Court Opinion

ID: 9761375
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 01:41:03.775182+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:23.242695
License: Public Domain

Dissenting Opinion
SEILER, Judge.
I respectfully dissent and adopt as my dissent the opinion prepared by Judge Houser, Commissioner in Division One. His opinion (without setting it out in *335quotation marks and after removal of those portions which would repeat the facts set forth in the majority opinion) reads as follows:
The junior college district is a body corporate and a subdivision of the state, organized under and possessing the powers, functions and duties as prescribed in §§ 178.770 through 178.890, V.A.M.S. The district was organized June 5, 1964 pursuant to an election held May 26, 1964. Its boundaries include parts of Jackson, Clay, Cass and Platte Counties for a total of 400 square miles. The junior college district comprises Kansas City School District No. 33, Center School District No. 58, and six other school districts (Hickman Mills, Raytown, Grandview, Lee’s Summit, Belton and North Kansas City). Here are the enumeration figures for the junior college district for the years shown:
Component
School District 1963-64 1964-65 1965-66 1966-67
#33 Kansas City 112,815 121,292 123,388 123,754
#58 Center 6,215 6,666 6,903 7,431
R-VII Lee’s Summit 5,475 6,148 6,482 6,875
C-l Hickman Mills 10,553 13,838 15,175 15,634
C-2 Raytown 16,466 19,992 21,599 21,202
C-4 Grandview 5,117 5,788 6,151 6,496
#74 N. Kansas City (Clay) 18,662 21,103 22,633 23,865
#124 Belton (Cass) 2,205 2,443 2,628 2,749
177,508 197,270 204,959 208,006
#33 Kansas City 63.55% 61.48% 60.20% 59.49%
Other 36.45% 38.52% 39.80% 40.51%
The enumeration figures for all of the junior college districts in the state, showing representation of boards of all junior college districts follow:
Total District Largest Component School District
Percent Percentage of
District Enumeration Enumeration Directors age of Directors Enumeration
St. Loms-
33.3% 45.7% St. Louis Co. 336,277 153,656 CVJ
33.3% 48.8% Jasper Co. 20,954 10,224 OJ
33.3% 37.0% Three Rivers 18,005 6,688 CM
50.0% 64.4% Sedalia 8,141 5,248 CO
66.7% 80.0% Mo. Western 28,231 22,619 Tt*
50.0% 63.6% K. C. Mo. 177,508 112,815 CO
(At large) Newton-McDonald
(At large) Jefferson Co.
(At large) Mineral Area
At the present time three of the trustees on the board of defendant junior college district were elected from Kansas City School District No. 33. The other three *336trustees were elected from the remainder of the junior college district.
In Armentrout v. Schooler, Mo.Sup., 409 S.W.2d 138, we extended to seats on a city council the principle that seats in the legislative branch of the state government must be apportioned substantially on the basis of population. In applying the principles of Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U.S. 533, 84 S.Ct. 1362, 12 L.Ed.2d 506; Gray v. Sanders, 372 U.S. 368, 83 S.Ct. 801, 9 L.Ed.2d 821, and Wesberry v. Sanders, 376 U.S. 1, 84 S.Ct. 526, 11 L.Ed.2d 481 et al., to that local organ of government we considered that the Fourteenth Amendment to the federal constitution applies not only to the state but also to every creature of the state to which the latter has delegated powers of government, and reasoned that an elected city council, primarily a legislative body to which broad legislative powers and governmental functions of a general nature have been delegated as an agency, arm or instrumentality of the state, must as a matter of logic be governed in its composition by the same principles applicable to its creator; and that therefore voters selecting representatives to sit on a municipal legislative body are entitled to the same equal protection and rights in casting such votes as those enjoyed by voters on the state level voting on candidates for the offices of representative and senator in state and national legislative bodies.
Now we are called upon to determine whether as a matter of constitutional right this same principle must be further extended and applied to seats on the board of trustees of a junior college district, which is not primarily a legislative body exercising general governmental functions.1
As pointed out in Armentrout, the Equal Protection of the Laws Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment applies to the State of Missouri and to every governmental creature of the state to which it has delegated the powers of government. “The State of Missouri may exercise its legislative powers only through a legislative body apportioned on a population basis, and it logically follows that the agency, arm or instrumentality to which the state delegates some of its powers should be governed by the same principle. Seaman v. Fedourich [16 N.Y.2d 94,] 262 N.Y.S.2d 444, l.c. 449, 209 N.E.2d 778, l.c. 782[4]; Brouwer v. Bronkema, No. 1855, Cir.Ct. Kent County, Michigan, September 11, 1964.” Armen-trout v. Schooler, supra, 409 S.W.2d, l.c. 143. The Wisconsin Supreme Court expressed the same thought in this language: “Since the composition of the legislature must conform to the principle of equal representation, it is logical that the arm or political subdivision of such legislature enacting legislation should be governed by the same principle of equal representation.” State ex rel. Sonneborn v. Sylvester, 26 Wis.2d 43, 132 N.W.2d 249, 256. See also Cooper v. Aaron, 358 U.S. 1, 78 S.Ct. 1401, 3 L.Ed.2d 5. Sections 2 and 25 of Article I, Constitution of Missouri, 1945, also apply to the State and to those of its agencies, arms and instrumentalities to which the State has delegated powers of government.
School districts, including junior college districts, “* * * are public corporations, *337form an integral part of the state, and constitute that arm or instrumentality thereof discharging the constitutionally intrusted governmental function of imparting knowledge and intelligence to the youth of the state that the rights and liberties of the people be preserved.” School Dist. of Oakland v. School Dist. of Joplin, 340 Mo. 779, 102 S.W.2d 909, 910. A junior college district is a creature, a subdivision of the state. § 178.770, V.A.M.S. Its board of trustees exercises the powers delegated to it by the General Assembly. While these powers are primarily administrative in nature, limited by law and relate to the special purpose of education, they include legislative powers of vital importance to the state materially and substantially affecting the lives, property and welfare of the citizenry. The General Assembly could have provided for the exercise of these powers by officials chosen by appointment, or by a combination of the appointive and elective methods of selection, but it did not do so. The General Assembly provided that the officials in whose hands these powers of government are entrusted shall be chosen by a vote of the people. The trustees represent the people of the district and reflect their views. Having been given the right to select their representatives to sit on junior college district boards, the people are entitled to the same protection in the exercise of their suffrage as that enjoyed by voters on the state level voting for their senators and representatives, or voters on the municipal level voting for their city councilmen, without dilution or diminution of the weight of their individual votes because of the mere fact that they happen to reside in a certain school district.
This logical conclusion has the support of substantial and respected authority. The difference between this case and Reynolds v. Sims, supra, is one of degree and not of principle. In addition to the cases and legal scholars upon which we relied in Armentrout, supra, 409 S.W.2d, l.c. 142, 143, several jurisdictions have reached the same result in cases involving the election of school officials.
In Meyer v. Campbell, Iowa Sup. (1967), 152 N.W.2d 617, it was held that county boards of education, selected by popular vote, are direct representatives of the people and that the state and federal constitutions require their election on an equal representation basis. After analyzing Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186, 82 S.Ct. 691, 7 L.Ed.2d 663, Gray v. Sanders, Wesberry v. Sanders, and Reynolds v. Sims, supra, the Iowa Supreme Court considered that “* * * there is nothing in these cases that indicates that the fundamental principle that all men are created equal, and thus accorded an equal vote, should not apply similarly to other inferior bodies that possess legislative power, when the method of their selection is by the elective process. Hanlon v. Towey, 274 Minn. 187, 142 N.W.2d 741 (1966), and citations; State ex rel. Sonneborn v. Sylvester, 26 Wis.2d 43, 132 N.W.2d 249. Since it is a basic principle of representative government that the weight of a person’s vote does not depend on geographical boundaries, it follows logically that any inferior elective body, that is representative of the people, be representative of all the people equally. Seaman v. Fedourich, 16 N.Y.2d 94, 262 N.Y.S.2d 444, 209 N.E.2d 778; Armentrout v. Schooler (Mo.), 409 S.W.2d 138 (1966); Bianchi v. Griffing [D.C., 238 F.Supp. 997]. * * * Since our own legislature chose to make members of the board elective rather than appointive, it intended that these members represent the people and not geographical land areas. Each voter similarly situated is entitled to equal representation.” 152 N.W.2d, l.c. 621. After determining that the primary functions of county boards of education were administrative the court concluded that substantial legislative functions were delegated to them “sufficient to require member selection under the one man-one vote principle announced in Reynolds v. Sims, * * * when the legislature also provided that the mem*338ber be chosen by election.” Ibid, l.c. 622 [8],
In Strickland v. Burns, M.D.Tenn. (1966), 256 F.Supp. 824, it was held that a Tennessee statute providing that the School Commission be composed of 11 members, one commissioner to be elected from each of 11 school zones (which were unequally populated), violated the Fourteenth Amendment. The court stated that “The plaintiffs herein have established that their individual votes in electing members of the Rutherford County School Commission have been substantially diluted by the provisions of the Act complained of. They have established that the only basis for such dilution is their place of residence. No showing has been made by defendants that would justify the discrimination.
“We hold, therefore, that the discrimination existing is invidious. Since we can find no basis for applying the ‘one man, one vote’ rule to the congeries of powers possessed by the Legislature itself and at the same time denying its application to a subordinate body simply because it possesses a fractional part of those powers, so long at least as the fractional part cannot be said to be insignificant or unimportant, we must also hold that the apportionment provisions of the Act complained of are void as violative of rights secured by the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.” 256 F.Supp., l.c. 827.
In Delozier v. Tyrone Area School Board, W.D.Pa. (1965), 247 F.Supp. 30, it was held that the directors of the board of a consolidated school district, elected by popular vote, are subject to the principle of equal representation laid down in Reynolds v. Sims, supra; that a local school district, being the arm or agency of the state to administer its educational system, is not immune from the constitutional requirement. Noting that the principle had been applied to various elective bodies, local, municipal, county and school districts, “where that body is elective and exercises legislative power,” and citing State ex rel. Sonneborn v. Sylvester, 26 Wis.2d 43, 132 N.W.2d 249; Ellis v. Mayor and City Council of Baltimore, D.C.Md. (1964), 234 F.Supp. 945; Brouwer v. Bronkema, Circ. Ct. Kent Co. Mich. (1964); Bianchi v. Griffing, E.D.N.Y. (1963-1965), 217 F. Supp. 166; 238 F.Supp. 997; and Damon v. Lauderdale County Election Commissioners, (Civil Action 1197-E) U.S.D.C., S.D. Miss. (1964), in support of its ruling, the court struck down the plan before the court as violative of the Equal Protection of the Laws Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, wherein one representative would represent several times the voting power of another representative.
Pitts v. Kunsman, E.D.Pa. (1966), 251 F.Supp. 962, a case involving an administrative unit in a school system, recognized the principle that when representatives are elected from individual districts each district under the Fourteenth Amendment, “must then have relatively the same population so as to obtain as nearly as possible equal weight for the franchise of each citizen. [Citing Reynolds v. Sims, Gray v. Sanders, Baker v. Carr, and Delozier v. Tyrone Area School Board.]”
Respondents deny the applicability or pertinence of these decisions, claiming that they either do not make or do not give proper consideration to the distinction between local government units exercising broad, general governmental functions through bodies whose functions are primarily legislative in nature, and local government units essentially administrative in character, organized for a special limited purpose, and they point out that we carefully made that distinction in Armentrout. The argument is that these special purpose bodies “exercise far fewer powers than do general purpose units of government and, therefore, their governing officials, even though they may be elected, are more concerned with administering the special purpose for which such governmental units *339exist than they are with representing and advocating the interests of their constituents”; that the functions of a junior college district are limited and circumscribed; that the state board of education has supervisory control over such districts; that the duties of the trustees are essentially administrative and “not legislative in the classical sense”; that the trustees are elected “not to serve constituencies and advocate their interests in enacting legislation and laws which will be applicable to all persons who live in the district, but to serve as administrators of the district for the limited purpose of providing a two-year college education.” Granting that all of this is true, it does not militate against nor render inapplicable the principle of equal representation. The board of trustees of a junior college district is a representative body. The right in question is the elector’s right to an equal vote in the election of members of a representative body, to which has been delegated a number of legislative powers of vital importance to the State which materially and substantially affect the people of the district.1 The fact that some or most of the functions of the trustees are administrative in nature and that the district is subject to supervisory control by the state board of education does not permit the abridgment of the rights of the electors to equality in casting their votes for members of the board.
The same argument was made as to a county board of supervisors and answered as follows in State ex rel. Sonneborn v. Sylvester, supra, 132 N.W.2d, l.c. 256: “The fact the county also performs administrative functions and is somewhat responsive or subject to the legislature does not justify the denial of the application of the equal-representation principle to county boards. Solely administrative duties would not call forth the application of the principle, nor do these administrative duties or the limited legislative powers destroy the fact that realistically the county today is a unit of government with vital powers over the lives of its residents. Those powers, which it may now exercise or may be given as a legislative body, require in our form of government the principle of equal representation be applied.” In Meyer v. Campbell, supra, the Supreme Court of Iowa, adverting to Gray v. Sanders and Reynolds v. Sims, said 152 N.W.2d, l.c. 624: “It now seems to us the principles which gave rise to those decisions must be applied to our present method of selection of members of the county board of education. Where the election of those members is required, and where as here the legislature provides for the election of these representatives of the people whether their function be considered legislative, quasi-legislative, or primarily administrative, their election must be made on a population basis, not upon area.”
The fact that the governmental unit involved is on the local level and is smaller in size and scope than a governmental body operating on the state level does not make the trustees any less representative of the views of the citizens. As said by Judge Johnson in his dissenting opinion in a case involving county boards of revenue, “To the contrary, rather than limit the principles of Reynolds, as the majority opinion does, it would seem that these principles might well have their most meaningful application at the local level.” Moody v. Flowers, M.D.Ala. (1966), 256 F.Supp. 195, 201.
Respondents further urge that if the principle of representation were to be applied to all local administrative units throughout the United States, such as fire, sewer, water, drainage, and metropolitan districts, and port authorities, “an extremely chaotic situation would be created thereby.” By this decision we are not determining that every unit of local government must be organized on this principle. We are holding that the principle of representation applies to the members of the board of trustees of a junior college dis*340trict to whom are delegated a substantial number of material and important legislative powers, where the board is elected by the vote of the people. Further extension of this principle must be made, if at all, on a case-by-case basis, depending upon the facts in each case. The granting or withholding of constitutional rights, however cannot ever be made to depend upon the time, trouble or inconvenience involved, or whether “chaotic” changes upsetting traditional thought patterns will ensue.
After the argument of this case in division but before its submission en banc the United States Supreme Court handed down Avery v. Midland County, Texas, 390 U.S. 474, 88 S.Ct. 1114, 20 L.Ed.2d 45 extending the principle of representation to the selection of the Midland County, Texas Commissioners Court, which, although the general governing body of the county, has only limited powers. It was stated as beyond question that a state’s political subdivisions must comply with the Fourteenth Amendment. The court broadly held that the Fourteenth Amendment forbids the election of local government officials from districts of disparate size; that “when the State delegates lawmaking power to local government and provides for the election of local officials from districts specified by statute, ordinance or local charter, it must insure that those qualified to vote have the right to an equally effective voice in the election process. If voters residing in oversize districts are denied their constitutional right to participate in the election of state legislators, precisely the same kind of deprivation occurs when the members of a city council, school hoard, or county governing board are elected from districts of substantially unequal population.” (Our italics.) The court turned aside the legislative-administrative argument, demonstrating that while the county commissioners court’s legislative powers are negligible, apparently concentrated on the subject of rural roads, the court does have power to make many decisions having a broad range of impacts on the citizenry generally. While not denying the right of the states to devise mechanisms of local government with varying populations in residential districts, as where the governing body’s functions are essentially administrative in nature or where the scheme is one of at-large voting, the court insisted upon the “requirement that units with general governmental powers over an entire geographic area not be apportioned among single-member districts of substantially unequal population.” This latest expression of the United States Supreme Court on the subject is strong and compelling authority in support of the conclusion we have reached.
Respondents’ reliance upon Sailors v. Board of Education, W.D.Mich. (1966), 254 F.Supp. 17, aff. 387 U.S. 105, 87 S.Ct. 1549, 18 L.Ed.2d 650, is misplaced. The issue was not framed in that case. In Michigan the five-member county board of education is chosen not by the electors of the county but by delegates from the local school boards. The qualified school electors elect the local boards. A majority of the three-judge federal district court panel held that the rule of equal representation was inapplicable and dismissed the complaint. The United States Supreme Court affirmed, but gave no definitive answer to the question now before us. Justice Douglas pointed out that the Michigan system for selecting members of the county school board is basically appointive rather than elective, stating, “If we assume arguendo that where a State provides for an election of a local official or agency — whether administrative, legislative, or judicial — the requirements of Gray v. Sanders and Reynolds v. Sims must be met, no question of that character is presented. * * * Since the choice of members of the county school board did not involve an election and since none was required for these nonlegislative offices, the principle of ‘one man-one vote’ has no relevancy.”
*341The Attorney General argues that the government and control of a junior college district resides in and is exercised by the voters and the legislature; that “[t]he representative body which holds the key governmental powers in junior college districts is the state legislature. If the appellants desire changes to be made in these powers and there [sic] exercise, the appropriate place of redress is the state legislature.” We do not agree. The government and control of a junior college district resides in and is exercised by the board of trustees, under the limitations and controls provided by law. The board of trustees is the representative body which holds the “key governmental powers.” Under the equality clauses of both federal and state constitutions the trustees vested with these powers must be directly representative of the people of the district. Appellants, whose constitutional rights have been violated, are not required to resort to the General Assembly for relief. Any person whose right to vote is impaired has standing to sue in the courts. Gray v. Sanders, 372 U.S. 368, 375, 83 S.Ct. 801, 9 L.Ed.2d 821.
The district contends, however, that the statutory formula for the allocation of trustees is based upon school enumeration, not population, and “therefore, the ‘one man-one vote’ principle which relates to population is not applicable.” The argument is that school enumeration refers to persons who are minors of school age and has nothing whatever to do with population or voters; that there is no reasonable connection or mathematical relationship between the number of students of school age and the number of people or voters resident within a school district, and that the General Assembly had the right in its discretion to use school enumeration as the basis for allocating trustees among the component school districts.
This contention cannot be sustained. The principle of equal representation is fully applicable in the instant situation notwithstanding the statutory formula is based upon school enumeration rather than population. In either event the elected trustees must be apportioned on the basis of population — total population — and not on the basis of any artifical classification that necessarily abridges the principle of equal representation of the people, such as representation according to the number of trees or acres,2 or the number of persons in the district between the ages of six and twenty years. “Population is, of necessity, the starting point for consideration and the controlling criterion for judgment in legislative apportionment controversies.” Reynolds v. Sims, supra, 377 U.S., l.c. 567, 84 S.Ct., l.c., 1384, 12 L.Ed.2d l.c. 530.
The allegation of a population disparity of the proportion alleged by plaintiffs states a claim of invidious discrimination against the voters resident in the larger district, entitling them, on proof or admssion of such a population differential, to a judgment invalidating the statute authorizing election of representatives from such unequally populated districts, whether the statutory formula is based upon population, school enumeration or any other factor. This is for the reason that every elector in the junior college district is entitled to protection against the dilution of the weight of his individual vote in comparison with the weight accorded the votes of others by reason of a general population differential between his school district and other more favored districts, and indeed is entitled to be protected against the diminishing of the weight of his vote by reason of a population differential as to persons between the ages of six and twenty in different districts.
The circuit court therefore erred in sustaining and should have overruled the motions to dismiss the petition.

. A junior college district has the power to sue and he sued, to levy and collect taxes within the limitations of §§ 178.770-178.-890, V.A.M.S., to issue bonds and exercise the same corporate powers as common and six-director school districts, other than urban districts, except as otherwise provided by law, § 178.770; to provide instruction, classes, school or schools, determine per capita cost of college courses, collect approved nonresident tuition fees and charges to resident pupils, § 178.850; to conduct hearings and suspend or expel pupils on disciplinary charges, § 167.161; to make rules and regulations for the organization, grading and government of the district, § 171.011; to let contracts, employ and dismiss teachers and approve bills, § 178.830; to appoint employees and define and assign tlieir powers and duties and fix their compensation, § 178.860; to pass on annexation of school districts to the junior college district, § 162.441, and to acquire real property by condemnation, § 177.041.

. Reynolds v. Sims, supra, 377 U.S., 1, c. 562, 580, 84 S.Ct. 1362.