Stewart v. Ne Smith
Stewart v. Ne Smith
Opinion of the Court
Appellant here appeals from a final judgment dismissing his petition for mandamus directed to appellee as chairman of the Blount County Democratic Executive Committee. The court had sustained a demurrer to his petition, which he declined to amend, thus causing the dismissal. That is one method of reviewing a ruling of the court sustaining a demurrer to a petition or complaint. The ruling is assigned as error and both it and the final judgment are in sufficient form to support the appeal and a basis for the assignment of error.
The question involved presents the constitutionality of two local acts applicable to Blount County. Both acts relate to the county board of education of that county. Act No. 227, approved August 8, 1955, Acts 1955, page 535, provides that the members of the board of education for that county shall be nominated and elected by the electors of the county at large. There is no provision as to his residence in any certain school district of the county. If that Act were valid it would repeal the other local act referred to above. That is Act No. 447, approved August 17, 1951, Acts 1951, page 799. The 1951 Act staggers the election of members of the board, so that only one such member shall be elected at a general election. It requires each such member of the board of education to be elected at the specified general election by the qualified electors of the entire county under the general election laws of the State, but such member must be nominated by the qualified electors of the “commissioner’s district * * * of Blount County as now fixed and designated by law”, and must be a resident citizen and qualified elector of the designated district for which he is nominated and elected. The Act says nothing about school districts.
The case of Kyle v. Wiggins, 212 Ala. 116, 102 So. 145, does not answer the question here presented. There the Court was dealing with an act which, in terms, provided for separate school districts. The Act here in question does not so provide, unless its reference to commissioner’s districts is an adoption of them as school districts within the meaning of section 104(22) of the Constitution. We see no reason why the law cannot require the members of the board of education to reside in separate commissioner’s districts and be nominated there.
We cannot agree with the contention made that the Act of 1951 establishes separate school districts within the meaning of section 104(22) of the Constitution. It is evident that the Act of 1951 was patterned after Act No. 173, approved March 15, 1939, Local Acts 1939, page 98, in which the election of county commissioners is similarly provided for in commissioner’s districts. Upon that theory, we think the trial court correctly held that the Act of 1951 did not violate section 104(22) of the Constitution. The judgment should be affirmed.
Affirmed.
Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.