35 S.C. 508 | S.C. | 1892
The opinion of the court was delivered by
The action in this case was brought by the plaintiff against Joseph E. Murray, as late county treasurer of Aiken County, and his sureties on his official bond as such, alleging that said Murray, as county treasurer, had collected and failed to pay over sundry sums of money collected by him for general county purposes, as well as certain other sums of money, constituting a part of the school fund of said county. The only question raised by this appeal (the other question made by the exceptions having very properly been abandoned on the argument here) is, whether the Circuit Judge erred in overruling the demurrer based upon the ground “that it appeared
It is contended by the appellants, that while the county commissioners are the financial agents of the county in the disbursement of funds received for general county purposes, the school commissioner is the financial agent for the disbursement of the school funds; and that as it is made his duty, by section 1002 of the General Statutes (which, in the absence of any showing to the contrary, it must be presumed he has performed) to apportion “annually, on the first day of February,” “the income of the county school fund among the several school districts of his-county,” which, by section 1008, are made bodies corporate, such an action as this cannot be maintained by the county as a body corporate, but must be brought by the several school districts in their corporate capacity for their respective proportions of the school fund, as ascertained by the apportionment made by the county school commissioner.
From this brief review of the law, both constitutional and statutory, it is very obvious that the school fund of each county belongs to the county, and that the provisions made for its distribution and disbursement by the various county agencies or officers cannot affect the real ownership of the fund. From this it follows necessarily that such fund may be sued for by the county in its corporate capacity. This is the view which was taken by this court in Greenville County v. Runion, 9 S. C., 1; for while it is true that the question was not presented in that case in precisely the same form as it is here, yet the court did not rest its decision upon the form in which the question was presented, but considered the question on its merits.
The judgment of this court is, that the judgment of the Circuit Court be affirmed.