township treasurer, his securities and legal representatives shall be bound to comply with the requisitions of this section, so far as the said securities and legal representatives may have the power so to do; and, for failure to comply with the requisitions of this section, the persons neglecting or refusing shall be liable to a penalty of not less than ten (10) dollars nor more than one hundred (100) dollars, at the discretion of the court before which judgment may be obtained, to be recovered in an action of debt, in the name of the trustees of schools, before any justice of the peace, for the benefit of the school fund of such township: Provided, that the obtaining or payment of such judgment shall in no wise discharge or diminish the obligation of the persons signing the official bond of such township treas

urer.

1. When a delinquent treasurer goes out of office and retains moneys which he received by virtue of his office, and refuses to pay the same to his successor in office, a right of action is created thereby in favor of the board of trustees, and against the delinquent and his sureties on his official bond, whether an apportionment or division of the fund has been struck or not among the various districts of the township. And when an apportionment has been made to the several districts, it is not necessary that the board should sue to the use of the districts. The money recovered would be held in trust for the districts entitled to the same, according to the apportionment. Trustees of Schools v. Stokes, 3A-267.

§ 22. The township treasurers shall receive in full, for all services rendered by them, a compensation to be fixed, prior to their election, by the board of trustees.

1. This section, in express terms, prohibits any extra pay for the performance of any duty imposed by the statute. Lovingston v. Board of Trustees, 99-564.

2. Where a school treasurer is permitted to retain two per centum of all moneys paid out, this means for the current year. A treasurer cannot continue from year to year to pay out the revenues in his hands, including his own commission, whether as a gratuity or from ignorance of his rights in the premises, and then on becoming better informed as to his rights. break in on the revenue raised for the support of the public schools of the current year for back salary. Bunn v. The People, 32A-410.

ARTICLE V.

BOARD OF DIRECTORS.

SECTION 1. In all school districts having a population of less than one thousand inhabitants, and not governed by any special act in relation to free schools now in force, there shall be elected in the manner hereinafter provided for, a board of directors to consist of three members. (As amended by an act approved June 1, 1889.) § 2. The directors of each district are hereby declared a body politic and corporate, by the name of "School Directors of District No.... ..township No.. ....county of .and State of Illinois," and by that name may sue and

be sued in all courts and places whatever.

. range.

........

1. The board of school directors, though a corporation, are possessed of certain specially defined powers, and can exercise no others, except such as result, by fair implication, from the powers granted. Glidden v. Hopkins, 47-525; Wells v. The People, 71-532; Peers v. Board of Education, 72-508; School Directors v. Fogleman, 76-189.

2. The powers of school directors are limited to those expressly granted, or such as result by necessary implication from those granted. Stevenson v. School Directors, 87-255.

3. The duties of school directors are derived exclusively from the statute, are specifically defined, and if they excercise powers and functions not conferred upon them, the statute has made them responsible for all losses that may ensue. Adams v. State of Illinois, 82-132; Sharp v. Smith, 32A-336.

4. Directors can exercise only such powers as may be given by law, and such as results from fair implication from such powers, and if they exceed such powers and do an act expressly prohibited by law, their action is void. Wells v. The People, 71-532; Stanhope v. School Directors, 42A-570.

5. The statute prescribes the duties, and defines the powers of a board of school directors, in terms clear and explicit, and that body can exercise no other powers than those expressly granted, or such as may be necessary to carry into effect a granted power. School Directors v. Wright, 43A-270.

6. One board of school directors has no power under our school law to make contracts wholly to be carried out in the future, to divest future boards of the power to select the teachers they shall desire, for the terms to be commenced after their organization. School Directors v. Ann Hart, 4A-224.

7. Directors cannot be permitted, five days before the current school year expires, to hire a teacher, perhaps obnoxious to the people of the district, to teach a term of school extending three months or nearly so into the ensuing school year. Cross v. School Directors, 24A-191.

8. School directors have no power to make contracts for the employment of teachers for terms to commence beyond the expiration of the current school year. There is no objection to contracts for the teaching of terms extending for a reasonable time beyond the current school year, when such contracts are entered into in good faith, and not for the purpose, merely, of forcing upon the district an unsatisfactory teacher or defeating the will of the voters at the annual election. Stevenson v. School Directors, 87-255.

9. The statute requires an annual reorganization, and the intention of the statute is that the board organized for the school year shall exercise the powers and control the schools of their district during that year. Davis v. School Directors, 92-293.

10. It becomes manifest that if, just before the school year ends, two directors were to employ teachers and make all contracts of every kind for the ensuing year, against objections of the other director, and one of those making such contract should not be re-elected, and his successor was opposed to all of the contracts thus made, the school and the affairs of the district would, during the year, be governed and controlled by but one director. To suffer such contracts to be made would take the control of the affairs of the district from the board organized and empowered to control the schools of the district, and thus by this means thwart the object and evident intent of the statute. Ibid.

11. The persons assuming to act as directors of a district are the only parties that need to be brought before the court to test the validity of the organization of the district. Chessire v. The People, 11-493.

12. The acts of officers de facto are as valid and effectual where they concern the public or the rights of third persons, as though they were officers de jure. School Directors v. Tingley, 73A-471.

13. The presumption in regard to school, as well as all other public officers, when assailed collaterally, is, that they are lawful until the contrary is clearly established; and a court can indulge in no presumption of irregularity except where it is expressly agreed to exist. People v. Newberry, 87-41.

14. Where there is but one office, there can not be an officer de jure and an officer de facto, both in possession of the office at the same time. Where one rightfully entitled to the office, is discharging its functions and actually in possession, the acts of another obtruding himself into the office are void. School Directors v. National School Furniture Company, 53A-254.

15. Where a judgment is obtained by fraud, a court of equity will restrain its collection. But where the debt on which the judgment is based is a valid one, when the party obtaining the judgment has acted in good faith and obtained service on one acting as clerk for the only board really acting as directors, a court of equity should not interfere. lbid.

16. A school district cannot recover from another district, which has collected taxes upon lands within the former through a mistake of the clerk as to the location of the lands, a greater sum than it has levied and would have collected had there been no mistake. Walser v. Board of Education, 160-272; Board of Education v. Board of Education, 57A-288, affirmed.

17. A school district which has collected its full tax levy cannot recover from another district taxes collected by it upon lands within the former through a mistake of the clerk as to the location of the lands, although the rate per centum of the tax as extended in the former was thereby made greater than it otherwise would have been. lbid.

18. Tax-payers in one school district who voluntarily pay a tax levied by mistake upon their lands, to another district, cannot recover back the same, where the books were kept open and means of knowledge of all the facts existed, although they supposed they were paying the tax of the district in which their lands lay. Ibid.

19. A contract for a school building, signed by the individual directors of the district, is the obligation of the district, where the contract recites that the board of directors is the party of the second part, that the parties have hereunto set their hands, and it is stipulated that the contractor completed the building for the district and that it was accepted by the board. Railroad Company v. The People, 202-9.

Wabash

20. The fact that there is money in the treasury of a school district which may be applied to building a school house, adds nothing to the power of the directors to make a contract for the building, where it is not shown that such money was applied to or set apart for that purpose. Ibid.

21. The directors of school districts are by statute declared to be bodies politic and corporate. They are invested with corporate powers for a few specific purposes. Where there is a school district de facto, and school directors elected for it, and they proceed to build a school house, and a tax is levied for the purpose of paying for the school house, such school directors are officers de facto by color of election, and are exercising an office to which the power to levy a tax is incident. Trumbo v. The People, 75-561.

22. Where a school district is formed in violation of statutory provisions, the legality of the formation of such district can not be enquired into in a collateral proceeding The only mode in which the illegality can be taken advantage of, is by information in the nature of a quo warranto. People v. Newberry, 87-41; Renwick v. Hall, 84-162; People v. Trustees of Schools, 111–171. 23. In a proceeding by information in the nature of a quo warranto where school directors are called on to show by what warrant they exercise the functions of their office, they are bound to exhibit good authority for acting as such officers. It is not enough to allege generally that they were duly elected to office; it is necessary to state particularly how they were elected, and how the school district, of which they claim to be directors, has been formed. Carrico v. The People, 123-198.

24. A change in a school district can not ordinarily be questioned collaterally. A much stricter rule prevails in a direct proceeding questioning the corporate existence of the body and its right to exercise corporate functions. An information in the nature of a quo warranto is the proper remedy to test the legality of the formation of a school district. School Directors v. School Directors, 135-464.

25. That a school house site has been selected, contracts for work and materials made, bonds issued and sold and a teacher engaged does not operate as an estoppel against a proceeding by information in the nature of a quo warranto against school directors to test the legality of the organization of the district, where it does not appear that the bonds were sold or the money expended before the filing of the information, and the hiring of the teacher was after that time. Mason v. The People, 185-302.

26. After a considerable lapse of time public policy forbids that discretionary writs like those in quo warranto and certiorari should be granted. Where more than five years have elapsed since the formation of a district, and during that time the majority of the people in the district had the power to change it, if they saw proper, it is better, through the proper school officers, to reorganize the districts, if it is desired, as they were before, than to open up an indefinite field of strife and litigation by nullifying the action of the trustees and thereby declaring everything done pursuant thereto illegal. People v. Boyd, 30A-608.

27. Under our form of government all power emanates from the people. The right to inquire into the authority by which any person assumes to exercise the functions of a school office, belongs to the people as a part of their sovereignty. In the quo warranto proceeding the people are the plaintiffs, whether upon the relations of a third person, or not. The rule that, where a new right and a remedy for its invasion are conferred by the same statute, parties injured are confined to the statutory redress, does not apply to the people. Snowball v. The People, 147–260.

28. Because the statute provides a mode of contesting elections in the county court, it does not follow that the people, in their sovereign capacity, are thereby precluded from inquiring by information in the nature of a quo warranto into usurpations of office. The two remedies are distinct, the one belonging to the elector in his individual capacity as a power granted, and the other to the people in the right of their sovereignty. Ibid.

29. A board of directors cannot maintain a suit to compel a deed for a school house site. Such suit can be brought only in the name of the school trustees, who, as a quasi corporation, have the entire control of such matters. The school directors, as such, cannot interfere and have no such interest in the subject. A suit for such purpose could only be maintained in the name of the trustees of schools, or in the name of some tax-payer or other person having a pecuniary interest in the matter, by showing that the trustees refused to perform their duty. The law invests the school directors with no such interest. Wilson v. School Directors, 81-180.

30. Where a contractor accompanies his bid for the performance of certain work for a board of education with a deposit of a sum of money under an understanding and agreement to forfeit the sum so deposited in case of his neglect or refusal to enter into a contract to do the work, and without any default on the part of the board of education, he fails to execute the contract agreed to be made, he cannot recover the money so deposited, and the board of education may rightfully declare the same forfeited to its own use. Robinson v. Board of Education, 98A-100.

31. It is a fraud upon the rights of the people of a district for the directors to allow a decree to be entered against the district without interposing any defense, and no one of the board of directors should be allowed to profit by a fraudulent act. When they assume the position of school directors, they have no right to allow private interests to conflict with public duty. Equity and good faith require them to defend and protect the property of the district to the best of their skill and ability, regardless of any and all private interests which they may have, and when they fail to do this, they prove recreant to their trust, and their acts cannot be upheld in a court of equity. Noble v. School Directors, 117-30

32. It is true that a defendant that has been negligent, and allowed a judgment to be rendered against him through his laches, cannot come into court and obtain relief as against his own negligent acts. But the principle which precludes a negligent party from obtaining relief, has no application

to a case of this character. Here, officers intrusted with the rights of the public have disregarded their trust, and suffered the district to be defeated in their own private interests. Ibid.

§ 3. Any person, male or female, married or single, of the age of 21 years and upwards, who is a resident of the school district, and who is able to read and write in the English language, shall be eligible to the office of school director: Provided, that no person shall be eligible to the office of school director who is at the time a member of the board of school trustees.

§ 4. If any director shall, during the term of his office, remove from the district in which he was elected, his office shall thereby become vacant and a new director shall be elected, as in other cases of vacancy in office.

§ 5. The annual election of school directors shall be on the third Saturday of April, when one director shall be elected in each district, who shall hold his office for three years, and until his successor is elected.

1. A person cannot be legally elected to the office of school director for a district in Illinois by persons voting for him in some other state. The right of an elector to vote outside of the State for an office within the State, is not recognized by either our Constitution or statute. Both require that he shall have resided in the State one year, in the county 90 days, and in the district where he seeks to cast his vote 30 days. School Directors v. National School Furniture Company, 53A-254.

§ 6 In new districts, the first election of directors may be on any Saturday, notice being given by the township treasurer, as for the election of trustees, when three directors shall be elected, who shall, at their first meeting, draw lots for their respective terms of office for one, two and three years.

§ 7. When vacancies occur, the remaining director or directors, shall, without delay, order an election to fill such vacancies, which election shall be held on Saturday.

§ 8. Notice of all elections in organized districts shall be given by the directors at least ten days previous to the day of said election. Said notice shall be posted in at least three of the most public places in the district, and shall specify the place where such election is to be held, the time of opening and closing the polls, and the question or questions to be voted on.

1. Where notice of an election for several purposes is given, it will be held to be sufficient if there is no doubt as to its meaning. Merritt v. Ferris,

22-303.

§ 9. Should the directors fail or refuse to order any regular or special election, as aforesaid, it shall be the duty of the township treasurer to order such election, and if the township treasurer fails to do so, then it shall be the duty of the county superintendent to order such election of directors within ten days, in each case of such failure or refusal, and the election held in pursuance of such order shall be valid the same as if ordered by the directors.

§ 10. Two of the directors ordering such election shall act as judges, and one as clerk of such election. But if said directors or