De Baker v. Batcheller

McFarland, J. April 6, 1891, certain persons presented to the board of supervisors of Los Angeles County a petition for the formation of a levee district under the act of March 10, 1891, entitled “ An act to provide for the organization and government of levee districts created for the protection of lands from overflow of innavigable running streams of water,” etc. (Stats. 1891, p. 30), to be called the Fruitland Levee District. Such proceedings were afterwards had that the board of supervisors declared such district organized; and after other steps provided for by the act had been taken, the defendants were elected as the board of directors of said district; and they were about to issue and sell certain [473]bonds of said district, when the plaintiff commenced this action to restrain them from so doing. A portion of plaintiff’s complaint was stricken out against her objection, and the defendants having answered, the case was heard by the trial court, and judgment rendered for defendants. From the judgment, and from an order denying a new trial, plaintiff appeals.

1. The lands included in the district lie along the Los Angeles River, and the main contention of appellant is, that the petition failed to give the supervisors jurisdiction, because it was signed only by a majority of freeholders owning lands within the proposed district, whereas it is contended by appellant that it should have been signed by a majority of freeholders owning land injuriously affected by overflow from said Los Angeles River throughout its entire course. If the contention of appellant be true, then no levee district under the act could be legally created along any of the rivers of the state, — not even along the San Joaquin or Sacramento,— except upon a petition signed by a majority of all the freeholders of lands liable to be injuriously affected by overflow from the foothills to the bay.

We do not think that appellant’s position is tenable. The whole contention rests upon the language of the first few lines of the bill, to wit: “A majority of freeholders owning land injuriously affected or liable to be injuriously affected by overflow from any innavigable running stream,” etc.; and it is contended that this language necessarily means a majority of all the freeholders who own land at any point on the stream which might be injuriously affected by overflow. But when the entire act is looked at, it clearly means a majority of such freeholders within the proposed district. The second section expressly provides that the petition shall be “ signed by the required number of freeholders of such proposed district.” It also provides that the board of supervisors “may make such changes in the proposed boundaries as they may find to be proper, and shall establish and define such boundaries”; also “that no lands already