Court Opinion

ID: 9574815
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:08:33.840236+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:45:17.056579
License: Public Domain

LATIMER, Justice.
I concur.
I believe it well to emphasize the concept that the right to condemn property is in derogation of common rights and permits the taking away from a land-owner the property he desires to retain. A man’s home may be taken by the state or one of its political subdivisions if the governing body believes it necessary for a public purpose. This is a drastic method of taking when considered from the viewpoint of the person whose property is condemned. Accordingly, we must jealously guard the individual’s rights and not infer the authority unless the express purpose of the legislation demands that the power be vested in the school board.
In the present litigation we are faced with inferring that the legislature intended to grant to the Board of Education of Salt Lake City the right to condemn property outside of the district for school purposes. The legislative history of schools and school districts in this state argues otherwise. Most legislation dealing with school boards and districts suggests that the power and authority of the board cannot be exercised beyond the territorial limits of a particular district. The only principal exception that I find in the statutes is the authority granted to adjoining school districts to construct and operate schools jointly for the benefit of the children of all districts. This grant of authority seems to me to negative the inferential grant of the power to condemn outside of a district as the legislative enactment only permits the right when exercised jointly with other adjoining districts. Whether under the perculiar circumstances of this case the Salt Lake City School District could *358obtain the ends it now seeks by a bona fide agreement with the adjoining school district to condemn the land and joint-; ly construct and operate this school is not before us and I, therefore, express no opinion as to that question.
If limiting a school board to condemnation within its district were to detract from, interfere with, or destroy the grant of authority to operate schools and construct school buildings, then I could see some good reason for inferring the right. But I neither can find, nor has anyone suggested, why it should be anticipated by a legislative body that the operations of a school board would be crippled by being unable to condemn property in other districts. True, we have a peculiar geographical situation facing us in this instance. But, concepts cannot be warped to meet individual needs and peculiarities.