The State ex inf. Gentry v. Lamar

• Decision Date: 15 February 1927
• Docket Number: 27404
• Citation: 291 S.W. 457,316 Mo. 721
• Parties: The State ex inf. North Todd Gentry, Attorney-General, v. Kirby Lamar et al
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

291 S.W. 457

316 Mo. 721

The State ex inf. North Todd Gentry, Attorney-General, v. Kirby Lamar et al

No. 27404

Supreme Court of Missouri

February 15, 1927

Writ denied and proceeding dismissed.

North Todd Gentry, Attorney-General, for informant; Robert L Lamar, of counsel.

(1) The posting of notices of special meeting for considering the question of consolidation by the County Superintendent as required by Sec. 11259, R. S. 1919, is jurisdictional. The authority of the County Superintendent in this respect is ministerial and mandatory, and the notices and plats must be posted in the manner and within the time prescribed by law. Sec. 11259, R. S. 1919; 35 Cyc. 838; State ex inf. Burges v. Potter, 191 S.W. 57; Perryman v. Bethune, 89 Mo. 158; Hopkins v. Railroad, 79 S.W. 98; McPike v. Penn. 51 Mo. 63; Stephens v. People, 89 Ill 337; Haddax v. County, 69 Va. 677; Meachem on Public Officers, sec. 178; Beach on Public Corp. sec. 384; McCreary on Elections (3 Ed.) sec. 141; School Dist. v Wallace, 75 Mo. 317; School District v. Pace, 87 S.W. 570; School Dist. v. School Dist., 94 Mo 612; Mason v. Kennedy, 89 Mo. 23; State ex rel. v. Young, 84 Mo. 90; State ex rel. v. Eden, 54 Mo.App. 31. (2) It is proper in construing a statute in order to arrive at the true legislative intent to read it in the light of all other statutes in pari materia, whether prior or subsequent in date of passage. A statute should be construed also in the light of a uniform policy of the Legislature with reference to such subject. 35 Cyc. 1147; State ex rel. v. Davis, 284 S.W. 470. (a) The general policy of the Legislature in this State with reference to the organization of school districts, of all classes, is and always has been to fix a minimum requirement both as to enumeration and as to area or assessed valuation. Secs. 11199-11203, 11253, 11261, 11263, R. S. 1919. (b) The word "or" does not necessarily signify a disjunctive or alternative. Lewis' Sutherland on Stat. Const. (2 Ed.) par. 377, 380, 397; United States v. Fiske, 70 U.S. 445; Witherspoon v. Jernigan, 76 S.W. 445. (c) In construing statutes the fundamental rule to be observed is to ascertain and give effect to the purpose of the Legislature. Under that rule the court may reject the words and figures when necessary to give effect to the manifest intention of the framers of the statute. Mere verbal inaccuracies, or clerical errors in statutes in the use of words, or numbers, or in grammar, spelling or punctuation, will be corrected by the court whenever necessary to carry out the intention of the Legislature as gathered from the entire act. State ex rel. School Dist. v. Hackmann, 258 S.W. 1011. (d) Where a statute is prohibitory in its nature and forbids the doing of a certain act unless certain conditions precedent are complied with, such conditons are concurrent, and if through loose or inaccurate phraseology they are connected by the word "or" the word "or" should be read "nor" or "and" unless the clear, unmistakable and unequivocal intention of the Legislature is otherwise. United States v. Fiske, 70 U.S. 445; Lewis' Sutherland on Stat. Const. (2 Ed.) pars. 377, 380, 397; Rice v. Ashland County, 108 Wis. 189; Witherspoon v. Jernigan, 76 S.W. 445; Maylone v. St. Paul, 42 N.W. 88; Weston v. Layhed, 14 N.W. 892; Murray v. Keyes, 36 Pa. 384; Foster v. Commonwealth, 8 Watts & S. 77; Canne v. Railroad, 23 N.W. 856; McConkey v. Superior Ct., 56 Cal. 83; Standard Co. v. Atty. Gen., 46 N.J.Eq. 270.

Hiett, Lamar & Covert for respondents.

(1) The fact that the County Superintendent did not post the plats and notices within thirty days after the filing of the petition does not invalidate the election. St. Louis Co. Court v. Sparks, 10 Mo. 117; State ex rel. v. Cloud, 192 Mo.App. 322; Sanders v. Lacks, 142 Mo. 255; State v. Swearingen, 128 Mo.App. 613; Ex parte Leach, 149 Mo.App. 329; Bowers v. Smith, 111 Mo. 61; State ex rel. v. Hackman, 273 Mo. 701; Horsefall v. School Dist., 143 Mo.App. 545; Bauch v. Cabool, 165 Mo.App. 494; Molyneaux v. Molyneaux, 106 N.W. 370; Munn v. School Dist., 82 N.W. 325; State ex rel. v. Burford, 82 Mo.App. 343; State ex rel. Moulton v. School Dist., 192 N.W. 6. (2) In organizing consolidated school districts only a substantial compliance with the statute is necessary. State ex inf. McDowell v. Thompson, 260 S.W. 84; State ex rel. v. Stouffe, 197 S.W. 249; State ex rel. v. Bird, 295 Mo. 344; State ex rel. v. Jones, 266 Mo. 191; State ex rel. Fleenor v. School Dist., 238 S.W. 819; State ex rel. v. Job, 205 Mo. 34; State ex rel. v. Brooks, 249 S.W. 73. (3) The word "or" is ordinarily employed to indicate an alternative, as one or the other, but not both of two or more things. The word corresponds with either, as either "this or that;" that is to say, either one thing or another thing. State v. Combs, 273 S.W. 1039; Kach v. Fox, 75 N.Y.S. 916; Sheppard v. New Orleans, 25 So. 544; Webster's Dictionary. (4) Where there is no ambiguity in the words or the statute there is no room for construction. Trefny v. Eichenseer, 262 Mo. 442; 36 Cyc. 1114; State ex rel. v. Wilder, 206 Mo. 549. (5) Sections 11199, 11200, 11201, 11203, 11253, 11261 and 11263, R. S. 1919, cited by the relator in his brief, do not apply to a consolidated district organized under the provisions of the Act of 1913, as amended in 1921, Laws of 1921, page 654, but apply to common school districts and other consolidated school districts organized under other provisions of the school law. State ex inf. v. Schuster, 285 Mo. 411; State ex inf. v. Scott, 264 S.W. 371. (6) The Act of 1913, as amended in 1925, is a later expression of the legislative will than are the sections referred to in the above paragraph by the relator, and it by implication repeals all the provisions of the school law inconsistent with it. State ex inf. v. Scott, 264 S.W. 371; State ex rel. v. Wells, 210 Mo. 620; 36 Cyc. 1073. (7) The Act of 1913, pertinent to the matter in question, was construed by this court in: State ex inf. v. Clardy, 267 Mo. 371; State ex rel. v. Long, 204 S.W. 914. And by the Springfield Court of Appeals in the recent case of State v. Ross, 286 S.W. 726. (8) The Clardy case was decided in 1915. The Long case in 1918, and in 1925 the Legislature repealed the Act of 1913, Sec. 11258, R. S. 1919, and enacted a new section, to-wit: Sec. 11258, Laws 1925, page 330. At the time the Legislature passed the Act of 1925 it knew the construction put on said section by the Supreme Court and enacted it in the same words as was in the Act of 1913, so far as this controversy is concerned. When the Supreme Court construes a statute and that statute is afterwards reenacted or continued in force without any change in its terms, it is presumed that the Legislature adopted the construction given to it by the court. Handlin v. Morgan County, 57 Mo. 114; Camp v. Railroad, 94 Mo.App. 281.

Gantt, J. All concur, except Graves, J., absent.

OPINION

GANTT

Information in quo warranto filed in this court to oust respondents from office as directors of alleged Consolidated School District, designated as "Consolidated School District No. 1, of Texas County Missouri." Respondents filed return.

The case is submitted on relator's motion for judgment on the pleadings. The validity of the organization of the district is questioned, and the facts determined from the pleadings are as follows:

The resident citizens of the community in which the city of Houston, in the County of Texas, is located, under authority of Section 11259, Revised Statutes 1919, as amended, Laws 1921, p. 654, filed on the 15th day of March, 1926, with the County Superintendent of Schools for said county, a petition, signed by at least twenty-five qualified voters of said community, praying for the formation of a consolidated school district in said community. The County Superintendent, on the 15th day of April, 1926, called a special meeting of all qualified voters of said community, to be held in the city of Houston, on the 30th day of April, 1926, at two o'clock P. M., to consider the question of consolidation. The special meeting was held at said time and place, the qualified voters of the proposed district voted on the question of consolidation, and the election resulted in the casting of 179 ballots for consolidation and the casting of 141 against consolidation. The respondents were duly elected directors of said district, possess the necessary qualifications, and within four days after their election duly qualified and organized by electing officers. All of the requirements of the statute for holding the election and organizing the district were literally complied with by the County Superintendent, except he did not post the notices and plats within the proposed district calling for a special meeting of all the qualified voters of the proposed district within thirty days after the filing of the petition. However, it is admitted that the voters of the proposed district were not misled or deceived on account of the failure of the County Superintendent to post the notices and plats within thirty days. And it is further admitted that the vote cast at said special meeting was much larger than the combined vote cast at the annual school meeting of all the territory included in the boundaries of said proposed district. The proposed district contained fifty square miles in area, but did not have an enumeration of two hundred children of school age, and did not include within its territory any town or city district at the time of its organization which had by the last enumeration five hundred children of school age.

By the pleadings and the briefs our attention is directed to two questions for solution.

I. The statute directs the County Superintendent to call the election within...