Imperial Valley press., 1933-10-25
REASONS FOR ORDERING RECALL
SET OUT IN COURTS DECISION

retary of said original and dupli-
cate sections of said recall petition,
made the petition a public document
in the files of said district. An Or
der OF court restoring the lost por-
tions of the petition was not neces-
sary to give it validity. The loss or
destruction of such public records
did not effect their validity or ef-
fectiveness. Estate of Haywood, 154
Cal. 312, 315). Secondary evidence
of the contents of said petition
could be received and acted upon
by the board of directors of said dis
trict (Sec. 1855. Code of Civil Pro-
cedure; Hibernia Savings, etc Bank
V. Boyd, 155 Cal. 1889.
Respondents rest their conten-
ton for the propriety of said judg-
ment upon the provisions Of section
28la of the irrigation district act,
which provides that the secretary
shall examine the petition and he
shall attach to said petition his cer-
tificate showing the result of said
examination; also If the petition
shall be found to be sufficient, the
secretary shall submit the same to
the board of directors without de-
lay, whereupon the board shall
forthwith cause a special election to
be held > We think that the
construction contended for is en-
tirely too technical When the board
examines the certificates of the Sec
retary and hears the evidence of the
loss or destruction of the petition,
or any material portion thereof, and
concludes therefrom that a suffi-
cient petition was filed and proper
ly certified, the same may be said
to be. in law submitted to said
board.
The Judgment is reversed.
Preston, j.
I'VE concur: Curtis, j., Seawell, j.,
Langdon, j.; Waste, c.. j.; Thomp-
son." j.
Decision in the Morrow case fol-
lows:
"ThiS is an original proceeding
seeking preemptory writ of man.
date requiring respondents, as the
full board of directors of the I'M
perial Irrigation district. to forth
with meet as such board and call
a special election to determine whe-
ther Burleigh E. Adams should be
recalled as a director from the
fourth division of said district, and
his successor elected. Directors
Hewes and Young have not ap-
peared. The other three members
of the board have answered. How
ever, respondents do not question
the Sufficiency of the petition, nor
of the certificate of the secretary
of the board, nor the fact that the
board has failed to act, nor that
they will not act without an order
of court directing them to do SO.
The answer sets up the proceeding
this day determined (Box VS.. Nc
Iver, Cal. Dec).
From the situation as therein set
forth, it is urged that the second
petition, the one here involved,
should not be entertained or acted
upon until the first petition, the
one involved in said Box case, has
been disposed of by proper action
of the board. 1t is unnecessary to
give detailed account of these
proceedings. 1t sufficies to say
that prior to the filing of the pres
ent petition a petition for the iden-
tical purpose was filed with the
secretary of the district, was eX-
amined by him, and determined to
be sufficient, but before the COM
pletion of his certificate thereon IL
sections of the petition, containing
some CAT names, were purloined
from the files of the district. The
secretary nevertheless proceeded to
make his certificate setting forth
the loss or destruction of the docu-
ments and filed same with the
board of directors. AT this point
the above mentioned proceeding
was commenced (Box VS.. McIver,
supra to permanently restrain the
calling of special election until
the lost documents were restored to
the files or the loss accounted for
by decree of court. Judgment was
granted therein as asked. An ap-
peal was taken and said judgment
has, aforesaid, been this day re-
versed (Box VS.. McIver, SUPRA.
The petition and certificate in
volved in the instant proceeding
are sufficient and hence no justifi-
cation can be found for the failure
of the board to act thereon and
proceed to call the special election.
The fact that two valid petitions
may be on file at the same time
does not warrant refusal to act
if either of them is sufficiently
certified. When the election is
called under one petition, any
other petition for the same purpose
then on file or in existence, be-
comes functus officio.
The provisions of Sec. 28is of