In re the Extension of the Boundaries

153 So. 2d 809, 247 Miss. 527, 1963 Miss. LEXIS 320
CourtMississippi Supreme Court
DecidedJune 3, 1963
DocketNo. 42716
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 153 So. 2d 809 (In re the Extension of the Boundaries) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Mississippi Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
In re the Extension of the Boundaries, 153 So. 2d 809, 247 Miss. 527, 1963 Miss. LEXIS 320 (Mich. 1963).

Opinion

Lee, P. J.

This is an appeal by the City of Hazlehnrst from a decree of the Chancery Court of Copiah County, dismissing the City’s petition to ratify, approve, and confirm an ordinance, which proposed to enlarge the city limits.

Hardy W. Graves and others filed their objection and protest against the petition for confirmation of the ordinance, raising, in addition to the merits, by what might be termed pleas in bar, two issues, attacking the validity of the proposal as a matter of law.

The court signified its desire to hear and determine the issues as to validity first, and by agreement of the parties and their attorneys, it was stipulated (1) that certain property of the Copiah County School Board, on which were located buildings and facilities for a school bus terminal and repair shop for the schools of the county, was included in the proposed extension, and that consent for such inclusion had not been obtained from the board of trustees thereof. Also, that certain property, leased for a period of ninety-nine years, on which were located the buildings and grounds of an Armory of the National Guard of the State, were included in the proposed extension, and that consent therefor had not been obtained from the governing board or body.

It was further stipulated (2) that the copy of the proposed ordinance of extension as furnished to the printer, was correct but that it did not contain a certificate of the clerk of the city, certifying to said ordinance and did not contain or have affixed thereto the impression of the corporate seal of the city; that the signatures of W. L. Reno, Mayor, and J. A. Wood, Clerk, [532]*532of the City, were mere copies and not genuine, and, as published, the ordinance did not contain a certificate of the clerk of the city certifying to said ordinance or any indication that the imprint of the municipal seal was affixed thereto. For that reason, the ordinance was void.

The court, in a written opinion, held that the school bus terminal and repair shop, with its buildings and facilities, was a state institution; that the National Guard Armory, its buildings and grounds constituted a state institution; and that, since the consent of the respective boards of trustees or governing boards in neither event was obtained, the proposal, under Sec. 3374-18 of the Code, was void.

The appellees cite a number of Mississippi cases, including Harrell v. City of Jackson, 229 Miss. 815, 92 So. 2d 240, and County Board of Education, Jones County v. Smith, 239 Miss. 53, 121 So. 2d 139, 114 So. 2d 613; and certain statutes, as well as decisions from other jurisdictions, for the purpose of showing that school districts are agencies of the state.

Section 3374-18 of the Code is as follows: “No municipality shall hereafter be created or shall hereafter change its boundaries so as to include within the limits of such municipality any of the buildings or grounds of any state institution unless and until consent thereto shall have first been obtained in writing from the board of trustees of such institution, or such other governing-board or body as may hereafter be created for the control of such institution, provided that any proceeding-creating a municipality or enlarging the boundaries of any municipality which does not comply with this statute shall be void and of no effect.”

At the time that Sec. 3374-18, supra, was enacted, it had been provided by Sec. 213-A, Article 8 of the Constitution, that the state institutions of higher learning, under the management .and control of the board of trus[533]*533tees of state institutions consisted of the University of Mississippi, Mississippi State College, Mississippi State College for Women, Mississippi Southern College, Delta State Teachers College, Alcorn Agricultural and Mechanical College, and Mississippi Negro Training School, and any others of like kind which might be thereafter organized or established. Section 6744-03 of the Code provided for a hoard of trustees for the Columbia Training School and the Oakley Training School to he known as the Board of Trustees of Mississippi Training Schools. Section 6944 of the Code provided for a Board of Trustees of State Eleemosynary Institutions, consisting of Ellisville State School for the Feeble Minded at Ellis-ville, the Mississippi Industrial and Training School at Columbia, the State Insane Hospital at Whitfield and Jackson, the East Mississippi State Hospital at Meridian, the Mississippi State Charity Hospital at Jackson, the Mississippi State Charity Hospital at Vicksburg, the South Mississippi Charity Hospital at Laurel, the Natchez Charity Hospital at Natchez, and the Matty-Hersee Hospital at Meridian. Subsequently, Chap. 9, Laws of the Ex. Sess. 1947, amended Sec. 6944, supra, to provide for a hoard of trustees of mental institutions, consisting of Ellisville State School for the Feeble Minded, State Insane Hospital at Whitfield and East Mississippi State Insane Hospital.

In Vail v. City of Jackson, 206 Miss. 299, 40 So. 2d 151, 41 So. 2d 357, one of the objections to the extension of the corporate limits of the City of Jackson was that two state institutions, the Blind Institute and the Institute for the Deaf, with grounds and buildings appurtenant thereto, were in the territory proposed to be annexed; that the governing authorities thereof had not consented to the inclusion; and that the proposal was therefore void under the then Sec.-3383 of the Code, now Sec. 3374-18, supra. But the buildings and grounds then being used by those two institutions were already [534]*534within the corporate limits of the City of Jackson. The title to the acreage from the old Asylum grounds, on which, by legislative act, the Building Commission was directed to erect and equip suitable plants for the use and housing of the Mississippi School for the Blind and the Mississippi School for the Deaf, was still in the Building Commission. The point, which was raised by the appellant, was overruled by the court, counsel for the appellant having frankly said in their brief: “We are not idiotic enough to assert that the State Building Commission is an institution, and we do not believe that the Legislature had little enough sense to entertain the idea that a city ordinance could incorporate a board, composed of men, in a city.”

The Court prefers to use a more euphemistic expression but holds that the legislation did not intend to nullify the extension of municipal limits by the inclusion of an armory or a small plot of land on which transportation vehicles for county schools may be repaired and stored. While these properties belong to state agencies, they are not state institutions within the meaning of the statute. It can be readily seen how such places, as are involved in this controversy, might reap benefits in police protection from inclusion, and suffer no detriments whatever. An opposite result might occur if an institution, such as the University of Mississippi, should be brought within the corporate limits of the adjacent city. Because of local city ordinances, the University might be harassed and encounter serious conflicts in disciplinary matters, to say nothing of other possible detriments.

On the second proposition, namely, the validity of the ordinance, it appears that Secs.

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Bluebook (online)
153 So. 2d 809, 247 Miss. 527, 1963 Miss. LEXIS 320, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-re-the-extension-of-the-boundaries-miss-1963.