21 S.D. 6 | S.D. | 1906
This is. an appeal by the relator from a judgment . dismissing his application for a peremptory writ of mandamus commanding the defendants, as county commissioners, to submit the question of changing the location of the county seat at the general election of 1904. The facts as found by the circuit court are substantially as follows: On January 4, 1904, T. E. Andrews presented a petition to the board at its regular session, signed by 1,528 persons, asking to move the county seat from Wheeler to Platte, and for an order submitting the proposition at the next general election. On the same day J. W. Lindsay filed a statement and asked for time in which purported signers of the Platte petition might he heard. Such statement was sworn to and stated that a large number had signed the Platte petition under a misapprehension of facts, giving particulars wherein they had been misled and the names of the signers so misled. Such statement also alleged upon information and belief that a large number of the signers of such petition, more than enough to reduce the number below a majority of the voters of the county, were induced to sign it by reason of false and fraudulent representations made by persons circulating the same. It also .contained the allegation that several hundred signers of such petition had already signed a petition to the
The law governing the official conduct of the defendants is thus prescribed by the state Constitution: “Whenever a majority of the legal voters of any organized county shall petition the board to change the location of the county seat which has once been located by a majority vote, specifying the place to which it is to be changed, said board shall submit the same to the people of the said county at the next general election.” Article 9, § 3. The established rules of construction applicable to statutes also apply to the construction of Constitutions. 8 Cyc. 729; Davenport v. Elrod, 20 S. D. 567, 107 N. W. 833. Under statutes defining the duty of county commissioners with respect to submitting the question of relocating county seats, in language substantially the same as that employed in our Constitution, it has been held that the signers of such petitions have a right to withdraw their names at any time before final action has been taken thereon, and that withdrawn names cannot be counted to make a valid petition. La Londe v. Board, 49 N. W. 960; State v. Nemaha County, 4 N. W. 473;
The judgment of .the circuit court is affirmed.