State ex rel. Holloway v. Sheats

Citations

• 78 Fla. 583
• 83 So. 508

Syllabus

<p>1. The term “office” implies a delegation of a portion of the sovereign power to, and the possession 'of it by, the person filling the office, while an “employment” does not comprehend a delegation of any part of the sovereign authority.</p> <p>2. An employment does not authorize the exercise in one’s own right of any sovereign power or any prescribed independent authority of ia governmental nature; and this constitutes perhaps the most decisive difference between an employment and an office, and between an employee and an officer.</p> <p>3. Some offices are merely clerical 'or ministerial; but they are useful in enforcing the powers confererd on other officers or tribunals, and they are usually designated as offices by the law and have features of tenure and duration and of duties prescribed by law, which differentiate an office from a mere employment.</p> <p>4. The intent of a valid statute is the controlling law; and such intent .is presumed, to accord with orgianie law.</p> <p>5. Unless offices are created there can be no 'officers.</p> <p>6. The “positions” of “Rural School Inspectors” “created”, by Chapter 6539, Acts of 1913, are, in view of the duties assigned to such inspectors, employments and not offices. As no part 'of the sovereign power of the State is delegated to the Rural School Inspectors authorized to be appointed by said statute, such inspectors are not officers but employees; iand as the provisions of the constitution relative to the appointment and salaries of officers are not applicable to employees, the provisions of the statute authorizing the appointment 'of Rural Seliool Inspectors and providing the method of paying their salaries must be observed.</p>