156 N.W. 587 | S.D. | 1916
Proceeding ’under section 69, c. 135, Laws .1907, defendant district was organized out of a part of plaintiff district. Such section provides, among other things, that:
“At the regular meeting of the board of county commissioners in July following said election, the board of county commissioners and the county superintendent shall make an equitable apportionment of the property and indebtedness (other than bonded) of the district among the new districts formed therefrom.”
The commission named in such section met pursuant thereto and apportioned the property and indebtedness of the old district between the two districts, finding that there was a certain sum due to the old district. This action was brought to recover such sum, the complaint setting forth the above facts. To the original answer a demurrer was, interposed and sustained. The answer was amended. To the amended answer a demurrer was interposed and sustained, and the trial court, without entering separate conclusions of law, rendered and filed its judgment reciting therein, preliminary to the judgment proper, that:
“It is hereby ordered, adjudged, and decreed that the plaintiff’s demurrer herein be and the same is hereby sustained.”
From such judgment this appeal was taken.
It is urged that, unless appellant could have the action of the commission reviewed by the circuit court, it is denied a day in Court. Upon the other side, it is contended that their award,
This apportionment was not a judicial action, but an action purely administrative. The Legislature has full power to divide districts and create from them new ones; it also, has full power to fix the property rights of the new districts. If it divides a district, and makes no- provision for the division of the property thereof, the property of the former district, situate within the ter.ritory remaining in the old district, together with all intangible property in its possession, remains the property of the old district; the property situate in a new district passes to such new district; the existing indebtedness1 stands against the old district. The Legislature can, by direct legislation, declare the exact property that shall belong to each new district, and what amount of indebtedness, if any, that shall be assumed by such new districts, or it can declare the rule that shall govern the division of property ■and indebtedness, and leave to. some person or commission the administrative act of making the apportionment according to such •prescribed rule. Our Legislature pursued the latter course. The •action of the commission, in adjusting the property rights and parrying .out the legislative intent, was purely administrative. •This action, if regular, .and not vitiated by any fraud, is as binding .-as would have -been the .same action by the Legislature itself. '1 he Only function of the .court is to enforce the apportionment made.
The judgment appealed from is affirmed.