State ex rel. Moulton v. Consol. Indep. Sch. Dist. of Buck Creek

• Citation: 192 N.W. 5,195 Iowa 637
• Decision Date: 17 February 1923
• Docket Number: No. 34908.,34908.
• Parties: STATE EX REL. MOULTON v. CONSOLIDATED INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DIST. OF BUCK CREEK, DELAWARE COUNTY, ET AL.
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Iowa

195 Iowa 637

192 N.W. 5

STATE EX REL. MOULTON

v.CONSOLIDATED INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DIST. OF BUCK CREEK, DELAWARE COUNTY, ET AL.

No. 34908.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Feb. 17, 1923.

Appeal from District Court, Delaware County; H. B. Boies, Judge.

Quo warranto to test the legality of the organization of a consolidated independent school district. Judgment and decree for the defendants. Plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.Carr & Carr, of Manchester, and Edwards, Longley, Ransier & Harris, of Waterloo, for appellant.

Bronson & Tierney and Blair & Doolittle, all of Manchester, for appellees.

STEVENS, J.

A petition for the establishment of the consolidated independent school district of Buck Creek was filed in the office of Delaware county April 12, 1921. Notice fixing the time for filing objections was duly published. Reuben Moulton, relator herein, and two others filed objections in writing. A hearing was had before the county superintendent, resulting in a decision in favor of the petitioners. Notice of appeal to the county board of education was given by all of the objectors, but the county superintendent failed to notify Moulton by registered letter, as required by statute, of the time fixed for the hearing of the appeal. The county board of education sustained the decision of the county superintendent. That official, having later discovered his failure to give notice to Moulton of the time fixed for hearing the appeal before the county board of education on May 19, 1921, caused a new notice fixing the time within which objections to the proposed district might be filed to be published. This notice was, of course, published after the time designated by the statute. Within the time fixed, two of the original objectors caused their previous objections to be refiled. Upon hearing, the county superintendent again found in favor of the petition, and, upon appeal to the county board of education, his decision was affirmed. An election, duly called, resulted in a majority in favor of the proposed school district. The defendants, except the school corporation, are the directors elected by the electors of the new consolidated district.

Chapter 149, Acts of the Thirty-Eighth General Assembly, authorizes the filing of a petition for the establishment of a consolidated district, and reads in part, as follows:

“When a petition describing the boundaries of contiguous territory containing not less than sixteen sections, within one or more counties, asking for the establishment of a consolidated independent school district and signed by one third of the qualified voters residing therein, is filed with the county superintendent of the county in which the largest number of qualified voters in the proposed district reside, he shall within ten days give public notice of the place and date when all objections shall be filed. * * * All notices under this act shall be by one publication in a newspaper published within the proposed district or if there be none, then in a newspaper having general circulation within the proposed consolidated district, which publications shall be made not less than five days nor more than fifteen days prior to the hearing or election to which they refer. Objections may be made by any person residing upon or owning land within such proposed boundaries or who would be injuriously affected by the formation of the proposed district and shall be on file not later than twelve o'clock noon of the day fixed for receiving objections. Within five days after such filings the county superintendent shall review all papers filed in his office and after careful review and investigation of their merits shall overrule or sustain the objections filed and fix and...