It shall be unlawful for any officer of a county, municipality, township, or school district, who has been elected or appointed, to be interested, either by himself or agent, in any contract entered into by said county, municipality, township, or school district, either for labor or services to be rendered, or for the purchase of commodities, materials, supplies, or equipment of any kind, the expense, price, or consideration of which is paid from public funds or from any assessment levied by said county, municipality, township, or school district, or in the purchase of any real or personal property belonging to the county, municipality, township, or school district or which shall be sold for taxes or assessments or by virtue of legal process at the suit of such county, municipality, township, or school district. Such contract shall be null and void from the beginning.
S.D. Codified Laws § 6-1-1
Local officer's interest in public purchase or contract unlawful--Contract void
Applied in 13 court decisions — leading case Simpson v. Tobin (1985)
Most recently applied in Aspen Storage, Inc. v. Lawrence County (July 2007)
Source: SL 1955, ch 206, § 1; SL 1957, ch 254; SL 1959, ch 273; SDC Supp 1960, § 10.0708; SL 1963, ch 30.
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Official source: South Dakota Legislature. Reproduced from public-domain South Dakota statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.