Murphy v. City of San Luis Obispo

Citations

• 119 Cal. 624
• 51 P. 1085
• 1898 Cal. LEXIS 686
• 39 L.R.A. 444

Syllabus

<p>Bonds foe Municipal Improvements—Construction of Statute—Election of Municipality as to Gold Coin.—Under the terms of the original act of March 19, 1889, providing for the issuance and sale of bonds of a city to pay the cost of municipal improvements authorized by the voters, the municipality was not required to designate the kind of money in which the bonds should be payable, and, in the absence of such designation, could at maturity elect to pay them in any lawful money; and the purpose of the legislature in the amendment of 1893, providing that such bonds “shall be payable in gold coin or lawful money of the United States,” was not to require that the bonds should express that alternative, but to confer the power of election upon the municipality to make the bonds payable in gold coin only.</p> <p>Id.—Mode of Holding Election — Provisions of Ordinance—Mandatory Requirement—Invalid Election. —An ordinance of a city designating the mode of holding an election for the issuance of bonds for municipal improvements, having been passed by virtue of the statute authorizing it, has the force of a statute, and is to be construed with the same effect as if its terms had been prescribed by an act of the legislature; and where the ordinance provides that “each voter shall indicate his wish by writing or causing to be written or printed ‘yes’ or ‘no’ on the right-hand margin on his ticket opposite the proposition on which he may desire to vote,” such requirement is mandatory, and a disregard of it renders the vote nugatory; and where the ballots contained an improper notice printed upon them, “to vote for or against a proposition, place an ‘X’ in the square at the right,” and more than two-thirds of the voters followed such direction, instead of following the direction .given in the ordinance, the election is invalid.</p> <p>Id.—Alternative of Marino Interest Payable Annually ob Semi-Annually—Submission to Voters.—It was not necessary to submit to the voters the alternative