Farwell v. San Jacinto & Pleasant Valley Irrigation District

WELCH, J.,

pro tem.

The plaintiff is the owner and holder of certain bonds issued by the defendant corporation. She instituted this action September 7, 1917, to recover about $83,000, principal and interest owing to her on said bonds. The defendant and intervening land owners of the

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district made two principal defenses to the cause of action of plaintiff, namely, that the cause was barred by the limitation of subdivision 1, section 337, of the Code of Civil Procedure, and that by a judgment of the superior court in and for the county of Riverside given, made, and entered on June 17, 1899, in a

quo warranto

proceeding, the defendant corporation was adjudged to have no existence and that it was never duly organized or brought into being, and further, that it was usurping the rights and franchises of a public corporation. The court decided the cause herein in favor of the defendant and the interveners. The appeal is from the judgment upon the judgment-roll alone. For the facts of the case we must look to the pleadings and findings of the court.

Under what is known as the Wright Act, approved March 7, 1887, (Stats. 1887, p. 29), and an act amendatory thereof, (Stats. 1891, p. 147), defendant in the early part of the year 1892, organized itself into an irrigation district, comprising land then wholly within the county of San Diego, but now entirely within the county of Riverside, said Riverside County having since been created out of a portion of San Diego County. It thereupon began to and did transact business as a public corporation, and in good faith held itself out to the public as such. It issued bonds to the amount of $350,000, in various denominations, with interest-bearing coupons as provided by said act. The plaintiff purchased certain of such bonds, and at the commencement of the suit was the owner and holder thereof. There was then due and owing her the amounts claimed by her, above mentioned. The bonds bore date July 1, 1892. Two months before this date, the board of directors of the defendant Irrigation District commenced an action in the superior court in and for the county of San Diego to determine the validity of such bonds. (The law provides that the action should be commenced after the issuance of the bonds.) In due time a judgment was made and entered on June 22, 1892, adjudicating that the said district was duly organized; that all the proceedings had and taken for the issuance of said bonds were approved and confirmed.