Trumper v. School Dist. No. 55 of Musselshell County

• Decision Date: 20 June 1918
• Docket Number: 4209.
• Citation: 173 P. 946,55 Mont. 90
• Parties: TRUMPER, Superintendent of Public Instruction, et al. v. SCHOOL DIST. NO. 55 OF MUSSELSHELL COUNTY et al.
• Court: Montana Supreme Court

173 P. 946

55 Mont. 90

TRUMPER, Superintendent of Public Instruction, et al. v. SCHOOL DIST. NO. 55 OF MUSSELSHELL COUNTY et al.

No. 4209.

Supreme Court of Montana

June 20, 1918

Appeal from District Court, Musselshell County; A. C. Spencer Judge.

Action by May Trumper, Superintendent of Public Instruction, and H L. Hart, State Treasurer, and S. C. Ford, Attorney General constituting the Public School Teachers' Retirement Salary Fund Board, against School District No. 55 of Musselshell County, Mont., and O. R. McVay, Clerk. Judgment for plaintiffs, and defendants appeal. Affirmed.

W. W Mercer, of Roundup, for appellants.

S. C. Ford and R. S. Mitchell, both of Helena, for respondents.

SANNER J.

This appeal assails the validity of chapter 95, Session Laws of 1915-particularly sections 1, 4, 5, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, and 18-known as the Teachers' Pension Law, held by the judgment below to be valid and enforceable. In substance, these provisions are: Section 1, creating the public school teachers' retirement salary fund and the public school teachers' permanent fund, the latter made up of "contributions made by teachers as hereinafter provided," income and interest, donations, legacies, gifts or bequests, and "appropriations made by the state Legislature from time to time to carry into effect the purposes of this act." Section 2. The retirement salary fund shall be made up of moneys transferred from the permanent fund. Section 4. "There shall be deducted from the salary of every teacher," subject to the provisions of the act, one dollar from each month's compensation, to be placed in said permanent fund. Section 5. "No person shall be eligible to receive the benefits of this act who shall not have paid *** an amount equal to twelve dollars for each year of service, up to and including twenty-five years." Section 13, Every teacher of 25 years' service, the last 10 of which shall be in this state, is entitled to retirement and to receive during life an annual retirement salary of $600, in quarterly installments. Section 14. Any teacher who shall have served as such or as a school officer for 15 years, and who by infirmity shall become incapacitated, may be retired or may by proper authority be compelled to retire and shall receive an annual retirement salary in proportion to length of service. Section 15. The authorities shall determine what constitutes a school year. Section 16. The act is binding on such teachers employed in the public schools of this state at the time of the approval of the act, as shall on or before January 1, 1916, signify their agreement accordingly, and (section 17) upon all teachers elected or appointed after the approval of the act. Section 18. If any retired teacher shall be re-employed in the schools, the retirement salary shall be suspended during such period of re-employment, and any teacher retired for disability or on less than 25 years of service who returns to service and later qualifies for retirement, the retirement salary on such second retirement shall be reduced so as to cover the amounts paid on the first retirement.

The objections urged to this legislation, so far as they are cognizable by this court, are constitutional in character. They are not very clearly stated, but from the argument of the appellants' brief we infer the contentions to be that it violates the state Constitution (sections 3 and 27, art. 3; section 26, art. 5, and section 11, art. 12) as well as the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the national Constitution. In substance, the provisions thus invoked are: The declaration that all persons possess the inalienable right of acquiring, possessing, and protecting property; the guaranties that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law, or be denied the equal protection of the laws; the prohibition against the passage of local or special laws for the management of the common schools; the requirement that taxes shall be uniform and laid by general laws for public purposes. The most cursory examination of the statute thus assailed will disclose that the constitutional propositions insisted upon are inapplicable.

There is no question of taxation involved. The legal relation of the state through its several boards of school trustees with the teachers employed by it is one of contract. It has the right to say upon what terms it will hire or authorize the hiring of persons to teach in its schools. It may, if it sees fit to do so, discriminate in the terms of its contracts upon any basis it chooses to adopt or upon no basis at all. Here it has said to all teachers employed after the approval of the act:

"Your contract shall have read into it the provisions of this act;

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