Board of Regents of State Soldiers' & Sailors' Monument v. Daily
Board of Regents of State Soldiers' & Sailors' Monument v. Daily
Opinion of the Court
By an act approved. March 3, 1887 (Acts 1887, p. 30), the General Assembly appropriated $200,000.00, “for the purpose of erecting a State Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument, said appropriation to be used in connection with such other funds as have already been, or may hereafter be, donated and contributed for said purpose.”
By an act approved March 7, 1891 (Acts 1891, p. 341), an additional appropriation of $30,000.00 was made for the same purpose; and, by the same act, there was likewise appropriated the sum of five mills upon each one hundred dollars worth of taxable property in the State, to be assessed and collected in each of the years 1891 and 1892, as other taxes are assessed and collected; “which money,” it was there provided, “when collected, shall be placed to the credit of, and known as the State Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument fund, and the same is hereby appropriated for the completion of said State Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument.”
From the complaint, it appears that the funds realized from the five mills tax for Í891 and 1892 amounted to $123,168.84, making the total appropriation by the State $353,168.84.
By the third section of the act of 1891, the board of monument commissioners were required to give bond'in the sum of $100,000.00, conditioned that they would complete the monument, “in every particular, without any further cost or expense to the State of Indiana.”
Finally, by an act in force March 6, 1895 (Acts 1895, p. 134), a board of three regents was substituted for the monument commissioners. In this act it was provided that the regents should serve without pay, except that they should be reimbursed for their necessary expenses, and that the president of the board should receive a yearly salary of $1,500.00, “to be paid from any moneys in the State treasury not otherwise appropriated.” It was further provided that the regents should discharge all obligations incurred by their predecessors, the commissioners, “and carry to completion, as far as may be desirable and practicable, the work heretofore entrusted to their supervision and control, and in accordance with the laws under which they acted.”
Relying upon the provisions of the several statutes above referred to, the board of regents brought their action in the Marion Circuit Court for a writ of mandate to require the Auditor of State, “to transfer several sums of money paid by the State of Indiana upon warrants issued by said defendant [the appellee, Auditor of State], namely f6,000.00 to Bruno Schmitz, of Berlin, Prussia, and $2,500.00 to the Connersville Blower Company — classified as merely incidental expenses — from the fund known as the ‘Monument Fund,’ and to charge the same to and against the fund known as the ‘General Fund,’ in the treasury of the State of Indiana; and further commanding the defendant herein to draw a warrant in favor of the Capi
To the alternative writ issued in compliance with the petition of the appellant, the appellee filed'his answer and return, from which it appears that on or about the 22nd of May, 1896, the board of regents entered into contract with Bruno Schmitz, of Berlin, Prussia, to make and place in position upon the monument the groups of “War” and “Peace” and reliefs, according to designs and models accepted by the board, to be of the best Indiana oolitic limestone, and to be duly prepared and finished, and properly fitted and put in place upon the monument, and entirely completed by said Bruno Schmitz on the 1st day of August, 1898.
In the contract set out in the return, it is shown that Bruno Schmitz agreed “to do and furnish, or cause to be done and furnished, all incidental work of every kind, character and description relating to the making and putting in place, on said monument of said groups
The return also sets out the contract of the board with the Connersville Blower Company for the purchase, for $2,500.00, of two cycloidal rotary pumps; and avers that they were to be placed in the crypt of the monument, and used to pump water from the wells to the fountains on either side of the monument.
The contract with the Capital Machine Company for the purchase, for $3,100, of two gas engines, is also set out in the return; and it is averred that the engines were to be attached to the pumps aforesaid and so furnish power to supply water for the fountains. It is further averred that the fountains are a part of the original plan of the architect for the monument, and that the same are intended and designed to be and remain a permanent part of said monument and the decorations thereof. It is alleged in the writ, and is admitted in the return, that, of the' amount appropriated for the construction and completion of the monument, there remains in the State treasury, to the credit of the monument fund, the sum of $70,327.09.
In the petition and writ it is alleged that the cost of the pumps and gas engines and also the first, second, and fourth items, or installments, of the sum of $60,000.00 paid, or to be paid, to Bruno Schmitz are incidental expenses of the building of the monument,
The contract with Bruno Schmitz provided that the $60,000.00, to become due him for the groups of “War” and “Peace” and reliefs should be paid in nine installments, as follows: (1) At delivery of sketches, $6,000.00; (2) at completion in clay, one-third natural size, of first group, $8,000.00; (3) at completion of first group, in plaster of Paris, natural size, $7,000.00; (4) at completion, in clay, one-third natural size, of second group, $8,000.00; (5) at completion of second group, in plaster of Paris, natural size, $7,000.00; (6) at delivery and placing in position on monument of stone for first group, $5,000.00; (7) at delivery and placing of stone for second group, $5,000.00; (8) at completion of.work on first group, $7,000.00; (9) at completion of second group, $7,000.00.
The contract was for the whole work; and it would seem that the payments were to be made in install
The appellants, however, now contend that the action then taken was erroneous, and that the pay
Certain decisions of this court are cited in support of the contention that the items referred to should be classed as incidentals, and not as structural, expenses. The cases cited were of an unusual character, involv
In the act of March 14, 1877, for the erection of the State-house (Acts 1877, Sp. Sess., p. 68), it was provided, amongst other things, that “when it becomes necessary they [the State-house commissioners] shall cause the old building to be removed, and they shall provide temporary quarters for the General Assembly, and for the officers now occupying the present building.” The act contemplated the erection' of the State-house at a cost not to exceed $2,000,000.00. In Williams v. Mansur, 70 Ind. 41, the question was whether, in view of those provisions of the act, the rent of the temporary quarters provided for some of the State officers should be paid out of the new Statehouse fund, or out of the general fund. It would seem that this rent was clearly an incidental 'expense, and that the authority given the commissioners to select such necessary quarters for the transaction of the business of the State was a sufficient appropriation for payment of the rent out of the general fund. The court, however, held that the rent should be paid out of the fund raised for the erection of the new Statehouse. The foregoing decision was somewhat miodified in Board, etc., v. Whittaker, 81 Ind. 297, where it was held “that it was the legislative intention, that the sum of $2,000,000.00 might be expended in the construction of the new State-house; and that, in ad
In Campbell v. Board, etc., 115 Ind. 591, it was held that the $200,000.00 appropriated by the act of 1887 for the erection of the Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument must “be devoted to the structural work of the monument, and hence,not to merely incidental expenses, which do not enter into the cost value of the edifice, and which must be otherwise paid.” The incidental expenses there in controversy were, “the salaries of such commissioners, the salary of their secretary, and other incidental expenses.”
Following these cases, came Henderson v. Board, etc., 129 Ind. 92, 13 L. R. A. 169, where it was held that the act of 1887, making the $200,000.00 appropriation for the monument, authorized, by implication the payment out of the general fund in the State treasury of incidental expenses connected with the building of the monument. The items there in controversy, and allowed as incidental expenses, were the following: Payment of architects, commissioners’ per diem, traveling and hotel expenses, engineering, experts, attorneys, office and miscellaneous, secretary’s salary, printing and stationery, superintendence, advertising, and removal of the Morton monument.
Without questioning the correctness of the foregoing decisions, we are unable to see that they have any application to the case before us. There is here no question of salary, or other expense regarded as incidental in those cases. Indeed it would seem that the last act of the legislature, supra (Acts 1895, p. 134), was expressly directed against the allowance of any incidentals, except as in the act itself particularly
It is at least certain, as we think, looking at all the acts of the legislature upon the subject, that the items of expense here in controversy cannot be regarded as incidental. They are parts of the total cost of the monument, and to be paid for out of the fund appropriated by the General Assembly “for the completion and decoration of the said Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument and surrounding grounds in such manner as the said board of commissioners may designate.” The groups of “War” and “Peace” and reliefs are to be put in place in the monument, under a single contract, for .$60,000.00. Every item of that contract is essential, and not incidental, to “the completion-and decoration of the said Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument.” The fountains, too, are parts of the original plans of the architect for the “decorations of the said Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument and surrounding grounds;” and hence the pumps and engines, without which the fountains could not exist, are also essential, and not merely incidental, to the completion and decoration of the monument and grounds. The items in controversy should therefore be paid out of the monument fund, and not out of the general fund in the State treasury. Judgment affirmed.
Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.