County of San Diego v. Southern Pacific Railroad

Action to recover the amount apportioned to the county of San Diego of the taxes assessed by the state board of equalization for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1888, against the franchise, roadway, roadbed, rails, and rolling-stock of defendant’s railway, a railroad operated in more than one county.

The lower court sustained the demurrer to the complaint, and, plaintiff declining to amend, final judgment was entered against it, from which it appeals.

One of the grounds of demurrer, and the only one that need be noticed, is that plaintiff is not authorized to maintain the action. The action is brought under the supposed authority of an act authorizing the bringing of suits for the collection of delinquent taxes and prescribing a form of complaint therein, passed March 23, 1880 (Stats. 1880, p. 136), which provides: “That any county, or city and county, where such taxes are delinquent, may sue in its own name for the recovery of delinquent taxes, whether the same be for county, or city and county, and state purposes, or taxes, or either of them.” In 1883, however, the legislature passed an act (Stats. 1883, p. 65), whereby it amended certain sections of the Political Code and…