the legislature, chapter 294, Laws of 1918, is a private and special law applied to the McAdams consolidated public school district. We are not disposed to argue with counsel as to the good or evil effect of this particular chapter, but it is readily seen that the evil effects shown in this particular law is such as to warrant the most rigid adherence to the provisions of the constitution as written.

Thomas Land, for appellee.

Counsel says that the special Acts of 1918 is in conflict with the chapter on the Establishment of Agricultural Schools at Large, and that it is its purpose to single out this special district of Attala county, Mississippi, and levy a tax upon that district to build an agricultural school for Attala county, Mississippi. Thus by his argument making it that the board of supervisors of Attala county was making them build a school for the whole county. This is, I do know, to be an incorrect idea in this case, for this is not the acts of the board of supervisors of Attala county, but it is the acts of the McAdams consolidated school district, a district that has the power of a municipality, to tax its district to construct buildings for schools and by special acts the village of Tishomingo, and the village of Weir, gave the counties their school buildings, and yet it is not questioned. No, it is the district issuing these bonds through the board of supervisors, and counsel would have poor old man Frank Scarbrough paying a double tax, put on him by the board of supervisors, and he argues that it is for support and maintainance. How can it be? This record does not show that it is in existence, and you cannot support and maintain until you have a thing proven to be in existence. It is for the construction, and in the case of Bingham v. Woodell, in its elaborate opinion based upon Chrisman v. Brookhaven, 70 Miss. 477, it gives counsel a clear conception of the powers of these special school districts when they say that the districts have the power to build the school house although it may not be fit for the use it was created for, and that they had a right to float the bonds and sell them; that this was a constructive power given them by law and the constitution, and that the management and support was matters that came up after, for which the court was not called upon to decide. But the issuance of the bonds did not include that question, and that question was this exactly. This is to issue bonds to build school buildings and it is not directing the management nor the tax to run it, so these administrative matters cannot, according to those cases, come up here; that would have to come up in a different suit, for this is for the purpose of building school buildings, and not the support and maintainance, and the case of Board of Education v. Pridgen, 106 Miss. 219., cited by counsel, is in support of my position as there the act was to distribute the state township common school funds set apart by the state, more than their share, that was given by donation by a special law, and the case of Cage v. State, 105 Miss. 326, is certainly an error of the stenographer of counsel, for it is a criminal case, and the opinion is as to several sales being proven in an unlawful retailing charge against the defendant.

And in finality of this question presented by counsel, I simply will try to close this reply, which has been too lengthy, but it being a question of importance to the public educational interest of the whole state, I have tried to give a full and complete history of the laws, and this statute in its construction is to be presumed constitutional, and the decree of the distinguished chancellor must be upheld, if it is not apparent that great injury is the result because of the illegality of the decree, and it is a question of education under the constitution of the state of Mississippi, section 201, where there is a direct command as follows: "It shall be the duty of the legislature to encourage by all suitable means, the subject of education in the state." Now there is a liberal construction put upon the wide latitude given to these school districts and municipalities, and not that rule of strictness that counsel seeks to invoke, and there is for the general welfare, a strict regard given all steps of progress, given each and every step in science and literature, favored because of the public good that may be given, and cannot, by the courts of the country, be constrained to a narrow path, so we say that these powers given are wise and plain and apparent under the history of the educational interest of the state and that it is upheld by the bond attorney of the state, and the wisdom of the able chancellor, and decided the case on the law and the facts, and is a law copied after the law of the villages of Tishomingo, Weir, and hundreds of other similar cases, and all of this certainly regulates what is meant by the customs and laws of the state as to schools.

And section 90, clause P, refers to all schools under the constitution that have been changed by the general laws of consolidation, such as municipalities, separate school districts, and consolidated districts, which change was made by a general law, are operated and directed under section 201 of the constitution, and a careful observation will disclose this fact, and the McAdams...