Court Opinion

ID: 9794316
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 03:03:44.101065+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:14:36.566033
License: Public Domain

MR. JUSTICE BOTTOMLY
delivered the Opinion of the Court.
This is an appeal from the judgment and amended judgment entered in the above-entitled cause in favor of plaintiffs and against defendants, in the district court of the seventh judicial district of the State of Montana, in and for Dawson County High School Building District No. One bond election held on September 19, 1959, in which judgment and decree the district court ordered:
“It is ordered, adjudged and decreed that the Defendants, their attorneys, agents, servants and employees are hereby permanently and perpetually restrained and enjoined from issuing and selling any bonds as authorized by the Dawson County High School Building District No. One bond election held on the 19th day of September, 1959;
“It is further ordered, adjudged and decreed that the Defendants, their attorneys, agents, servants and employees are hereby permanently and perpetually restrained and enjoined from levying any tax assessment for the construction of a new *578high school and for the purchase of any property for the site of said new high school;
“It is further ordered, adjudged and decreed that the defendants, their attorneys, agents, servants and employees are hereby permanently and perpetually restrained and enjoined from further collecting or attempting to collect any and all taxes levied or assessed by the defendants for the construction of the new high school in said High School Building District No. One of Dawson County, Montana, and from holding any election for the purpose of selecting any site for the said new high school and from collecting or attempting to collect a tax and assessment in this cause and from enforcing or attempting to enforce it in any way whatever ;
“It is further ordered, adjudged and decreed that the defendants, their attorneys, agents, servants and employees are hereby permanently and perpetually restrained and enjoined from holding or causing to be held an election for the selection of a site for the said new high school as involved in this cause. ’ ’
And in the amended judgment and decree, the court further ordered:
“It is ordered, adjudged and decreed that the bond election held on the 19th day of September, 1959, is null and void and of no effect.”
This nullifying Order, Judgment, Decree and injunction is based entirely on the grounds and for the reason that the election irregularities charged in the complaint and proven by a preponderance of evidence and, in fact, admitted by the defendants, are in direct violation of the school election laws of the State of Montana; that said irregularities were fatal in the instant ease, not merely immaterial.
Appellants contend there was a common sense compliance with the school election laws, and that such laws should be liberally construed.
This election was a school bond election, held by the board of trustees of Dawson County High School, which is also the *579Board of Trustees of the High School Building District No. One of Dawson County, Montana, held September 19, 1959, to determine a very important matter to every taxpayer, as to whether or not the said Board of Trustees be authorized to issue bonds in the amount of $1,600,000 bearing interest at a rate not to exceed six percent per annum, during a period not exceeding twenty years. The proceeds from the sale of said bonds to be used in erecting and equipping a new high school, and for the purchase of a site for said high school.
The respondents contend that the mandatory provisions of the school bond election laws were not complied with by the judges and clerks of said election. This being a school bond election the laws enacted by our Legislature must be complied with. They are clear, concise and written in the English language, and are plain and unambiguous. This court has said many times when the intent of a law is clear and unambiguous, it means exactly what it says, and needs no interpretation. The school board election law is such a law and the necessary sections of the general election laws necessary for completion are also unambiguous.
The district judge was correct in his judgment and in ordering that the temporary restraining order and injunction be made permanent.
Either the sanctity of the ballot must be preserved and the legislative mandate enforced or we have no law and only agreement in this case as to how the election should be conducted. The legislature in mandatory language set forth the rules and the judges and clerks of school elections must follow them.
Section 75-1612, B..C.M.1947, provides:
“At every election held under this act, a poll-list shall be kept by the judges and clerk at each polling-place, and immediately after the close of the polls the judges shall count the ballots, and if there be more ballots than votes cast the judges must draw by lot from the ballots, without seeing them, sufficient number of ballots to make the ballots remaining correspond *580•with the number of votes cast. The clerk shall write down in alphabetical order in a poll-book provided for that purpose the name of every person voting- at the time he deposits his ballot. There shall also be provided a tally-list for each polling-place; after the ballots have been counted and made to agree with the poll-list the judges shall proceed to count them. The clerk shall enter in the tally-list the name of every person voted for as trustee, and the term, and tally opposite his name the number of votes cast for him, and at the end thereof set down in a column provided for that purpose the whole number of votes he received. The judges and clerk shall sign a certificate to said tally-list, setting forth the whole number of votes east for each person or trustee, designating the term, and they shall verify the same as being- correct, to the best of their knowledge, before an officer authorized to administer oaths. No informality in such certificate shall vitiate the election, if the number of votes received for each person can reasonably be ascertained from said tally-list. Said books and tally-lists shall be returned to the board of trustees of the district, who shall canvass the vote and cause the clerk of the district to issue a certificate of election to the person or persons elected, designating their term, a copy of which must be forwarded to the county superintendent of schools. School trustees are hereby authorized to administer oaths to judges of election.”
The requirements of this section were admittedly not complied with, but on the contrary, the judges and clerks in receiving the ballots at the dose of the election adjourned, taking the ballots from the place where they were cast and the purported election held, to the office of the superintendent of the high school, where, according to the record they took the ballots from the box, turned them right side up, and placed all of the “yes” ballots in one pile and all of the “no” ballots in another separate pile, before the ballots were counted. Then, they disqualified sufficient of the “no” ballots so that the result was that the “yes” ballots carried, whereas, and where*581by, the above section says and commands in no uncertain terms that before the ballots are counted, the voted side must not be seen until the ballots are counted and compared with the list of voters, then they may proceed to count the “yes” and “no” ballots.
The foregoing holding of this election is an absolute contradiction and violation of the above statute, which is admitted. The foregoing violation is only one of the several violations which the district court pointed out. The judge of the lower court did not need to reach or consider the constitutional question raised in the lower court and on this appeal as the statutory requirements on the holding of a school bond election were not complied with. Therefore, we need not consider nor pass upon the constitutional question thereon raised. We will not prolong this opinion, as it would simply encumber the record. Suffice to say that upon the holding of another election, the board of trustees will see to it that the constitutional limitations and statutes will be complied with.
Because of the foregoing facts and circumstances which were brought out fully in the record, and which the district court interpreted correctly, we uphold its judgment in every particular, and in the rendering of the permanent injunction of which we approve. Therefore, the appeal is dismissed and the cause is remanded for compliance with this opinion. It is so ordered.
MR. JUSTICE ADAIR concurs.