10 S.D. 368 | S.D. | 1897
The plaintiff, claiming to be the owner of a number of the registered warrants of the city of Huron, brought this action to enjoin the city treasurer of that city from paying the city warrants drawn by said city upon the '
The court found that plaintiff’s and intervener’s warrants were legal and valid, duly presented for payment and registered, and that defendants were paying out the funds raised by taxation for current city expenses, without regard to the prior-registered warrants issued by said city, and threatened to continue to pay its current expenses with the funds raised by taxation and from other sources, without regard to its prior registered warrants. The court further found that the city of Huron issued during the years 1889, 1890, and 1891 a large number of warrants and bonds, denominated public improvement warrants and bonds, to carry on capital campaigns on the part of said city, -and also warrants to purchase the right of way for a certain railway company. As to the indebtedness of said city, the court finds as follows: “That, excluding public improvement warrants, all of the warrants involved in this action were issued during the fiscal yetrr in which they were issued, before the city had issued warrants in excess of the taxes levied for the fiscal years in which said warrants were issued. (24) That the indebtedness set up in the answer embraces all the registered warrants outstanding and unpaid, for whatsoever purpose issued at the date of thé commencement of this action, as well as all the bonds of said city, for whatsoever purpose issued; that eliminating therefrom all public improvement warrants, and all bonded indebtedness created to fund the floating indebtedness of the city of Huron, which were used to take up public improvement or capital campaign warrants, there only remain the registered warrants, then outstanding, issued for usual and ordinary expenses of said city, and the bonds issued October 1, 1883, andFebruary 12, 1884, aggregating $40, - 000, and which are not questioned; that said, bonded indebtedness to gether with said remaining outstanding registered warrants, at no tim e, as hereinbefore found exceeded the constitutional limit of said city’s right to become indebted; and that at no
As will have been noticed, the main grounds upon which the defendants rely in defense of this action are: (1) That the city of Huron claims the right to collect its revenues, and place them in what it denominates a “special fund” for the payment of its current expenses, and to pay them out for these current expenses without regard to the warrants issued and registered for payment in prior years; (2) that the city had issued a large number of warrants and bonds in excess of the limit of indebtedness fixed by the organic act and the state constitution, prior to the issuance of the warrants in controversy in this action, and that plaintiff’s and intervener’s warrants were therefore . void.
All the questions arising under the first defense are substantially disposed of by the decisions of this court in Town-Lot Co. v. Lane, 7 S. D. 599, 65 N. W. 17; State v. Campbell, 7 S. D. 568, 64 N. W. 1125, and Shannon v. City of Huron, 9 S. D. 356, 69 N. W. 598. The theory of the learned counsel for
The appellants contend that the warrants of plaintiff and intervener were not legally registered, and' were not therefore entitled to payment in the order of their presentation for registration. This contention is not tenable. The court, in its fourth finding of fact, finds that the warrants of plaintiff ‘ ‘were duly registered. ” The intervener, in her complaint, alleged that her warrants ‘ ‘were registered for payment according to law by the treasurer of said city of Huron, at the dates of their respective presentations.” This allegation is expressly admitted by the answer. The contention of appellants that this allegation is a legal conclusion only, and therefore its admission by the answer is not binding upon the defendants, cannot be sustained. Such an allegation is equivalent o an allegation that they were duly registered, and that all the acts required by law had been performed.
The next contention of appellants we shall notice is that the court erred in allowing interest on these warrants from the date of their presentation and registration. In this, we think, the court ruled correctly. The warrants were payable upon presentation for payment; and, payment being refused for want of funds, the holder was thereafter entitled to interest, under the provisions of Sections 3721, 4746, Comp. Laws, until the treasurer set apart funds to pay them, as provided by Section 1674, Comp. Laws. This and the preceding section clearly assume that such warrants bear interest after presentation and registration.
This brings us to the consideration of the important question in this case, namely: Was it competent for the plaintiff and intervener to show that’certain bonds and warrants, issued by the city prior to the issuance of the warrants in controversy in this action, were illegal and void? Appellants contend that evidence tending to prove that these bonds and warrants were issued for an illegal purpose, and were therefore void, is in the nature of a collateral attack; and the determination of that question by the court would be determining the validity of ob
Appellants assign as error the ruling of the court’overruling an objection to a question, upon the ground that the question was leading, and called for a conclusion of law. The question does seem to have been somewhat leading in form, but was apparently asked as a summing up of the testimony of the witness. The abstract does not purport to give the testimony of the witness in full, but enough appears to show that the witness had been interrogated to some extent upon the subject. The admission of evidence as to matters of form is so largely in the discretion of the trial court that this court would be very reluctant to reverse a judgment of such court, except in a very clear case of an abuse of such discretion. We find no such'abuse in this case.
We have omitted any consideration of the question as to the effect of the contract made with the city by plaintiff’s assignors for lighting the same, under which plaintiff’s warrants were issued. The warrants issued under that contract having been held valid and legal by the trial court, independently of the construction to be given to the contract, a decision upon it is rendered unnecessary at this time.
There were some other assignments of error discussed by counsel, and, while they have not been overlooked, we deem them so intimately connected with the assignments of error discussed as not to require a separate consideration. We have not deemed it necessary to go into or discuss the bewildering mass of figures presented by this record. The findings of the court below were evidently prepared with great care, and after