Garrity v. State Board of Administration

In 1911, a university museum curator, a member of the Board of Regents, took Garrity's (plaintiff) fossil without permission for display; a 1913 legislative act then abolished the Regents and transferred authority to the new State Board of Administration (defendant), empowering it to execute obligations "now or hereafter committed to" the state universities. Garrity sued Administration as Regents' successor, pleading facts sufficient to support either a tort claim (conversion) or a contract claim (implied promise to pay for the fossil), and argued he could waive the tort theory to avoid its two-year limitations period, which had already run. The lower court sustained Administration's demurrer based on the expired tort limitations period.