Metropolitan Milk & Cream Co. v. City of New York

The action was brought to recover $30,000 damages sustained by the plaintiff by the revocation by the board of health of the city of New York of certain permits issued by the said board under which the plaintiff was authorized to sell fresh and condensed milk in the city of New York. The plaintiff was a domestic corporation and engaged in selling milk and cream in the city of New York. The complaint alleges: That the department of health is a department of the city of New York, organized under the charter of the city of New York (chapter 466, p. 1, of the Raws of 1901). That prior to January 1, 1897, the board of health of the former city of New York issued to the plaintiff seven permits or licenses to sell milk in the city "of New York, dated May 10, 1896. That thereafter the present board of health organized under the charter of 1901 issued to the plaintiff three additional permits to sell milk in the city of New York, dated May 7, 1902, and June 10, 1903. That the sale of milk by the plaintiff in the city of New York without a permit from the board of health was after the 14th of December, 1904, a misdemeanor. That on the 14th day of December, 1904, the board of health adopted a resolution wherein and whereby they directed all said 10 permits or licenses to sell milk theretofore issued to the plaintiff and under which the plaintiff was carrying on its said business to be forthwith annulled and revoked. That the action of the board was unjust, arbitrary, unlawful, and illegal, and-without just cause, and that the said board was without any power, authority, or warrant in law to revoke said licenses. The form of the permits were set forth in the complaint as follows:

“Metropolitan Milk & Cream Company is hereby authorized to sell milk, fresh and condensed, at borough of Manhattan, under the laws, rules, and regulations of the board of health, of the department of health of the city of New York. This permit is not transferable to any person or location other than above, and must be kept posted at all times in a conspicuous place in the store, and is revocable at the pleasure of the board.”

That the plaintiff’s good will, trade, and business were at the time of said revocation of the value of $30,000. That in consequence of said revocation of the said licenses or permits the plaintiff was prevented from continuing or carrying on its said business, and said business thereby and thereupon was forthwith wholly and instantly terminated and entirely destroyed, all to the plaintiff’s damage in the sum oi $30,000. The defendants served separate answers, which set up as a separate defense that by virtue of the laws of the state of New York and the Sanitary Code of the city of New York the defendant, the department of health of the" city of New York, had authority and power

The learned counsel for the defendants do not attack the sufficiency of the complaint, although it is somewhat difficult to-see how any act of the board of health, acting under an authority conferred by the state to regulate the sale of impure and unwholesome milk in the city of New York, can impose an obligation upon the municipality. As this point, however, is not taken by the defendant, it will not be considered. The first seven permits were issued on March 10,1896, under the consolidation act. Chapter 410, p. 1, Laws 1882, as amended. By section 34 (page 8) of that act the board of health was created a department of the said city. Section 575 (page 158) provides that the Sanitary Code “adopted and declared as such at a meeting of the board of health of the health department of the city of New York, held in the city, on the second day of June, 1873, as amended in accordance with law, is hereby declared to be binding and in-force in said city.” Section 576 (page 159) provides that the board of health “shall cause to be enforced the provisions of its Sanitary Code.” In People ex rel. Lieberman v. Vandecarr, 175 N. Y. 440 , 67 N. E. 913 , it was held that section 66 of the Sanitary Code which reads, “No milk shall be received, held, kept, offered for sale or delivered in the city of New York without a permit in writing from the board of health and subject to the conditions thereof” was valid; that it was lawful for the health authorities in the city of New York to require the relator to obtain a permit under section 66 of the Sanitary Code in order to receive, hold, offer for sale and deliver milk, and failing so to do to arrest and punish him; that the vesting of powers more or less arbitrary in various officials and boards is necessary if the work of prevention and regulation is to ward off fevers, pestilence, and, the many other ills that constantly menance great centres of population. The board of health thus having power to issue permits authorizing a person to- carry the business of dealing in milk

“The Sanitary Code which shall be in force in the city of New York on the first day of January, ninteen hundred and seventy-two, and all existing provisions of law fixing penalties for violations of said Code are -hereby declared to be binding and in force in the city of New York, and shall continue to be so binding and in force, except as the same may, from time to time, be revised, altered, amended or annulled, as herein provided.”

By section 1169 it was made the duty of the board to “enforce all laws of this state applicable in said district, to the preservation of human life, or to the care, promotion or protection of health; and said board may exercise the authority given by said laws to enable it to discharge the duty hereby imposed; and this section is intended to include all laws relative to cleanliness, and to use or sale of poisonous, unwholesome, deleterious, or adulterated drugs, medicine or food. * * * The board of health shall use all reasonable means for ascertaining the existence and cause of disease or peril to life or health, and for averting the same, throughout the city.” The board, being charged with the duty of protecting the health of the inhabitants and preventing the sale of impure or adulterated food, ascertained that the plaintiff, acting under the permits which it had issued, was engaged in selling impure and adulterated milk. The board gave to the plaintiff notice of these charges, and after a hearing it revoked the permits; and to sustain the contention of the plaintiff we must hold that such permit thereby becomes irrevocable and authorizes the person -to whom it was granted to continue forever to sell milk, although the conditions under which the permit was issued were continually violated, the provisions of the Sanitary Code in relation to milk sold disregarded, and that a person acting under, a permit from the board of health is selling to the inhabitants of the city of New York poisonous and impure article for food, endangering the public health. The sole authority that the health board would have, if this contention was correct, would be to prosecute the person selling the poisonous article in the shape of milk, fine it, and in the meantime such person could go on poisoning the people under a permit or license from the health authorities, a proposition which is so unreasonable that a mere statement is sufficient to refute it. There is nothing in either the Penal Code or the charter that makes such a permit irrevocable. The permit itself provides that it is revocable at the pleasure of the board, and the plaintiff accepted it with that condition. There is nothing unreasonable in this condition; and, irrespective of the general power of the board of health to revoke a permit which is being abused and under which the person accepting it and using it is persistently violating the law, it is certainly not an unreasonable condition to insert into such a permit a provision that it is revocable by the board that issues it. To hold that a permit once granted is irrevocable would be to totally defeat the object of the statute in requiring such a permit before a person should engage in the business of supplying to the inhabitants of a city food.

All concur.