People ex rel. County of Contra Costa v. Board of Supervisors

By the Court, Sawyer, J. In 1852, one Gilman built a bridge for the County of Contra Costa, upon a contract for about eight thousand ( dollars, to bear interest at the rate of five per cent per month till paid. The bridge was not completed till some time in 1853. On the 23d of March, 1853, the County of Alameda was created by the Legislature out of territory taken from the Counties of Contra Costa and Santa Clara, and the said bridge fell within the new County of Alameda. The contract for building the bridge being with the County of Contra Costa, and the money being unpaid, Gilman sued that county for the amount due, and in 1856 recovered a judgment for upwards of twenty thousand dollars, with accruing interest and costs. In 1858, the Legislature passed, an Act appointing Commissioners to adjust the amount to be paid by Alameda County,to Contra Costa County, as her share of the debt that had accrued while a portion of Alameda County formed a part of the County of Contra Costa, but the Commissioners in their award were limited by the Act to the indebtedness which had accrued prior to the 23d of March, 1853, the date of the creation of the new county. At that date, no interest on the bridge contract had accrued. The Commissioners awarded ■ against Alameda County the sum of three thousand nine hundred and forty-four dollars and sixty-six cents, but for reasons before stated, the award did not include any interest on the bridge contract. This award was afterwards in 1860 and 1861, paid to the County of Contra Costa. On the 14th of March, 1860, the Legislature passed an Act empowering and requiring the Board of Supervisors of Contra Costa County to levy a special tax for the payment of the judgment, interests and costs recovered by Gilman in 1856 on the bridge contract, which was accordingly done and the judgment paid by the County of Contra Costa.

In 1862, another Act was passed reciting in its preamble the payment by Contra Costa County, in pursuance of said Act of 1860, of the said Gilman judgment of “ thirty-one [647]thousand dollars, some twenty-four thousand dollars of the amount being for interest * * * on an obligation contracted before the organization of Alameda County,” etc., and in the body of the Act appointing Commissioners “ to ascertain and award the amount of indebtedness, if any be found equitably due from the County of Alameda to the County of Contra Costa on account of obligations existing at the time of the organization of the said County of Alameda.” The Commissioners are required, if any award be found against the County of Alameda, to certify the same to the Boards of Supervisors of the respective counties, and thereupon the Board of Supervisors of Alameda County are required, within a specified time, to levy a tax for the purpose, and pay the amount so awarded to the County of Contra Costa. Under this Act the Commissioners awarded in favor of Contra Costa County against the County of Alameda, the sum of eleven thousand five hundred and seventy-four dollars and twelve cents, this sum being for a portion of the said interest paid by the County of Contra Costa on the said bridge contract, and the judgment thereon, and for nothing else. The award having been certified to the Board of Supervisors of Alameda County, and a demand that the tax for its payment be levied in pursuance of the Act having been made, and the said Board having refused to levy the same, an alternative mandamus was issued by the District Court of the Fourth Judicial District against said Board in this case, which was afterwards, by the judgment of the Court made peremptory. From the judgment this appeal is taken.