Lovelace v. . Pratt

Hoke, J. The Consolidated Public School Law (chapter 136, Laws-1923, article 23) provides, in effect, that when the outstanding indebtedness created prior to the year 1923 for the necessary expenses of conducting a six-months school in the respective counties, shall exceed the sum of $10,000, the boards of county commissioners are authorized, empowered and directed to fund the same by issuing the serial notes of the county, or serial bonds thereof, for the amount of such indebtedness, and to levy annually a special ad valorem tax on all the tangible property of the county sufficient to pay said obligations, principal and interest as they mature, and that such tax shall be in addition to all other taxes authorized by law to be levied in said county. And, further, that when the note or notes of a county have been issued for funds borrowed to erect school buildings at the request of the board of education, and required to provide for the necessary school buildings to maintain a six-months school, the said notes are in all respects validated and may be funded as authorized and directed by this article. On perusal of the record, the facts bring the case clearly within these statutory provisions; and it appearing further that the indebtedness was *689 contracted for tbe erection of buildings within two regular school districts of the county, and that they were necessary to a proper maintenance of a six-months school in the same, as required by Article IX of the Constitution, it was fully within the power of the Legislature to assume this indebtedness and direct that it be provided for by the respective counties as administrative units of the public-school system of the State. Lacy v. Bank, 183 N. C., 373; Jones v. Comrs., 137 N. C., 579. ¥e are cited by counsel for the plaintiff to several decisions of the Court in which it was held that the erection of school buildings is not a necessary municipal expense, and therefore a county cannot be brought under this indebtedness without the approval of the electorate, as required by Article VII, section 7, of the Constitution; but without impingement on those decisions or the principle they really present and uphold, the later and .authoritative cases are to the effect that they do not apply to an indebtedness incurred by legislative authority in carrying on the public-school system of the State and the necessary maintenance of a six-months school term, as required by the Constitution. In the case of State Treasurer Lacy v. Bank, supra, the Legislature had provided for a building fund for educational purposes of $5,-000,000, to be loaned to the counties of the State for the erection of necessary and adequate school buildings, the counties to execute their bonds to repay the State amounts advanced to them under the act. It was urged that the act was unconstitutional in that a county indebtedness was thereby created without the sanction of popular vote, and in disapproval of the position the Court said: “Nor can the second objection of appellant be allowed to prevail, that the statute will impose upon the counties of the State an obligation to repay the amount of money loaned to them without a vote of the people therein as required by Article VII, section 7, of the Constitution. It is said by a writer of approved merit that a constitution shall be construed on broad and liberal lines, and so as to give effect to the intention of the people who adopted it. Black on Interpretations (3 ed.), pp. 75 and 76. And to that end it is held that the instrument should be considered as a whole and construed so as to allow significance to each and every part of it if this can be done by any fair and reasonable intendment. “Applying the principle, the restrictions contained in this Article VII, section 7, which prohibits counties, cities and towns, or other municipal corporations, from contracting debts or levying taxes except for necessary expenses unless approved by a majority of the qualified votes therein, must be understood to refer to debts and taxes in furtherance of local measures, and- do not extend to a State-wide measure of *690 the instant kind, undertaken in obedience to a separate provision of the Constitution, and in which the counties are, as stated, expressly recognized as the governmental units through which the general purpose may be made effective. “The position is presented and clearly approved in principle in the Gollie case, supra,. There and at that time there was, in Article Y, section 1, of the Constitution, a limitation on the rate of taxation for general State and county purposes which at times, and in that instance, operated to prevent the maintenance of the public schools for the constitutional term of four months (since changed to six), and the Court held that in order to harmonize the two provisions and to allow each its proper significance, the general limitation must yield s.o as to permit a sufficient tax levy to maintain a school for the specified school term expressly required by Article IS of the Constitution. In the various decisions of the Court in which it has held that the incurring of debts, levying of taxes by counties or other municipal corporations were not to be regarded as necessary expenses within the meaning of Article VII, section 7, of the Constitution, they were either cases of cities or towns or special districts, or the purpose was to provide means for maintaining schools longer than the constitutional term, or they were cases of some school in a special locality enacted without any reference in maintaining a State-wide school system for any specified term, and in which the constitutional requirement in question was in no way presented or considered.” We regard the principle so stated as controlling on the facts of the present record. What the Legislature may authorize it can as a rule ratify and approve, Board of Education v. Comrs., 183 N. C., 300, and having taken over and used these school buildings as part of the public school system, it having been established or admitted that the same are necessary to a proper maintenance of the six months school term, it has in our opinion the power to assume and direct the payment of the indebtedness as it has done, and without the approval of the local vote. Affirmed.