Van v. Gunderson
| Decision Date | 13 April 1929 |
| Docket Number | 6411 |
| Citation | 55 S.D. 95,225 N.W. 54 |
| Parties | W. R. VAN, Appellant, v. CARL GUNDERSON, Governor, et al., Respondents. |
| Court | South Dakota Supreme Court |
Appeal from Circuit Court, Hughes County, SD
#6411—Affirmed
Clark & Henderson, Yankton, SD
Sutherland, Payne & Linstad, Pierre, SD
Attorneys for Appellant.
Buell F. Jones, Britton, SD
E. D. Roberts, Pierre, SD
Attorneys for Respondents.
Opinion Filed Apr 13, 1929
Plaintiff filed a claim with the rural credit board for $200 for services and $141.37 for expenses claimed to be due him as an employee of the rural credit board for the month of March, 1925. The board refused to allow the claim and plaintiff applied for a writ of mandamus to compel its allowance and payment. The trial court found that during his period of employment plaintiff had presented claims for, and been allowed and paid as mileage for the use of his car, the sum of $4,148.50 in excess of the amount allowed by law, and entered judgment dismissing the writ, from which judgment and an order denying a new trial plaintiff appeals.
Plaintiff’s employment began in December, 1918, and was for no definite term. He testified:
“I was merely employed at the will of the board, and that was my understanding.” The contract was oral, and he was to get $5 a day and 25 cents a mile for the use of his car. His duties were examining and reporting on lands offered as security for loans from the rural credit board, and collecting interest when due. The law at the time plaintiff was employed authorized the rural credit board to employ such employees as it might deem necessary to conduct its business, and to fix the salaries or fees of such employees. On June 30, 1920, chapter 85 of the Second Special Session of the Sixteenth Legislature went into effect. This act placed the management and control of all automobiles which are used in the transaction of the state’s business in the capitol commission, and made it the duty of the commission, on or before the 1st of May of each year, to prescribe a rate per mile which shall be paid to those operating privately owned cars on state business, giving to the commission authority to change the rate at any time in keeping with the actual cost of operation. After this act took effect plaintiff continued to render statements for the use of his automobile at 25 cents a mile, which were allowed and paid by the rural credit board, until he had received $4,148.50 in excess of the rate fixed by the capitol commission. In October, 1924, plaintiff was placed on a salary basis of $200 a month and furnished with a state-owned car. On this appeal he contends that the rural credit board is “an independent agency,” none of its business transactions passing through the state auditor’s office, and that, therefore, the act of June 30, 1920, does not apply to its officers or employees. The rural credit board is certainly not independent of the state; it is a branch of the state government; and judicial notice is taken that it is a bureau of the state, that its officers are public officers, and therefore its employees are necessarily state employees. State v. Ewert, 219 N.W. 817. We have no doubt that the act of June 30, 1920, applies to officers and employees of the rural credit department as to all officers and employees of the state, and that after the act took effect the rural credit board had no authority to allow its employees a rate per mile for the use of their privately owned cars in excess of that established by the capitol commission.
Section 2 of the act contains the following clause:
“It shall be lawful for the State Auditor to issue warrants covering automobile expense at the rate so specified by said Capitol Commission, and upon the sworn statement thereof of parties using such cars.”
Appellant argues that since the state auditor does not issue warrants for the rural credit board’s disbursements, this clause indicates...
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