Steele v. Winningham
| Decision Date | 04 May 1939 |
| Docket Number | No. 2204.,No. 2205.,No. 2199.,2199.,2205.,2204. |
| Citation | 128 S.W.2d 454 |
| Parties | STEELE et al. v. WINNINGHAM. TEXAS TECHNOLOGICAL COLLEGE et al. v. KIRBY, District Judge, et al. |
| Court | Texas Court of Appeals |
Appeal from District Court, Limestone County; H. F. Kirby, Judge.
Proceeding by George W. Winningham against L. L. Steele and others, individually and as Board of Directors, to enjoin election of college president. From an order granting temporary injunction, the respondents appealed and the appeals were consolidated. The Texas Technological College and others apply for an original writ of prohibition against H. F. Kirby, District Judge, to prohibit him from adjudging relators in contempt for disobedience of the temporary injunction. George W. Winningham moves court to adjudge Joe T. Sneed, Jr., and others in contempt for disobedience of the injunction while appeal was pending.
Cause reversed and judgment rendered dissolving the injunction and granting writ of prohibition.
Gerald C. Mann, Atty. Gen., Geo. W. Barcus and Glenn R. Lewis, Asst. Attys. Gen., and Ira Butler, Wm. M. Brown, and Mark McGee, all of Fort Worth, for appellants.
L. W. Shepperd, of Groesbeck, for appellees.
The above cases and the motion therein embrace the heretofore consolidated appeals from the order entered by the judge of the 77th Judicial District Court, Limestone county, Texas, on March 18, 1939, in the case of George W. Winningham vs. L. L. Steele, et al. granting a temporary injunction, restraining L. L. Steele, Thomas G. Pollard, Mrs. W. R. Potter, Mark McGee, Charles Thompson, Milburn McCarty, Joe T. Sneed, Jr., Spencer Wells and James M. West, Sr., individually and as constituting the Board of Directors of Texas Technological College from meeting and electing or attempting to elect Clifford B. Jones president of Texas Technological College on March 20, 1939, and/or on any other date pending the further orders of the court; the petition of Texas Technological College, a body corporate, and Mark McGee, Charles Thompson, Milburn McCarty, Joe T. Sneed, Jr., Spencer Wells and James M. West, Sr., members of and composing a majority of the Board of Directors of Texas Technological College, for writ of prohibition prohibiting Judge H. F. Kirby, as district judge of the 77th Judicial District, from entering any order adjudging or attempting to adjudge any of relators in contempt of said court by reason of the alleged disobedience of the temporary injunction in the election by them of Clifford B. Jones as president of Texas Technological College on March 20, 1939; and affidavit filed herein by George W. Winningham, praying that in the event this court should hold that cause No. 2199 on the docket of this court, styled George W. Winningham vs. L. L. Steele, et al, had been removed from the 77th Judicial District Court of Limestone County, Texas, by an effectual appeal and was legally pending in this court at the time of the disobedience of the hereinabove mentioned temporary injunction, that Joe T. Sneed, Jr., Mark McGee, Charles Thompson, Milburn McCarty, and James M. West, Sr., be held in and punished for contempt of this court.
The disposition of the questions involved in all of these matters is controlled by our determination of the propositions involved in the consolidated appeals from the temporary injunction, and for this reason all will be disposed of in one opinion.
Appellants and relators say that the order of the judge of the 77th Judicial District Court granting temporary injunction was void because (1) sufficient facts were not alleged in the bill of complaint to invoke the jurisdiction of the trial court, and (2) that the trial court was without power to enter such order.
The temporary injunction was granted upon a presentation to the trial judge in chambers of George W. Winningham's verified petition without notice to and hearing of the appellants and relators herein. The allegations of fact upon which George W. Winningham sought the injunction are: (1) that he was a property tax paying resident of Limestone county, Texas, and was instituting the suit for himself and all persons similarly situated; (2) that the appellants named in the petition constituted the Board of Directors of Texas Technological College on March 18, 1939; (3) that Texas Technological College was a state institution supported and maintained by appropriations of funds derived from taxes collected from citizens property owners and persons engaged in business in Texas; (4) that Clifford B. Jones was on and prior to November 26, 1938, a member of the Board of Directors of Texas Technological College, and that his election as president of Texas Technological College on that date was void because he was a member of the Board, and that the Attorney General of Texas had so ruled; (5) that the appellants are threatening to and have issued notice that they will meet on Monday, March 20, 1939, in Houston, Texas, and elect Clifford B. Jones president of Texas Technological College, and that they will meet and reelect Clifford B. Jones president of Texas Technological College unless restrained by the Honorable Court; and (6) that he had no adequate remedy at law, and that all those persons similarly situated and in whose interests he brought the suit would suffer irreparable injury and damage in a sum in excess of...
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Texas Dept. of Mental Health & Mental Retardation v. Wade
...an injunction will not lie against a public official to regulate the manner and method of performance of official duties, Steele v. Winningham, 128 S.W.2d 454, 457 (Tex.Civ.App.--Waco 1939, no writ), unless the action of the official is wrongful and will cause irreparable injury. Commission......