Mather v. City & County of San Francisco

Citations

• 115 F. 37
• 52 C.C.A. 631
• 1902 U.S. App. LEXIS 4183

Syllabus

<p>1. Municipal Bonds — Remedy fob Enforcement — Bonds Payable from Special Fund.</p> <p>An act of the legislature of California (St. 1875-76, p. 433) authorized the board of supervisors of the city and county of San Francisco, in its discretion, to pass an order for the widening of Dupont street in the city. It provided that, in case the street should be so widened, all damages, costs, and expenses thereof should be paid by “bonds of the city and county of San Francisco,” and that for the payment of the interest and principal of such bonds there should be levied a tax upon the lands found to be benefited by the improvement. It further provided that the city and county should not be liable for the debt so created. Under the law it was the duty of the city and county to make the necessary levies and collections required to provide the fund for the payment of the bonds. 'Held, that the bonds so issued, being nominally the bonds of the city and county, to be paid from a special fund, which it was the duty of such corporation to provide, the holders could maintain an action in a federal court to recover a judgment thereon against the city and county, to be paid from such special fund, and to be enforced by appropriate proceedings to compel it to provide such fund, as required by the act.</p> <p>C. Same — Action—Parties.</p> <p>In an action against the city and county on such bonds, the plaintiff is not required to join as defendants the owners of the property upon which the taxes for their payment are required to be levied.</p> <p>P. Same — Limitation—Interest Coupons.</p> <p>Under the statute of limitations of California (Code Civ. Proc. S? 337), which requires an action on a written instrument to be brought within four years, an action on interest coupons attached to municipal bonds is barred in four years from the time the coupons respectively matured, although such coupons have not been detached from the bonds.</p>