Sullivan v. Walton

Citations

• 20 Fla. 552

Syllabus

<p>1. Under the law of municipal corporations in this State they are authorized upon a vote of the electors to issue bonds to meet municipal expenses or for any municipal purpose. The statutes require that the amount to be issued, as well as the issuing of such bonds, shall be thus submitted to the electors, and in the event a required majority is given makes it the duty of the City Council to assess and collect such taxes from the citizens as are necessary for the* payment of the interest as well as for the final payment of the bonds. The tax so directed to be levied is not a “special tax,” within the meaning of chaxJter 3313, Laws of 1881.</p> <p>2. There are outstanding bonds of a city which the city desires to compromise by an issue of new bonds to take up the outstanding bonds. The question of the issue of the bonds and the amount to be issued is submitted to the qualified electors of the city ; the required majority is given for the issue and the amount to be issued; the statute in this event made it lawful for the bonds to be issued : Held,,, That the recital by the Mayor and Council in the proclamation submitting these questions that they were assured that the old bonds would be surrendered was no condition under the law for the issuing of the new bonds, and that the new bonds thus issued, if within the amount authorized and otherwise legal in the nature of their obligation under the statute, were valid and binding obligations upon the city.</p> <p>3. In such case the fact that the courts of the United States are entertaining jurisdiction to enforce the old bonds against the city does not prevent the city authorities from levying a tax to pay the new bonds to the extent to which an exchange has been made.</p>