School District No. 1, Tp. 24, Range 4, v. Boyle

• Decision Date: 02 June 1904
• Citation: 81 S.W. 409,182 Mo. 347
• Parties: SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. 1, TP. 24, RANGE 4, v. BOYLE et al.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

81 S.W. 409

182 Mo. 347

SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. 1, TP. 24, RANGE 4, v. BOYLE et al.

Supreme Court of Missouri.

June 2, 1904.

APPEAL — JURISDICTION — SCHOOL DISTRICT AS PARTY.

1. A school district is not a political subdivision of the state, within Const. art. 6, § 12, so as to give the Supreme Court jurisdiction of an appeal in a case where a school district is a party.

In Banc. Appeal from Circuit Court, Howell County; W. N. Evans, Judge.

Action by School District No. 1, Township 24, Range 4, against Arthur Boyle and others. Judgment for defendants. Plaintiff appeals. Transferred to Court of Appeals.

A. H. Livingston and Harris & Norman, for appellant. Orr & Luster, for respondents.

BRACE, J.

In this case a motion has been filed to transfer the cause to the St. Louis Court of Appeals because the jurisdiction to hear and determine the appeal herein is vested in that court, and not in the Supreme Court. The only ground upon which it can be claimed that this court has jurisdiction of the appeal is that a school district is a political subdivision of the state within the meaning of section 12, art. 6, of the Constitution. Since the adoption of the constitutional amendment of 1884, providing, among others, that "in cases where a county or other political subdivision of the state" is a party, writs of error shall run from, and appeals be taken directly to, the Supreme Court from the trial courts, very many cases have been taken to and decided by the Courts of Appeals wherein a school district was a party, and the jurisdiction of these courts in such cases seems never to have been questioned, except in one instance, and that was in the case of School District v. Burris, 84 Mo. App., loc. cit. 662, in which it was ruled by the Kansas City Court of Appeals that a school district was not a political subdivision of the state in a jurisdictional sense within the meaning of the constitutional provision aforesaid. While the question has never been raised or passed upon by this court, the exercise of jurisdiction in such cases by the Courts of Appeals may be said to have been tacitly assented to by this court in several cases; as, for example, State ex rel. v. School District, 143 Mo. 89, 44 S. W. 720; School District v. Livers, 147 Mo. 580, 49 S. W. 507; Cranor v. School District, 151 Mo. 119, 52 S. W. 232. And while there may have been a case or two decided in this court in which the question might have been raised, but was inadvertently passed over—as, for...