Court Opinion

ID: 9614803
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 04:28:27.833735+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:03:39.082458
License: Public Domain

Benham, Justice.
This is an appeal from an order invalidating an election.
1. Election returns carry a presumption of validity. Cowart v. City of Waycross, 159 Ga. 589 (126 SE 476) (1924). OCGA § 21-3-420 governs the procedural parameters of an election contest:
A petition to contest the results of a primary or election shall be filed in writing with the city clerk within five days after the results of the election are declared by the governing authority. . . .
In the present case, when the election results were declared on Monday, December 10, 1990, the appellees had through Monday, December 17, to file a petition because the fifth day fell on Saturday, December 15. However, appellees did not file the petition until December 18. In Schloth v. Smith, 134 Ga. App. 529 (215 SE2d 292) (1975), the Court of Appeals determined that since the contestants failed to comply with the statute’s five-day limit, the trial court lacked jurisdiction over the contest. Accordingly, under OCGA § 21-3-420 and the principle stated in Schloth, the trial court in this case was without jurisdiction to decide the merits of the statutory election contest.
Appellees’ argument that appellants’ fraud tolled the five-day limit of OCGA § 21-3-420 is not sustained by the record.
The record in this case, when applied to the controlling statutory and case law authority, demands the conclusion that the untimeliness of the challenge prevented the trial court from ever obtaining jurisdiction over the challenge. The trial court erred, therefore, in setting aside the election under the authority of OCGA § 21-3-420.
*6822. The superior court also erred in rendering its order based in equity. Equity will not take cognizance of a plain legal right where an absolute and complete remedy is provided by law. OCGA § 23-1-4. In Sherrer v. Hale, 248 Ga. 793 (285 SE2d 714) (1982), this court concluded that equitable relief is improper if the complainant has a remedy at law which is “adequate,” i.e., as practical and as efficient to the ends of justice and its prompt administration as the remedy in equity. In the present case, the procedure mandated by OCGA § 21-3-420 provides an adequate remedy at law. It follows that the trial court was without authority to exercise equitable jurisdiction.
3. Since the trial court did not have jurisdiction over either the statutory contest (because appellees did not file their petition within the statutory period of limitation) or the equitable claim (because an adequate remedy at law was available), its judgment must be reversed.

Judgment reversed.

All the-Justices concur.