Vill. of Morgan Park v. Knopf
| Decision Date | 25 October 1902 |
| Citation | 65 N.E. 322,199 Ill. 444 |
| Parties | VILLAGE OF MORGAN PARK v. KNOPF, County Clerk. |
| Court | Illinois Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Error to circuit court, Cook county; E. W. Burke, Judge.
Action by the village of Morgan Park against Philip Knopf, Cook county clerk. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiff brings error. Dismissed.
Enoch J. Price, for plaintiff in error.
Edward W. Sims, Co. Atty., and Frank L. Shepard and William F. Struckmann, Asst. Co. Attys., for defendant in error.
The village of Morgan Park brought suit in assumpsit in the circuit court of Cook county to recover alleged overcharges made by Philip Knopf, county clerk of Cook county, for fees, as such clerk, in executing tax deeds to said village. The declaration was in the common counts, and the plea of the defendant was the general issue. The case was submitted to the court for trial without a jury, and there was a finding and judgment for the defendant. The record has been brought into this court by writ of error sued out by plaintiff in error under the claim that the validity of a statute is involved.
The statute alleged by plaintiff in error to be invalid is one allowing the clerk 10 cents for noting on collectors' warrants tax sales subject to redemption. The validity of that statute was in no way connected with the controversy between the parties out of which the litigation grew, but, in preparing for the trial of the case in the circuit court, the village attorney made the discovery that the act providing for such fee purported to amend a certain section of a statute which had been previously amended, and had ceased to exist in its original form, and, on the trial, claimed the right to recover back the amount paid for such fees. Plaintiff in error accordingly submitted to the court a proposition of law that the amendatory act was invalid and void. The court wrote across the proposition: ‘Refused, expressing no opinion as to the law announced in this instruction, but because this charge was paid voluntarily.’ There was therefore no ruling on the proposition of law to be reviewed by this court, but the court declined to act on it at all, because it was not involved in the suit. Plaintiff in error did not insist upon a ruling, nor except to the refusal of the court to decide the question by holding or refusing the proposition. The validity of the statute does not appear to us to be involved in any way, or to be a controverted question in the case. The validity of a statute is involved where it is material to the rights of the litigants, as where a right is claimed under a statute by one side, and disputed by the other on the ground of the invalidity of the statute. It does not seem to be claimed by defendant in error in this court that the statute is valid and enforceable; and, so far as we can discover from the record, it was not so claimed in the trial court. The facts are that plaintiff...
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Independent School District No. 5 ex rel. Moore v. Collins
... ... 465; ... Argenti v. San Francisco, 16 Cal. 256; Village of ... Knopf, 199 Ill. 444, 65 N.E. 322; Frick v. Brinkley, ... 61 Ark. 397, 33 S.W ... 835; Fort Plain Bridge Co. v. Smith, 30 N.Y. 44.) ... Morgan ... & Morgan, for Respondents ... There ... was no obligation ... ...
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Lamar Township v. City of Lamar
...125 Mo. 486; Scott Co. v. Leftwich, 145 Mo. 34; State ex rel. v. Hawkins, 169 Mo. 618; Williams v. Carroll Co., 167 Mo. 15; Morgan Park v. Knopf, 199 Ill. 444; Badeau v. U.S., 130 U.S. 439; 30 Cyc. 1315. Under section 2778 a suit on an implied contract, as that alleged here, cannot be maint......
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Ohio Nat. Life Ins. Co. v. Bd. of Educ. of Grant Cmty. High Sch. Dist. No. 124
...such circumstances, the money will be deemed to have been voluntarily paid and there is no right of recovery. In Village of Morgan Park v. Knopf, 199 Ill. 444, 65 N.E. 322, it was held that the rule that money paid under mistake of law, there being no fraud or mistake of fact, cannot be rec......