Shriver v. Day

• Decision Date: 08 February 1917
• Docket Number: No. 10988.,10988.
• Parties: SHRIVER v. DAY, County Treasurer, et al.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

276 Ill. 403

114 N.E. 918

SHRIVER

v.DAY, County Treasurer, et al.

No. 10988.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Dec. 21, 1916.

Rehearing Denied Feb. 8, 1917.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Macoupin County; F. W. Burton, Judge.

Bill by William A. Shriver against Elmer E. Day, County Treasurer, and others, to restrain enforcement of an assessment for the purchase of a schoolhouse site. From an order granting the injunction, defendants appeal. Reversed in part and remanded, with directions.

James H. Murphy, of Virden, and Victor H. Hemphill, of Carlinville, for appellants.

Alexander H. Bell, of Carlinville, for appellee.

DUNN, J.

The appellee, as a taxpayer in Virden Township high school district, filed his bill in the circuit court of Macoupin county on April 2, 1915, alleging the organization of the district in 1912, the levying of a tax in 1914 and its collection, the intention of the board of directors of the district to use the money so collected in the purchase of a schoolhouse site, and reasons why such purchase would be illegal. The bill made the board of directors of Virden Township high school district (being school district No. 180) by that name, and O. H. Rohrer, township high school treasurer, defendants, and prayed for an injunction against the issue or payment of any warrants for the purchase of a schoolhouse site. A preliminary injunction was issued and nothing further was done until the final hearing, which was on demurrer at the June term, 1916, when the injunction was made perpetual. No complaint is made in regard to these proceedings. On March 27, 1916, the complainant obtained leave to file, and did file, what is called a supplemental bill, alleging that on April 6, 1915, four days after the filing of the original bill, an election was held in the district pursuant to a petition filed on February 11, 1915, with the school treasurer, on the proposition to discontinue the high school district, and the majority of the votes cast were in faovr of discontinuing the district, but, nevertheless, the board of directors afterward levied a tax in the district, which was extended by the county clerk and which the township collector was proceeding to collect; that the board of directors has never acquired any school property, had any school room, conducted any school or done anything in the way of education in Virden township except hold conferences among its members and levy taxes; that the high school district, by reason of the premises, has been fully dissolved and the act of the board of directors in levying taxes was illegal. The county collector was made a defendant to the so-called supplemental bill, and it prayed that each and all of the persons professing to act as members of the board of directors of Virden Township high school district be enjoined from so acting; that the high school district be deereed to have been dissolved; that the further collection of taxes be enjoined; and that the court decree a distribution of the money already collected, when paid over to the township treasurer, with all other money in his hands, among the several school districts any of whose territory was included within the township high school district. This document came on to be heard at the same time with the original bill on demurrer, and the court, after granting the relief prayed for in the original bill, further decreed that the Virden Township high school district be declared to be wholly dissolved and set at naught in consequence of the special election on April 6, 1915, and that the board of directors, and each member thereof, be enjoined from further action as a high school district except as thereafter directed, and that the county...