Case ID: ohio-st_61/html/0384-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "By The Court :", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

State of Ohio ex rel., v. Orr.
    
      Member of council — Removal from ward — Deemed to have resigned — Result of vacancy — Powers of municipality.
    
    1. A municipality has power to provide by ordinance, that a member of council who removes without his ward shall be deemed to have resigned his office.
    2. The fact of removal being conceded, the office may be regarded and treated as vacant, and the number of members of council thereby reduced accordingly.
    3. Where there is such a vacancy, a quorum will consist of a majority of all the members elected and remaining qualified.
    (Decided December 19, 1899.)
    In Quo Warranto.
    The city of Piqua is divided into five wards, and each ward is entitled to two members in the council, thus making the full council to consist of ten members. At the April election for the year 1898, a Mr. Crow was elected a member of the council for the Second ward, being the ward in which he then resided. He duly qualified, but shortly thereafter removed with his family into the fifth .ward, where he has ever since resided. An ordinance of the city passed in 1854, provides that a councilman who removes from his ward shall be deemed to have resigned his office. No election was held to fill the vacancy caused by the removal of Mr. Crow from the Second to the Fifth ward.
    After the April election for the year 1899, the council met for organization, and the clerk called the roll of the members who held over and three of them answered. He also called the names of the newly elected members, and two of them answered, and came forward and were duly qualified, so that there were five members of the council present. Thereupon the council proceeded with the five members present to organize, and all five of them voted for William P. Orr, defendant, for president of the council, he at the time being one of the five who were present. Other officers were elected by the same vote, and the council proceeded to business. Some of the absent members claimed that five did not constitute a quorum, and questioned the legality of the said election, and thereupon a proceeding in quo warranto was instituted by the Attorney General in this court, to oust Mr. Orr from the said office of president of the council.
    
      F. S. Monnett, Attorney General; A. C. Buchanan and George S. Long, for plaintiff.
    
      C. B. Jamison and R. A. Harrison, for defendant.
   By The Court :

Section 1680, Eevised Statutes, provides that “A member of the council or board of aldermen must be a resident of the corporation for which he is elected, and if the corporation is divided into wards or districts, then a resident of the ward or district for which he is elected.” This seems to mean that a member of council must be a resident of his ward, not only when elected, but also that he must remain such resident; and then the statute is supplemented by the ordinance of the city, which provides that a councilman who removes without his ward shall be deemed to have resigned his office. It being conceded in this case that Mr. Crow had removed out of his ward, it must follow that he thereby ceased to be a member of the council, the same as if he had resigned. After such removal and failure to fill the vacancy, the council consisted of only nine members, only that number having been elected. Section 1675, Revised Statutes, provides that “a majority of all the members elected shall constitute a quorum for the transaction of business.”

Five being a majority of nine, it follows that a quorum was present, and that Mr. Orr was elected president of the council by a majority of all the members elected to the council, and that his election was therefore valid.

Demurrer to the anstoer overruled and petition dismissed.