119 P. 1039 | Utah | 1911
This is an original application to this court for a writ of prohibition to prohibit the individuals named as defendants, while acting as the board of directors of the defendant Green River Irrigation District, from negotiating, selling, or disposing of certain bonds which were duly authorized by the qualified voters of said district under and in virtue of chapter 14, Laws Utah 1909, p. 144, as amended by chapter 53, Laws Utah 1911, p. 10. The defendants waived the issuance and service of an alternative writ, appeared, and filed a general demurrer to the application. The whole controversy between the parties is submitted for determination upon the application and the demurrer thereto.
It is not necessary to set forth the allegations contained in the application. It is sufficient to say that it is made to appear therefrom that all of the provisions of said chapter 14 were complied with in organizing the irrigation district, and in authorizing the issue of the bonds, the disposal of which is sought to be prohibited. It further appears therefrom that the regularity of the organization of the irrigation district has been judicially determined. The plaintiff bases his application for a permanent writ upon the assertion that chapter 14 is violative of certain provisions of our Constitution, and that said chapter is therefore void, and hence the organization of the district and the issuance of said bonds are without authority of law. It is provided in said chapter 14 that, whenever a majority of the landowners
Chapter 74 is based on what is commonly known as the “Wright Act,” passed by the legislature of California and approved March 7, 1887. (See Statutes and Amendments to the codes of California 1887, p. 29.) That act was amended February 16, 1889. (Stats., etc., of Cal. 1889, p. 15.) And was further amended March 20, 1891. (Stats., etc., of Cal. 1891, p. 142.) The Wright Act is set forth in the margin of the opinion rendered in Fallbrook Irr. Dist. v. Bradley, 164 U. S. 112, 17 Sup. Ct. 56, 41 L. Ed. 369. While there may have been additional amendments to the Wright Act, yet, if any were so made, they are not material here. We have carefully compared the provisions of chapter 74 with the provisions of the Wright Act; and while the two acts differ in phraseology respecting some of the details, and while certain provisions are incorporated
If, therefore, the provisions of the Wright Act have been passed on and upheld as constitutional by the court of last resort of California, this would no doubt furnish
The first ground of attack, namely, that the plaintiff is deprived of his property without due process of law by what is contained in said chapter 74, is fully answered in the negative by the Supreme Court of California in Irrigation District v. Williams, 76 Cal. 360, 18 Pac. 379,
Nor can objection No. 2 be sustained. That ground of objection is fully met by what is said in the two California cases, supra, and in the case from the Supreme Court of the United States to which we have referred. The question is also disposed of contrary to plaintiff’s contention
The real ground of objection No. 3 is in effect that the board of directors of the drainage district in providing funds to pay the interest on the bonds issued by the district and for other necessary purposes are by the law
Moreover, for the purposes of this proceeding, we must assume that all of the lands lying within the irrigation district are similarly situated and will be
The fourth and final objection is fully met by the Supreme Court of Colorado' in the case of Farmers’, etc., Ditch Co. v. Agr. Ditch Co., 22 Colo. 513, 45
The law in question in some respects is crude, and may not be the best that could be devised to attain the purposes sought to be accomplished. Such defects, if
To avoid any misconception, however, we desire to state that by what we have said we intend to- and do pass upon the constitutionality of the law in question only.
From what has been said it follows that the law in question is not vulnerable to the objections urged against it, that the writ prayed for should be denied, and the application dismissed. It is so ordered.