Doyle v. City of Troy

notice was not served upon the corporation counsel within three months.

Said section 224 of the Uniform Charter of Cities of the Second Class, so far as applicable to the question now under consideration, reads as follows:

“The city shall not be liable In a civil action for damages or injuries to person or property * * * unless a claim therefor in writing * * * shall within three months after the happening of the accident or injury, * * * be presented to the common council and served upon the mayor or city clerk, and notice of intention to commence an action thereon be served upon the corporation counsel, nor unless .an action shall be commenced thereon within one year after the happening of such accident or injury or the occurrence of such act, omission, fault or neglect; but no action shall be commenced to recover upon or enforce any such claim against the city until the expiration of three months after the service of said notice upon the corporation counsel.”

In behalf of the plaintiff it is contended that chapter 572 of the Laws of 1886, providing that notice of an intention to commence the action be given to the corporation counsel within six months after the cause of action shall have accrued, was not repealed either expressly or by implication by_ said Uniform Charter, and that such notice in the present case having been given to the corporation counsel within six months, as provided by the act of 1886, was sufficient. The act of 1886, except so far as it applied to the city of New York, is included in the schedule of laws repealed in the general municipal law being chapter 29 of the Consolidated Laws as passed in 1909. Viewed merely as a repealing act, such repeal could not, of course, affect this action previously commenced; but as the purpose of the Consolidated Laws was not to create new legislation, but to systematize and codify existing legislation, such repeal of the act of 1886 would seem to be indicative of the legislative understanding that said act had been previously repealed except so far as it applied to the city of New York. In the Consolidators’ notes to said schedule of repeals as contained in Birdseye’s, Gumming & Gilbert’s Consolidated Laws, vol. 2, p. 2160, it is said of the said act of 1886:

“So far as this statute applies to cities of the second class it is superseded by L. 1906, eh. 473, section 224 (Uniform Charter Cities of the Second Class), and so far as it applies to the city of Buffalo by L. 1901, ch. 105, sections 15, 16 (Revised Charter). This leaves the statute applicable only to the city of New York and special in its effect.”

Assuming that the act of 1886 was superseded by said section 224 of the Uniform Charter, I think nevertheless that the notice to the corporation counsel was served in due time. I cannot agree with the learned county judge in his interpretation of said section 224 above quoted. The claim presented to the common council and to the mayor or city clerk is required to be prepared with much detail and must, of course, be presented and served within three months. The words “shall within three months after the happening of the accident or injury” in my opinion apply only to the claim which is to be presented to the common council and served upon the mayor or city clerk, and do not qualify or apply to the notice of intention to commence an action which is to be served on the corporation counsel. Such is the natural

import and meaning of tKe phraseology employed. Such clause, "shall within three months after the happening of the accident or_ injury,” "is foimd in the midst of the provisions concerning the' claim to be .presented to the common council and served upon the mayor or city clerk, and must be taken from the context where found and transposed to another part of the section in order to make it qualify and apply- to the notice of intention to commence an action' which is to be served upon the corporation counsel. If it had been intended that the three months’ limitation should apply to this latter notice, the words "within three months after the happening of the accident or injury” would naturally and rhetorically be placed elsewhere in the section so as to make such meaning clear, ór other apt language would be used to convey that idea. Statutes, of course, do not always convey their meaning by the use of most artistic language or approved rhetorical or grammatical methods; but, unless the object sought'to be attained "or the manifest purpose of the statute otherwise requires, words and sentences should receive their natural and ordinary signification, and "not one which is forced, strained, or subtle. McCluskey v. Cromwell, 11 N. Y. 593 , 601; People ex rel. Kemp v. D’Oench, 111 N. Y. 359 , 18 N. E. 862 ; City of New York v. Wineburgh Advertising Company, 122 App. Div. 748 , 753, 107 N. Y. Supp. 478 .

No genuine advantage accrues to the city and no useful purpose is subserved by giving to this statute a forced or strained construction or by extracting therefrom any meaning other than such as the plain phraseology of the statute itself suggests. The rights of the city are fully protected. The claim with minute particulars and duly verified must within three months be brought to the knowledge of the legislative body and the chief executive officer of the city. The city thereby acquires full knowledge of the details of the claim. The claimant must bring his action within one year after the accident and must at least three months before doing so give to the corporation counsel notice of his intention so to do. The rights of the city are thus carefully guarded, and- it acquires no additional advantage either in time or in any other respect by limiting to three months after the acciderit the time within which the claimant must give to the corporation counsel notice of his intention to commence an action. If he does so withip three months, he nevertheless has until the expiration of a year to commence the action. Confessedly before the Uniform Charter of 1906 the claimant had under the act of 1886 six months within which to give the corporation counsel notice of his intention to commence the action. If it had been the purpose of the Legislature to reduce this time limitation from six months to three months, I think such intent would have been clearly manifested. As stated, no substantial advantage is derived by the city in shortening the time in view of the other limitations that the action must be commenced within one year, and not until three months after notice to the corporation counsel, and I think ;it was the purpose of the Legislature to enlarge, rather than to restrict, the timé Within which the notice of an intention to commence the action might be given to the corporation counsel. The construction which I have thus placed upon this statute seems to me to comport

more nearly with the natural and ordinary meaning thereof and to be more consonant with the legislative purpose. It deprives the city of no benefit and places it at no disadvantage in respect to the claimant except to deprive it of the unmeritorious advantage of defeating his claim on the technical ground that he has not earlier threatened the city with litigation, notwithstanding that he has speedily apprised the city of the full particulars of his alleged injury.

The judgment should be reversed, and a new trial granted, with costs to the appellant to abide the event. All concur.