Fitch v. Flanders
Fitch v. Flanders
Opinion of the Court
The questions raised by the defendant upon the trial in the county court, seem to be ultimately reduced to to those respecting the survey of the new roads, and the letting out a portion of the work, by the job, agreeing to call a given amount of work a certain number of days work at seventy-five cents each; and after considerable reflection on these questions, it seems to us, that the mode of estimating ought to be regarded, as chiefly involved in the allowanoe of the account of the committee, by the county court. If we give that allowance any effect, (and it seems it ought not to be made entirely nugatory,) it certainly should conclude the question of the faithful expenditure of the labor. I am not aware, that any case, before, has ever attempted to go behind the allowance of the committee’s account.
The remaining questions all concern the survey of the new roads upon which the tax was required to be expended. It does not seem to us that there was shown any such fatal irregularity in this matter, as will render the sale of the land, by the collector, void. These questions seem to me more properly to arise upon the allowance of the committee’s account. If the labor had not been done, or not done in the proper place, it could be urged successfully, as all will readily admit, against the allowance of the committee’s account. It ought then to conclude these questions, that the court did make the allowance.
But if the questions were open to examination, we are fully satisfied that they were properly disposed of in the court below.
Judgment affirmed.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- F. N. Fitch, of Betsey Fitch v. James Flanders
- Status
- Published
- Syllabus
- In the expenditure of a land tax, all questions respecting the faithful expenditure of the labor and whether or not it was expended in the proper place are involved in, and should be concluded by the allowance of the account of the committee by the county court. In this case, the act granting the tax, required portions of it to be expended upon new roads to be laid c( in the best place” between certain designated termini. It was claimed that the route selected had not been properly surveyed and the roads laid out upon them; also that a portion of the work had been performed by the job, the committee calling certain amounts of work equal to a certain number of days labor at the statute price; Held) that these matters were involved in and concluded by the allowance of the committee’s account.