131 So. 644 | Miss. | 1931
Several drainage districts organized under chapters 195 and 196 of the Laws of 1912, each of which includes sixteenth section land in Washington county, presented to the board of supervisors of Washington county claims for taxes or assessments levied for 1929, and several years prior thereto on land in the districts for the maintenance *108 of the districts. These taxes or assessments were levied for the year 1924, and for years prior and subsequent thereto. The board of supervisors declined to pay these taxes or assessments, and an appeal was taken to the circuit court, where judgments were rendered awarding to each of the drainage districts the amount claimed by it on these assessments. The cases were all considered and decided together by the board of supervisors, and by the circuit court, and will be here.
The assessments here sought to be recovered, levied for the year 1924 and subsequent years, are governed by chapter 267, sections 1, 2, Laws 1924, Hemingway's Code 1927, sections 5085 and 5086, so that we will deal first with the assessments levied for the years prior to 1924.
Chapters 195 and 196, both of the Laws of 1912, do not provide that assessments on land for the maintenance of drainage districts shall be a personal charge against the owner thereof, nor does any other statute that has been called to our observation, unless it be section 4256, Code 1906, section 8189, Hemingway's Code 1927, which we will assume, but merely for the purpose of the argument, does so provide.
But this assumption will not end the inquiry, for all sixteenth section land is owned by the state, and the boards of supervisors of the various counties are simply the state's agents for administering the school trust with which the land is charged. Jefferson Davis County v. Lumber Co.,
Sections 1 and 2, chapter 267, Laws 1924, Hemingway's Code 1927, sections 5085 and 5086, do provide for the payment of assessments of sixteenth section land for the maintenance of a drainage district. Such assessments, when the land is held by a lessee thereof, must be paid by the lessee, and, when not so held, must be paid by the board of supervisors of the county in which the land is situated. Under this statute the appellant is charged with the duty of paying the drainage assessments levied after the enactment of the statute on any of its sixteenth section land not leased included in the appellee districts, and such assessments only should have been included in the judgments here rendered by the court below.
Reversed and remanded. *110