State v. Bd. of Educ. of City of Bayonne

• Decision Date: 18 February 1892
• Citation: 23 A. 670,54 N.J.L. 313
• Parties: STATE ex rel. Doyle v. BOARD OF EDUCATION OF CITY OF BAYONNE et al.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

23 A. 670

54 N.J.L. 313

STATE ex rel. Doyle

v. BOARD OF EDUCATION OF CITY OF BAYONNE et al.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

Feb. 18, 1892.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Application of Thomas Doyle for a writ of mandamus to compel the board of education of the city of Bayonne, and George W. Streeder, to admit the applicant to the office of secretary of defendant board. Writ denied.

Argued November term, 1891, before Dixon, Garrison, and Reed, JJ.

W. W. Anderson, for relator.

W. W. Edwards, for defendant.

REED, J. The relator is asking for a writ of mandamus commanding the defendants to admit him to the office of secretary of the board of education of the city of Bayonne, and commanding the present incumbent to turn over the books and papers of such office to him. The relator was formally elected secretary by the board of education on the first Monday in July, 1891, his term to commence on the 1st day of September following. On the said 1st day of September, Doyle, the relator, applied to Streeder, the clerk for the preceding year, for the books, etc., to which application Streeder refused to accede. On the 8th day of September succeeding the 1st day, the relator, at a meeting of the board of education, offered to assume the duties of secretary, and the board refused to recognize him as such officer. The defendants refused to accede to the demand of Doyle, the relator, because they claim that his election to the position of secretary was a nullity. It appears that Mr. Doyle had in April, 1890, been elected a member of the board of education, and continued in office until July 20, 1891, at which time he resigned. When he was elected secretary of the board, he was a member of that body.

The defendants insist that he was ineligible for such position by reason of an act passed in 1885. Supp. Revision, p. 507, § 6. This act provides that "no member of any board of aldermen, common council, towsnhip committee, or other municipal board or body, shall, during the term for which he shall have been elected such member, be eligible for election or appointment to any office that is now or hereafter may be, by law, required to be filled by such board, council, committee, or body of which he is such member: provided, that this act shall not apply to any office now required by law to be filled from any such appointing body."

It is clear that the board of education of Bayonne is a municipal board; that Doyle was elected a member; and that, during the term for which he was elected, he was appointed to an office by the board. It is admitted that there is no law requiring the office of secretary of such board to be filled from the membership of the board. It appears, further, that the charter of Bayonne (P. L. 1872, p. 086, § 91) provides that the board of education shall appoint a secretary. From these facts it appears that the appointment of the relator falls within the literal prohibitory language of the statute. He was appointed by a municipal board of which he was a member, during the term for which he was elected, to an office required to be filled by such board, but not to be filled from the appointing body. The answer of the counsel for the relator to this is that, while it is true that the board of education is a municipal board, nevertheless it is not such a municipal board as comes within the intention of the legislature. The insistence is that the term "municipal board" is limited by the specification of the particular bodies which precedes the term "municipal bodies." The particular bodies mentioned are boards of aldermen, common councils, and township committees. It is argued that the meaning of the general term "municipal body" must be restricted to boards of a kind similar to those particular bodies enumerated. The rule of construction is invoked, that general words following specific ones must be construed as designating persons and things ejusdem generis. The bodies specifically mentioned are, it is claimed, legislative bodies, and therefore the general term "municipal boards" should be restricted to such other boards as are also legislative.

The canon of construction thus put forward, it may be remarked, is only one of many guides for ascertaining the intention of the legislative body. It is a rule of common sense, resting upon the notion that the legislature has disclosed the general character of the subject upon which it was intent, by the particular things or persons mentioned, and therefore, when a general supplementary term is used, it had in mind only things or persons of the same general character. There are other rules designed for the same purpose, and...