Peters v. Sisson

Headnote

Matter of Peters v. Sisson, 183 App. Div. 286 , affirmed.

Appeal from an order of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the fourth judicial department, entered May 1, 1918, which reversed an order of Special Term denying an application for the resubmission to the electors of the town of New Hartford of questions of local option under the Liquor Tax Law and granted said application. Leading up to the submission of said questions to the electors of said town at the last general election a petition in due form was filed with the town clerk asking for the submission of said questions at such election. Said town clerk thereupon duly filed with the county clerk of Oneida county a certified copy of such petition, but the last named official took no action thereon, and gave no notice, either by publication or posting, of the impending submission. The town clerk with whom the petition was filed, acting upon his own initiative, procured from a printer and posted in a large number of public places in said town notices signed by himself as town clerk to the effect that all of said local option questions would be submitted to be voted upon by the electors of said town at said town meeting, and in due time, prior to said election, caused like notices signed by said town clerk to be published in the Utica Daily Press and in the Utica Observer, two newspapers in which a notice of such submission might properly be published. The Appellate Division held that the town clerk was not the proper officer to post and publish such notices and that under the statute the county clerk was charged with the performance of such duty; that the statute was mandatory and could not be disregarded.