In the Court of Appeals for the Third Judicial District Austin, Texas
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No. 03-19-00304-CV In the Court of Appeals for the Third Judicial District Austin, Texas State of Texas, Appellant, v. City of Double Horn, et al., Appellees. On Appeal from the 424th Judicial District Court, Burnet County REPLY BRIEF FOR APPELLANT Ken Paxton Patrick K. Sweeten Attorney General of Texas Associate Deputy for Special Litigation Jeffrey C. Mateer David J. Hacker First Assistant Attorney General Special Counsel to the First Assistant Attorney General RYAN L. BANGERT State Bar No. 24103323 Deputy Attorney General for Legal [email protected] Counsel Kent Richardson Office of the Attorney General Assistant Attorney General P.O. Box 12548 (MC 001) Austin, Texas 78711-2548 Counsel for the State of Texas Tel.: (512) 936-1700 Fax: (512) 474-2697 Oral Argument Requested Table of Contents Page Index of Authorities ................................................................................................ii Introduction ............................................................................................................ 1 Argument................................................................................................................ 2 I. The State Satisfied the Probable-Ground Standard Necessary to File a Quo Warranto Lawsuit. .................................................................... 2 A. The probable-ground standard requires only allegations giving rise to a cause of action. ............................................................ 2 B. The probable-ground standard does not reach the merits. ................... 4 C. The Court should not contradict decades of quo warranto precedent. ........................................................................................... 7 II. A Quo Warranto Pleading Does Not Need to Be Verified and its Exhibits Do Not Need to Be Admissible. ................................................. 10 III. The Court Should Not Take Judicial Notice of the “Evidence” Double Horn Submits for the First Time on Appeal, and, in any Event, These Documents Are Irrelevant. ................................................ 13 IV. The State Pleaded a Probable Ground to Challenge Double Horn’s Incorporation. .............................................................................. 15 A. Double Horn is not a village or town that qualifies for incorporation as a city. ...................................................................... 15 B. Double Horn did not incorporate for strictly municipal purposes. ........................................................................................... 17 Prayer ...................................................................................................................20 Certificate of Service............................................................................................. 21 Certificate of Compliance ..................................................................................... 21 i Index of Authorities Page(s) Cases: Alamo Club v. State, 147 S.W. 639 (Tex. App.—San Antonio 1912, writ ref’d) ........................... 10, 11 Am. Veterans, Dep’t of Tex. v. City of Austin, No. 03–03–00762–CV, 2005 WL 3440786 (Tex. App.—Austin Dec. 15, 2015, no pet.) ................................................................................................ 3 Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662 (2009) ........................................................................................... 9 Butnaru v. Ford Motor Co., 84 S.W.3d 198 (Tex. 2002) ................................................................................ 8 Carlisle v. Philip Morris, Inc., 805 S.W.2d 498 (Tex. App.—Austin 1991, writ denied) .................................. 13 City of Waco v. Higginson, 243 S.W. 1078 (Tex. Comm’n App. 1922) ....................................................... 18 Collins v. Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, 224 F.3d 496 (5th Cir. 2000) .............................................................................. 9 In re Enron Corp. Sec., Derivative & ERISA Litig., 761 F. Supp. 2d 504 (S.D. Tex. 2011) ................................................................. 9 Gonzales v. Concerned Citizens of Webberville, 173 S.W.3d 112 (Tex. App.—Austin 2005, pet. denied) ..................................... 3 Harang v. State ex rel. City of W. Columbia, 466 S.W.2d 8 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 1971, no writ) ....................... 16 Horizon/CMS Healthcare Corp. v. Auld, 34 S.W.3d 887 (Tex. 2000) .............................................................................. 11 Hyland v. State, 574 S.W.3d 904 (Tex. Crim. App. 2019) ............................................................ 5 ii State ex rel. Manchac v. City of Orange, 274 S.W.2d 886 (Tex. App.—Beaumont 1955, no writ) ............................. passim McLeod Indep. Sch. Dist. v. Kildare Indep. Sch. Dist., 157 S.W.2d 181 (Tex. App.—Texarkana 1941, writ ref’d w.o.m.) ................ 10, 11 State ex rel. Mobray v. Masterson, 228 S.W. 623 (Tex. App.—Beaumont 1921, writ ref d) ............................... 16, 18 Perry v. Kroger Stores, Store No. 119, 741 S.W.2d 533 (Tex. App.—Austin 1987, no writ) ......................................... 13 Ramirez v. State, 973 S.W.2d 388 (Tex. App.—El Paso 1998, no pet.) ............................. 2, 4, 9, 11 Reed v. Prince, 194 S.W.3d 101 (Tex. App.—Texarkana 2006, pet. denied) .............................. 3 Rogers v. Raines, 512 S.W.2d 725 (Tex. App.—Tyler 1974, writ ref’d n.r.e.) .............................. 16 Sabine Offshore Service, Inc. v. City of Port Arthur, 595 S.W.2d 840 (Tex. 1979) ............................................................................. 13 Texas Department of Parks & Wildlife v. Miranda, 133 S.W.3d 217 (Tex. 2004) ........................................................................... 7, 8 State ex rel. Thornhill v. Huntsaker, 17 S.W.2d 63 (Tex. App.—Amarillo 1929, no writ) .................................... 2, 6, 9 Town of Fairview v. Lawler, 252 S.W.3d 853 (Tex. App.—Dallas 2008, no pet.) ........................................... 3 Statutes: Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 66.001 .................................................................. 10 Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 66.002 .................................................... 2, 4, 10, 11 Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 66.003.................................................................. 10 iii Other Authorities: Tex. R. App. P. 34.1 .............................................................................................. 13 Tex. R. Civ. P. 59 .................................................................................................. 12 Tex. R. Civ. P. 93 ............................................................................................. 10, 11 Tex. R. Civ. P. 682 .................................................................................................. 8 Tex. R. Civ. P. 779 ........................................................................................... 10, 11 Tex. R. Civ. P. 780 ........................................................................................... 10, 11 Tex. R. Civ. P. 781 ........................................................................................... 10, 11 Tex. R. Evid. 402 .................................................................................................. 14 iv Introduction The State of Texas appeals the district court’s refusal to allow it to file a quo warranto action against the newly incorporated City of Double Horn, Texas and its elected officials. Before the State may file an information in the nature of quo war- ranto, it must show the district court, during a pre-filing hearing, that it has a “prob- able ground” to proceed. Nearly a century of case law provides that a district court must accept the State’s allegations as true during this probable-ground stage, and that the State satisfies the probable-ground standard by alleging facts that state a cause of action. Double Horn asks the Court to ignore that precedent, just as the district court did. But by refusing to accept the State’s allegations as true and by considering the merits of the State’s claim and evidence offered by Double Horn, the district court applied an erroneous legal standard to deny the State’s petition for leave to file. And by sustaining objections to the verification attached to the State’s information and the exhibits to that pleading, the district court deviated from both the Rules of Civil Procedure and precedent, both of which allow the State to allege unverified quo war- ranto facts. The Court should reverse the erroneous judgment of the district court and re- mand this case with instructions to file the information and issue process. Argument I. The State Satisfied the Probable-Ground Standard Necessary to File a Quo Warranto Lawsuit. A. The probable-ground standard requires only allegations giving rise to a cause of action. The State satisfied each of the statutory requirements to file a quo warranto law- suit. The Attorney General represents the State, and he is one of three types of state officials who may file a quo warranto lawsuit. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 66.002(a)–(b). The Attorney General determined “grounds for the remedy [of quo warranto] exist,” so he “petition[ed] the district court of the proper county . for leave to file an information in the nature of quo warranto.” Id. § 66.002(a). And the Attorney General demonstrated a “probable ground” for the proceeding, which, once established,