51 Iowa 432 | Iowa | 1879
Section 1729 of the Code provides: “They (the board of directors of any district township or independent district) may use any unappropriated contingent fund in the treasury to purchase records, dictionaries, maps, charts, and apparatus- for the use of the schools of their districts, but shall contract no debts for this purpose.” These sections specify the only purposes to which the contingent fund may be applied. There is no specific designation that would authorize the appropriation of it for the erection of a lightning-rod. If the erection of a lightning-rod is authorized at all, out of the contingent fund, it must be by that general clause, “all other contingent expenses necessary for keeping the schools in operation.” The word necessary means “indispensably requisite; that cannot be otherwise without preventing the purpose intended.” Now, while lightning-rods upon a school building may be very desirable, and may greatly promote the safety of the building and the security of its inmates, still it is evident that they are not indispensably requisite for keeping the schools in operation, since many schools are -conducted successfully without them. Lightning-rods, when erected, constitute a part of the building. They may easily be embraced in the estimates for erecting the building, and paid for out of the school-house fund. Prima facie, the order in question, drawn upon the contingent fund for the erection of a lightning-rod, is invalid. If any fact existed which does not appear upon the face of the order, as that it was issued to supply the place of a lightning-rod become useless by age,
Affirmed.