State v. Hall

• Decision Date: 05 March 1921
• Docket Number: No. 22187.,22187.
• Citation: 228 S.W. 1055
• Parties: STATE ex inf. McALLESTER, Atty. Gen., ex rel. SHERMAN et al. v. HALL et al.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

228 S.W. 1055

STATE ex inf. McALLESTER, Atty. Gen., ex rel. SHERMAN et al.

v.

HALL et al.

No. 22187.

Supreme Court of Missouri, Division No. 1.

March 5, 1921.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Livingston County; J. A. Cooley, Special Judge.

Proceeding by the State of Missouri, on the information of Frank W. McAllister, Attorney General, on the relation of William Sherman and others, against Robert L. Hall and others. Judgment for defendants, and plaintiffs appeal. Affirmed.

L. A. Chapman, Frank Sheetz, and Scott Miller, all of Chillicothe, for appellants. Schmitz & Marshall, of Chillicothe, for respondents.

RAGLAND, C.

This is a proceeding by information in the nature of quo warrants, instituted in the circuit court of Livingston county by the Attorney General, on the relation of certain alleged resident taxpayers of school districts Nos. 48 and 49, township 57, range 25, in said county. The information charges that respondents, without any legal warrant, grant, or right whatever, have usurped, and do still usurp, the office of school directors of a pretended district which includes within its boundaries the whole of said districts Nos. 48 and 49. The return made by respondents denies the usurpation charged, and sets out in detail the proceedings under which they claim that consolidated school district No. 3 of Livingston county was duly organized and they elected directors, all in accordance with the provisions of the act of 1915, entitled:

"An act to provide for the organization of consolidated schools and rural high schools, and to provide state aid for such schools."

Respondents assumed the burden and introduced evidence tending to show the organization of the consolidated district and their election as directors, as pleaded in the return. It is conceded that, if the consolidated district was legally organized, the respondents are rightfully exercising the powers of school directors therein. No Question is raised with respect to their possessing the requisite statutory qualifications, or to their having been duly elected. Since the organization of the consolidated district, March 9, 1916, the respondents and their predecessors in office have been conducting therein six grade schools and a rural high school.

The legality of the organization of the district in question is challenged at one point only, and that goes to the sufficiency of the' plats posted by the county superintendent of public schools, prior to the meeting called by him to consider the question of consolidation, in his attempt to comply with the pro-1 visions of section 3 of the act hereinbefore referred to. Laws 1913, p. 722. Relators contend that these plats did not afford any, information as to the territory embraced' within the proposed consolidated district,) and were therefore insufficient.

According to the county superintendent, after he had determined the boundaries of j the proposed district and located the boundary lines, he prepared, in his office at Chillicothe, a plat, and at the same time he made five copies of it. These five copies he at once posted. A day or two later, while in a bank at Mooresville, he made two more copies, which he also posted — making seven copies in all that he posted in the proposed consolidated district. The original plat, which had been retained in his office, was introduced in evidence as Respondents' Exhibit 3. The following is a reproduction of it as copied in the abstract of the record:

NOTE: OPINION CONTAINING TABLE OR OTHER DATA THAT IS NOT VIEWABLE

The original plat and all the copies seem...