Bradford v. State

1. Claims Against the State: employment of attorney FOR THE STATE NOT VALID WHEN THERE IS NO LAW AUTHORIZING it. The claim on which the action was brought was for the recovery for services performed by the plaintiffs as attorneys in an action against the state, under an employment by the attorney general, by which they were to have a fee of ten thous- and dollars, contingent upon a judgment being finally recovered favorable to the state, which was obtained. Held, that there was no law authorizing the employment, and, if actually made, was void, and all services performed under it gratuitous, imposing no legal obligation on the state to pay for them. 3. -: -. If, in view of the services rendered, there be a moral obligation to pay for them, this is a consideration that may be addressed to the legislature, but which neither the auditor nor the courts can recognize. 3. -: ACTIONS AGAINST THE STATE : HOW COURTS GET JURISDICTION in. The courts can acquire jurisdiction in actions on claims against the state only by an appeal from the decision of the auditor of public accounts and secretary of state.

Error to the district court for Lancaster county. Heard upon a demurrer to the petition before Pound, J., who sustained the same and rendered judgment dismissing the cause for want of jurisdiction. insisted that plaintiffs were duly and legally employed, and that the services they rendered were under a contract with the state, authorized bylaw; that by act of 1867 power and authority were granted the governor: 1. To select and employ an attorney to prosecute any and all actions necessary and proper to secure the right of the state in or to any property owned or claimed by the state, in any court or in any county or state in the union. 2. To select and employ an attorney to defend any action which may be brought against the state, or any of its officers in respect of any property owned or claimed by the state. Laws 1867, p. 84; that by the act of February 9, 1867, until there should be an attorney general, there was devolved upon the attorney, so appointed by the governor, “in addition to those devolved upon him” by the act under which the governor appointed him, such duties “ as are usually performed by the attorney general of a state.” Laws 1869, p. 64. That in this case as alleged in the petition the employment was made by the attorney general “ by and with the advice and consent of Hon. W. H. James, then the governor of the state;” that the authority conferred by these acts upon the governor was not repealed by the act providing for the election of an attorney general, Laws, 1869, p. 164; and quoted in extenso the second, third, and fourth points in the brief of J. B. Webster in the case of The State v. Stout, ante p. 9Q, as applicable to the claim of the plaintiffs here. Plaintiffs in error are afraid that the honor and dignity of the state will suffer, and they invoke for the claimants “ broad principles of natural equity,” and claim that neither the laws governing courts nor the constitution apply to them. The logical sequence is this — that persons who hold claims against the state are a favored class, who can alone make wings of “justice and right ” to fly to that mystic region above and beyond the trammels of law, and where such unjust things as contracts and written constitutions do not exist; but where for them a straight and narrow pathway leads to the treasury, whose doors, without stint or delay, turn softly on golden hinges to admi-t them. Yet if I do not very much mistake this court, “ these wings ” will unfeather in their flight, and claimants against the state must fall to a common level with all other litigants, and stand up to the rack where is fed that good old fodder of “justice and right,” as administered by our courts. Stevens v. Boss, 1 Cal., 95.