Glover v. Board of Education

84 N.W. 761, 14 S.D. 139, 1900 S.D. LEXIS 18
CourtSouth Dakota Supreme Court
DecidedDecember 31, 1900
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 84 N.W. 761 (Glover v. Board of Education) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering South Dakota Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Glover v. Board of Education, 84 N.W. 761, 14 S.D. 139, 1900 S.D. LEXIS 18 (S.D. 1900).

Opinion

Fuller, P. J.

At the conclusion of a contempt proceeding, based upon an alleged violation of a peremptory writ of mandamus, an order was entered discharging the defendants, and plaintiff appeals. In the manner provided by the rules of this court, appellant has fully presented the record essential to a determination of every [140]*140material question, and nothing in the way of costs will be allowed for the printing of respondent’s two additional abstracts. On the 17th day of January, 1900, appellant’s son George W. Glover, Jr., was suspended from the public schools of the city of Lead for the sole reason that he refused to furnish satisfactory evidence of vaccination. At the hearing of an orderly proceeding for a mandamus made returnable fifteen days after the suspension, respondents tacitly conceded that at and prior to the time the boy was suspended there was no “case of smallpox in the city of Lead, or in said Lawrence county, and said alleged order is needless, and without justification, as a sanitary or preventive measure, and was issued by said board without cause, and without authority of law, and is unjust and oppressive.” Upon the affidavit, from which we quote this admission, and with the consent of respondents’ counsel, a peremptory writ of mandamus issued on the 2nd day of February, 1900, commanding such school board and superintendent to “immediately admit to the public schools of the said city of Lead the said George W. Glover, Jr., as a pupil, without requiring of him a certificate of vaccination or compliance with the order of said board of education requiring pupils of said schools to be vaccinated.” Conformable to this mandate, the boy was permitted to return to school, where he was received as a pupil on the 5th day of February, but in the afternoon of the same day he was presented with the following notice: “Lead, So. Dak., Feb. 5, 1900. George W. Glover: By order of the board of education of the city of Lead, passed February 3, 1900, you are refused admission as a pupil of the public schools of the city of Lead until you present satisfactory proof of your vaccination against smallpox, [signed] C. M. Pinkerton, Superintendent.” By a demurrer to the verified answer and return of respondents to the order to show cause why they should not be adjudged guilty of a contempt [141]*141of court for a violation of its mandate, appellant admits that subsequently to the service thereof, and before his son had been readmitted to the schools in compliance therewith for a day, most alarming local sanitary conditions were officially brought to their attention by the service of resolutions and orders of the state, county, and city boards of health, respectively showing that smallpox was then prevalent in the vicinity of the city, and requiring the health authorities to exclude all children and pupils from the public schools who fail or refuse to furnish satisfactory evidence of vaccination. The resolution of the respondent board, passed at a regular session held on the 3rd day of February, 1900, provides for vaccination without expense to indigent pupils, and the only reason why appellant refused to permit his son to comply with the order was that he rejects as fallacious the medical theory that vaccination is necessary to prevent the' dissemination of smallpox. For the purpose of presenting to the trial court their reasons for the belief that an emergency existed on the 5th day of February, when for the second time appellant was suspended, and to show their good faith in the matter, respondents recite in their verified return the following, which is admitted by the demurrer: “That at the time the said orders herein-before referred to, and each of them, was made, there was, and still is, at the present time imminent and impending danger of an epidemic of smallpox in the city of Lead, which said disease is of a contagious and infectious character, and reasonable ground to suspect and believe such an epidemic would take place there; that at that time, as these defendants are creditably informed, and believe, and also at the present time, there was and is now an epidemic of smallpox raging in the states of Iowa and Minnesota, near the line of this state on the east; that there are some cases in the eastern part of this state, quite a number in Sioux Falls, this state, some cases in Oma[142]*142ha and Lincoln, Nebraska, and in a number of towns in the central and western portions of Nebraska, and that said disease is spreading westward along the line of the railroads in said state, and that there was and is now an epidemic of said disease in Butte, Montana, on the west, from which many people are dying; that the city of Lead is a minig town of about 7,000 inhabitants, a large proportion of whom are miners, and travel from one mining town to another; that the city of Butte, Montana, where said epidemic is now raging, is also a mining town, and many persons are traveling from Butte city to Lead city, and that there is and was great reason to fear that said disease would be brought to Lead, and that if one case was start-in Lead city it would be almost sure to result in a dangerous and destructive epidemic; that these defendants have read letters from Butte, Montana, stating that there were 163 cases of smallpox in the pest house there, the number having grown from sixty-six to 163 since January 25, 1900, and many other persons, who are not in the pest house, which letters were written to the board of health of Lawrence county, or to members of said board, and have seen quite a number of people who have come to Lead city from said Butte city within a short time past; that there is railroad communication between the city of Lead and Butte city, and that, as defendants believe, it takes less than twenty-four hours to make that trip from one of the said cities to the other; that defendants are informed and believe that at the time said orders were made the state board of health, the county board of health, and the board of health of the city of Lead had good and reasonable grounds to suspect and believe, and did suspect and believe, that an epidemic of smallpox would break out in the city of Lead, and that they still have reason to fear and do fear that said epidemic of smallpox will break out in the city of Lead; that [143]*143about 900 pupils attend the Lead city schools and 98 per cent, have complied with the orders; that said rules and orders were not made to distress or oppress any citizen, but were made in good faith, for the purpose of protecting the inhabitants of Lead from the ravages of a dread disease, and for no other purpose whatever.”

The statute requires the state board of health to make and enforce such orders as tend to prevent the spread of contagious, infectious, or malarial diseases, and to isolate by quarantine any person affected with a contagious or infectious disease. Over the several boards of health established by the act, and given similar powers in cities, villages, and towns, and the county boards of health of the several counties, the state board is given general supervisory powers, and any violation of a rule or regulation made to prevent the spread of such diseases constitutes a misdemeanor punishable “by a fine of not more than one hundred dollars, or by imprisonment in the county jail for not more than six months, or by both such fine and imprisonment, in the discretion of the court.” Chapter 96, Laws 1895.

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Related

Rhea ex rel. Rhea v. Board of Education
171 N.W. 103 (North Dakota Supreme Court, 1919)
Streich v. Board of Education of Independent School District
147 N.W. 779 (South Dakota Supreme Court, 1914)
Carr v. District Court
126 N.W. 791 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1910)
Osborn v. Russell
68 P. 60 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1902)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
84 N.W. 761, 14 S.D. 139, 1900 S.D. LEXIS 18, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/glover-v-board-of-education-sd-1900.