State ex rel. Stevenson v. Smith

• Decision Date: 31 October 1885
• Citation: 87 Mo. 158
• Parties: THE STATE EX REL. STEVENSON v. SMITH, Auditor of the City of St. Louis, Appellant.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

87 Mo. 158

THE STATE EX REL. STEVENSON

v.SMITH, Auditor of the City of St. Louis, Appellant.

Supreme Court of Missouri.

October Term, 1885.

Appeal from St. Louis Court of Appeals.

REVERSED.

Leverett Bell for appellant.

The relator's term of office was for four years and until his successor shall have been duly appointed and qualified. The constitution provides that: “The compensation or fees of no state, county, or municipal officer, shall be increased during his term of office.” The city charter of St. Louis provides that the salary of no officer shall be changed during the term for which he he is elected or appointed. R. S., p. 1587, par. 8. Nor shall it be increased during such term. R. S., p. 1627, sec. 17. “The doctrine now well settled in this state is that an officer elected or appointed to hold for a definite period of time, and until his successor shall be duly elected and qualified, holds his office for the specified term, and if no successor be elected or appointed at the expiration of the time, his term of office continues until such appointment or election, and that the time during which he holds, after that specified time has expired, and until a successor is elected and qualified, is as much a part of his term of office as the preceding time.” Savings Bank v. Hunt, 72 Mo. 601; State v. Lusk, 18 Mo. 333; State v. Thompson, 38 Mo. 192; Long v. Seay, 72 Mo. 648.

John D. Stevenson pro se.

(1) The words “until his successor is appointed and qualified,” do not extend the term of officers; they were designed and intended to prevent an official ““hiatus,” that the duties of the office should still be performed though the term of office of the incumbent had terminated. State v. Howe, 25 Ohio St. 588; People v. Tilton, 37 Cal. 614. (2) Term of office is held to be “a fixed and definite period of time.” 3 Ky. (Metcalf), 207, and cases cited.

BLACK, J.

The relator was duly appointed and commissioned assessor and collector of water rates for the city of St. Louis in 1879, for the term of four years expiring on the third of April, 1883. At the time of his appointment his salary was fixed by ordinance at twenty-four hundred dollars per annum, payable monthly. By ordinance, approved March 28, 1883, the salary of the same office was increased to three thousand dollars a year. This ordinance took effect April 8, 1883. A new appointment was not made on April 3, 1883, and relator continued to discharge the duties of the office. For the month beginning April 3, 1883, his salary was duly paid at the rate of twenty-four hundred dollars per annum. He claims he should have been paid at the rate of three thousand dollars per annum, and by this proceeding seeks to require the auditor to audit his account for the difference for that month, being $38.33.

Section eight, article fourteen, of the state constitution, provides: “The compensation or fees of no state, county, or municipal officer, shall be increased during his term of office,” etc. The charter of the city of St. Louis is to the same effect, and it also provides that the salary of no officer shall be changed during the term for which he is elected or appointed. Sec. 17, p. 1627, and par. 8, p. 1587, Vol. 2, R. S., 1879. Indeed the third section of the ordinance, increasing the salary, provides that the salary thereby fixed shall be payable after the expiration of the term of office of the then incumbent. The assessor and collector of water rates is appointed by the mayor, confirmed by the council, and must give bond. R. S., secs. 7 and 8, p. 1612. Section two, article four, of the charter, provides that “the mayor shall appoint the following officers who shall hold their offices for four years and until their successors shall have been duly appointed and qualified.” The assessor of water rates is one of the...