Opinion ID: 1672216
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: whether the state of mississippi and its officials are equitably estopped from asserting the statute of limitations has run.

Text: The Appellants next contend that the State is equitably estopped from asserting a claim is barred by the statute of limitations where the State's conduct induced the plaintiff[s] to refrain from exercising their claim. Rhodes v. Guiberson Oil Tools Division, 927 F.2d 876, 878 (5th Cir.1991). They assert that the doctrine of equitable estoppel is premised on the maxim that no man may take advantage of his wrong. Glus v. Brooklyn Eastern District Terminal, 359 U.S. 231, 232, 79 S.Ct. 760, 762, 3 L.Ed.2d 770 (1959). The principle is that where one party has by his representations or his conduct induced the other party to a transaction to give him an advantage which it would be against equity and good conscience for him to assert, he would not in a court of justice be permitted to avail himself of that advantage. And although the cases to which this principle is to be applied are not as well defined as could be wished, the general doctrine is well understood and is applied by courts of law as well as equity where the technical advantage thus obtained is set up and relied on to defeat the ends of justice or establish a dishonest claim. Id. at 234, 79 S.Ct. at 762. The Appellants claim the State is equitably estopped from asserting the statute of limitations against their claims. In 1875, with five years remaining on the statute of limitations to sue the State for payment of the Union Bank and Planters' Bank bonds, the State procured passage of a constitutional amendment prohibiting payment of these bonds. Neither the Appellants, nor their predecessors, filed suit as a result of this prohibition. Further, the Appellants allege that because the State deterred any litigation attempts to collect on these bonds with the passage of the amendment, it cannot now invoke the statute of limitations when the lower court ruled that the amendment was unconstitutional. While articulating the correct explanation of the doctrine of equitable estoppel, the Appellants' argument is misplaced. The State did not induce the bondholders to abstain from filing suit to protect their rights and collect the duly owed debt. There is nothing in Section 258 of the Mississippi Constitution that prohibited the bondholders from filing suit to protect their claim. The language of that section merely prohibited payment of the debt if a claim is made. In White, this Court held that the savings statute contemplates one disabled to sue at all, not a rule of law that says they will lose if they do. White, 601 So.2d at 865. The bondholders were not personally prohibited from suing, only from collecting had they sued within the statutory time frame. The constitutionality, or lack thereof, of Section 258 of the Mississippi Constitution should have been attacked within the statutory time frame allowed by Chapter XXVI of the Laws of Mississippi of 1873. The bondholder's cause of action came into being at the time the interest came due on the bonds and the State failed to pay. No suit was brought. The next claim came into existence when the State failed to pay when the debt came due on the bonds themselves. Again, no suit was brought. The seven-year statute of limitations went into effect in 1873, and no suit was filed to protect the claims and rights of the bondholders. One who fails to act diligently cannot invoke equitable principles to excuse that lack of diligence. Baldwin County Welcome Center v. Brown, 466 U.S. 147, 151, 104 S.Ct. 1723, 1726, 80 L.Ed.2d 196 (1984). The bondholders did not file suit to protect their rights within the statutory time period. Therefore, this Court will not allow them to use equitable principles to circumvent their lack of diligence in bringing their suit over one hundred years after the statute of limitations has run. Contrary to what the Appellants suggest, there was no active misleading of the bondholders by the State by enacting section 258 of the Mississippi Constitution. If there was any doubt as to the meaning or constitutionality of the above mentioned section, a claim should have been made within the statutory time frame in order to preserve the bondholders' rights to any payment that was justly owed to them by the State. This issue is without merit.