Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 218, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 September 1913 — CLERKS BENEFITED BY RECENT RULING [ARTICLE]

CLERKS BENEFITED BY RECENT RULING

'Accounting Board Decides in Favor of,County Clerks and Fees May Be Retained. Clerks in many counties the State will be benefited by an opinion given by the state board of accounts in regard to the law enacted by the legislature of 1913, legalizing the retention by clerks of many thousands of dollars in fees under an act passed by the legislature of 1909, but which afterward was held by the courts to be invalid. 'finder the fee and salary law of 1895 the county clerk was required to turn all fees collected by him into the county treasury, and they became the property of the county. The legislature in 1909 passed a bill giving the county clerk more than fifty per cent of the fees charged and collected by him. Under this 1909 act many of the clerks retained the fees which the act gave them, while others turned the fees collected county treasury until the constitutionality of the 1909 law could be tested in the courts. The test case was filed and the courts held the act unconstitutional. This continued in force the act of 1895. This left up in the air the clerks who had retained the fees, for it placed them in position where they might be required to pay the money into the county treasury. To prevent this the clerks organized a lobby and worked for the passage of the legalizing act at the 1913 session.

William J. Kelley, who was clerk Of Ripley county, was one of the clerks that paid the fees collected into the county treasury. After the legalizing act of 1913 became a law he prepared an itemized statement of these fees to which he believed he was entitled- The bill amounted to something like $520. Ho presented the bill to J. Francis Loehard, county auditor and asked for a warrant for the amount. Lochard declined to issue the warrant until after the state accounting board had advised him whether he was justified in doing so. Lochard went to Indianapolis a few days ago and laid the matter before the accounting department, and Millard F. Cox, counsel for the department, has written him a letter holding that Kelley is entitled to recover the fees from the county. Cox’s letter is as follows;

“This department has considered the question submitted. Under the terms of the 1909 act the fees in question became the- property .of the clerk when collected: This act was declared to be invalid, with the result that the act of 1895 was continued in forca By the express provisions of the latter act the fees in question belonged to the county, and were properly paid into the treasury by the present claimant. But at .the 1913 session of the general assembly another act was passed, fixing a schedule of fees to be taxed and collected by clerks of the circuit court, and concluding with a slwtion containing the following provision relating to fees collected under the act of 1909: ‘AH of the fees so taxed, charged or collected under and pursuant to said aet from and after said 10th day of April, 1909, which by the terms of said act are specified as belonging to or as being the property of the clerks so taxing, charging or collecting same shall be taken and deemed to belong to and be the fimpp.rty nf such clerks and their respective claims thereto are hereby legalized.’ Until the contrary has been judicially declared, this department must assume that the above provisions are a valid exercise of legislative power. If so, the fees for which Mr. Kelley has filed a claim belong to him and he fs entitled. to have them repaid to him by the county upon an allowance being made by the board of county commissioners. Attention is called to the fact, however, that the 1913 act denies to clerks most of the fees attempted to be given to them by the 1909 enactment and specially limits their personal ownership of fees to those received for transcripts, for going after state election ballots, for services in insanity cases and per diem for attendance upon courts.