Sweet v. City of Syracuse

The plaintiff in this case seeks a remedy under the provisions of § 1925 of the Code of Civ. Pro., as supplemented by chap. 531 of the Laws of 1881 and chap. 673 of the Laws of 1887. Under these statutes, it was held by the court of appeals in Talcott v. City of Buffalo, 26 N. E. Rep., 263 ; 34 N. Y. State Rep., 871, that the remedy was confined to cases where the acts complained of are without power, or where corruption, fraud, or bad faith amounting to fraud, is charged, it being said that the terms “waste ” and “ injury ” used in the statute “comprehended only illegal, wrongful, or dishonest official acts, and were not intended to subject the official action of boards, officers, or municipal bodies acting within the limits of their jurisdiction and discretion but which some taxpayer might conceive to be unwise,

Upon this basis, the questions in this case are:

1. Whether the act of 1889 is unconstitutional by reason of its title, as in violation of § 16, art 3 of the constitution, which provides that no local or private bill shall embrace more than one subject, and that shall be expressed in the title.

2. Whether the provisions in the act of 1889 for the issuing of bonds are invalid, under § 11 of art 8 of the constitution of this state, by reason of the term of the bonds exceeding twenty years and the absence of any provision for a sinking fund.

3. Whether § 18 of the act,, as amended in 1890, is in violation of § 6 of art 7 of the constitution, which provides that the legislature shall not sell, lease or otherwise disjaose of the Erie canal, or is in violation of § 9 of art 1 of the constitution, which provides for the assent of two-thirds of each branch of the legislature to every bill appropriating the public moneys or property for local or private purposes.

1. The title of the act of 1889 is, “An act to establish and maintain a water department in and for the city of Syracuse.” The claim is that this does not adequately express the subject of the act, which is to supply the city of Syracuse with water.

In People exrel. City of Rochester v. Briggs, 50 N. Y., 554 , it was held that the title, “An act to amend the several acts in relation to the city of Rochester," expressed a subject broad enough to embrace all the details of the charter and government of the city of Rochester. In Astor v. Arcade R. Co., 113 N. Y., 93 , 110; 22 N. Y. State Rep., 1, it is said: “When the subject is expressed, all matters fairly and reasonably connected with it, and all measures which will or may facilitate its accomplishment, are proper to be incorporated in the act and are germane to the title. The title must be such, at least, as fairly to suggest or give a clue to the subject dealt with in the act, and unless it comes up to this standard it falls below the constitutional requirement” In Cooley on Cons. Lim., 172, it is said: “ The generality of a title is, therefore, no objection to it, so long as it is not made a cover to legislation incongruous in itself, and which by no fair intendment can be considered as having a necessary and proper connection. The legislature must determine for itself how broad and comprehensive shall be the object of a statute, and how much particularity shall be employed in the title in defining it”

Within these rules, the title in question was sufficient A water department, as that expression is ordinarily understood to mean, could not be established and maintained without a supply of water. The obtaining of such supply would, therefore, be within the scope of the subject as expressed in the title.

2. Section 11 of article 8 of the constitution is as follows:

“ Sec. 11. Ho county, city, town or village shall hereafter give any money or property, or loan its money or credit to or in aid of any individual, association or corporation, or become directly or indirectly the owner of stock in, or bonds of, any association or corporation; nor shall any such county, city, town or village be

allowed to incur any indebtedness except for county, city, town or village purposes. This section shall not prevent such county, city, town or village from making such provision for the aid or support of its poor as may be authorized by law. No county containing a city of over one hundred thousand inhabitants, or any such city, shall be allowed to become indebted for any purpose or in any manner to an amount which, including existing indebtedness, shall exceed ten per centum of the assessed valuation of the real estate of such county or city subject to taxation, as it appeared by the assessment rolls of said county or city on the last assessment for state or county taxes prior to the incurring of such indebtedness; and all indebtedness in excess of such limitation, except such as may now exist, shall be absolutely void, except as herein otherwise provided. No such county or such city whose present indebtedness exceeds ten per centum of the assessed valuation of its real estate subject to taxation, shall be allowed to become indebted in any further amount until such indebtedness shall be reduced within such limit. This section shall not be construed to prevent the issuing of certificates of indebtedness or-revenue bonds issued in anticipation of the collection of taxes for amounts actually contained, or to be contained in the taxes for the year when such certificates or revenue bonds are issued and payable out of such taxes. Nor shall this section be construed to prevent the issue of bonds to provide for the supply of water, but the term of the bonds issued to provide for the supply of water shall not exceed twenty years, and a sinking fund shall be created on the issuing of the said bonds for their redemption, by raising annually a sum which will produce an amount equal to the sum of the principal and interest of said bonds at their maturity. The amount hereafter to be raised by tax for county or city purposes, in any county containing a city of over, one hundred thousand inhabitants, or any such city of this state, in addition to providing for the principal and interest of existing debts, shall not in the aggregate exceed in any one year two per centum of the assessed valuation of the real and personal estate of such county or city, to be ascertained as prescribed in this section in respect to county or city debt."

The claim of the defendants is that the provision as to bonds issued to provide for the supply of water applies only to cities containing over one hundred thousand inhabitants. The claim of the plaintiff is that the provision is general and applies to all cities. It is conceded that the city of Syracuse has less than one hundred thousand inhabitants.

Section 11, as it now stands, was adopted in November, 1884. It was made up of § 11, as it existed prior to that date, adding thereto the provisions commencing with the words: “No county containing a city of over one hundred thousand inhabitants, or .any such city,” etc., to the end of the section. So that prior to 1884, no county, city, town or village could give any money or property, or loan its money or credit to or in aid of any individual or corporation, or incur any indebtedness, except for county, city, town or village purposes. An exception was made in favor

It would seem, therefore, that the provision as to water bonds had reference only to those large cities whose right to incur debts was limited. They were the only ones to be benefited by the reservation or privilege, and the burden is no more extensive than the benefit conferred. In fact, it is quite apparent that all the amendatory clauses had reference only to the described class of cities.

But it is said that there is no more reason for limiting the term and providing a sinking fund in case of bonds of large cities than of smaller ones. That may be so. And so it may be said with as much reason that smaller cities should be limited in the amount of their indebtedness to the same extent as larger ones. It is not done, however. And the same reason that would allow this to so remain would allow the power as to water bonds to be unlimited. The question for us is what is the fair construction of the section, having in view the circumstances of its adoption.

We, therefore, conclude that the limitation as to water bonds does not apply to the present case.

3. Does § 18 of the act as amended in 1890 appropriate the public property for local or private purposes? It is conceded that the law did not have the two-thirds assent required by the constitution, and it was a local act People v. O'Brien, 38 1ST. Y., 194. This is not disputed. Was there an appropriation of public property ?

The city, through its water board, was authorized to take and conduct from Skaneateles lake water not required for 'thp Brie canal through a pipe not exceeding thirty inches in diameter. Before doing this, however, the city must increase the storage capacity of the lake sufficient to store therein all the ordinary flow of its water-shed and must acquire or extinguish all water power rights upon the outlet of the lake to be affected by such storage. The work authorized by the section must be done under the direction and control of the superintendent of the public works and in accordance with plans and specifications prepared or approved

The board was given full power to do and perform all acts and' things necessary or proper to enable the city to acquire, store and obtain water from the lake in accordance with the provisions of the section.

In substance, the city was given the surplus waters as such sur-’ plus might be determined by the state officers, without reference to whether such surplus was greater or less than,the additional storage to be furnished at its expense.

The expression “superior claims,” used in the clause above quoted, had reference only to the claims of the state of water for the use of the canal, evidently contemplating that there was and would be a surplus which would be obtained by the city. The city was also given the right or privilege of using the lake as a means of storage of its additional waters, any right to or in which of any riparian owner upon the lake or outlet it was bound to extinguish.

Skaneateles lake, as the case shows, is a body of water about fifteen miles long, with a general width of about one mile, having a surface area of about thirteen square miles. It is located about seventeen miles from Syracuse, and is about 453 feet above the level of the Brie canal at the Jordan level It has a water shed, including the surface of the lake of 73-j: square miles, and discharges its water through an outlet, known as Skaneateles creek,, northerly into the Seneca river, distant between ten and eleven miles. The lake has been, for many years, navigated by steamboats and other craft, but there is no navigable communication between it and any other waters.

There is no direct evidence as to the ownership of the bed of the lake. It was conceded at the trial and is found that the patents issued by the state for the lands surrounding the lake designate by lot numbers the lands conveyed, and do not describe the same by metes and bounds, and that the original surveyor’s field notes of the lots show the shore fines of the lake as bounding fines thereof. Assuming, as we probably may, that the state was the original owner of the whole, its patents carried the title to low water mark, according to the rule laid down in Wheeler v. Spinola, 54 N. Y., 377 . That would leave the state the owner of the bed below low water mark.

The state, from the first construction of the Erie canal, had used

About nine miles below the foot of the lake, at the village of Jordan, a dam has been constructed across the outlet by means of which a portion of the flow from the lake is discharged into the canal. An aqueduct constructed under the canal permits the flow of that part of the stream not used for canal purposes beneath the canal and on to the Seneca river through its natural channel. Upon the outlet and between the lake and the canal are situated numerous mills, deriving their power from the use of the waters of the outlet, and these are the powers referred to in the act of 1890. During the time in every year when the canals are closed, a volume of water has been permitted to flow through the gates of the dam at the foot of the lake for the use of mills along the, outlet, except for several periods in different years when the water was held back either for purposes of repair or to increase the storage in the lake. The quantity of water thus ordinarily permitted to flow during the closed season of navigation amounts, as the court below found, approximately to about fifty millions gallons per day. This water has never been utilized by the state for canal purposes. The carrying capacity of the thirty inch pipe authorized to be laid is found to be fifteen million gallons per day, and the drawing of that amount per day would be equivalent in one month to two inches in depth from the surface of the lake

These are the main facts upon the subject. The theory of the defendants is, that by the appropriation of 1843 the state only acquired the right to so much water as might be required for the uses of the canal; that the balance belongs to the riparian owners, and that, therefore, the statute in question did not give to the city any property of the state. The theory of the plaintiff is, that the appropriation in 1843 was a permanent one and passed the fee to the state, and the act, which gave the city an interest in it, appropriated to that extent public property to the use of the city.

The appropriation of 1843 was in form permanent ana absolute. In this respect it differs from the case of Silsby Mfg. Co. v.

There is no doubt that in fact this was a permanent appropriation, and in such a case, as said in Heacock & Berry v. State of New York, 105 N. Y., 248 ; 7 N. Y. State Rep., 353, under the Revised Statutes then in force, §§ 46, 48, part 1, chap. 9, title 9, 1 R. S., 4th ed., 484, it was provided that the state should- take a fee, and unless the land owner applied for compensation within one year his right should be deemed extinguished. See, also, Mark v. State,. 97 N. Y., 572 .

•- In such a case, if the use for the purposes of a canal was abandoned the property would not revert Bexford -v. Knight, 11 N. Y., 308 ; Genesee Valley Canal B. B. Co. v. Slaight, 49 Hun, 37 ; 17 N. Y. State Bep., 241; Cooley on Cons. Lim. (6th ed.), 688.

If the statute authorized the entire ownership to be taken and the appropriation followed the statute, the fact that all might not be needed for the use of the canal would not reduce the extent of the right taken. In Sweet v. Buffalo, N. Y. & P. B. Co., 79 N. Y, 293 , it was held that a fee may be taken, although the public use for which the land is to be taken is special and not of necessity permanent or perpetual and that when a statute authorises the taking of a fee it cannot be held invalid, or that an easement, only was acquired thereunder, on the ground that an easement only was required to accomplish the purpose in view.

It is also to be borne in mind that in 1843 there was a statute, part 1, chap. 9, title 9, of B. S., § 75, et seq., providing for the sale of surplus waters, thus indicating that the appropriations of that character were not simply of so much as was necessary for the uses of the canals.

It seems to me, therefore, that we must assume that the appropriation of 1843 was not simply of what was required for the Erie canal but was just as broad as the resolution of the canal board made it, “ the waters of Skaneateles lake, and the outlet of the same.” It would then follow that when the act of 1890 assumed to give to the city of Syracuse the right to take waters “not required for the canal,” it would if operative give to the city the benefit of a portion of the title of the state; in other words appropriate public property.

Under the appropriation as made by the canal board, the state was entitled to take and have delivered through the outlet to the point where the state dam at the foot of the outlet is erected, all the flow from Skaneateles lake. The state, at its dam at the foot of the outlet could either turn the water into the canal, or into the Seneca river, or under the law as it then stood sell the surplus. Suppose, as claimed by the defendants, that the riparian owners along the outlet had a right to use the water as it passed along; that would not give them any right to divert it and prevent its delivery at the foot of the outlet, and the city as their grantee would obtain no such right. No one but the state could

There is another feature of the case which is of some importance on this question. The state by its appropriation in 1843 and subsequent improvements became the possessor and owner of a complete reservoir. The act of 1890 gives to the city of Syracuse the right in perpetuity to use this reservoir for the purpose of storage of surplus waters for its benefit There is thus constituted a kind of dual ownership, which, to say the least, is an impairment of the previous complete ownership of the state. The impairment of rights is the taking of property. Ex parte Jennings, 6 Cow., 525 .

■ I am not prepared to say that the act of 1890 can be construed to be within that provision of the constitution which says that the legislature “ shall not sell, lease or otherwise dispose of the Erie canal.” In the previous constitution the provision was that the legislature shall never sell, or dispose of, the said navigable communications or any part or section thereof.” It is true that by the statute in force in 1846 (1 E. S., pt 1, chap. 9, tit. 9, art 1, § 1), “ the navigable communication connecting the waters of lake Erie with those of the Hudson river, and all the side-cuts, feeders and other works belonging to the state connected therewith,” “ were known and designated by the name of the Erie canal.” This would include very likely the Skaneateles reservoir and feeder. Still the act of 1890 made the rights of the city of Syracuse subservient to the uses of the Erie canal. It aims to take surplus waters, which, though they may belong to the state, would hardly be considered a part of the Erie canal. True it is, too, that certain rights in the reservoir are conferred, but the paramount control for the benefit of the canal is retained. In the future management there might arise opportunity for friction and embarrassment in regard to conflicting claims or wants of the respective parties. Still there is some force in the suggestion that the inhibition upon a sale, lease or disposal of the canal, apparently as an entirety, does not reach the present casa

Be that as it may, I see no way to escape the conclusion that the act of 1890 assumes to appropriate public property to a local purpose, and is therefore invalid by reason of the absence of the requisite two-thirds assent of the legislature. Upon this ground the judgment should be modified by inserting a provision in effect declaring the invalidity of § 18 of the act of 1889, as amended by the act of 1890, and striking out the award of costs to the defendants. The appellant should have the costs of the appeal

Judgment accordingly.

Hardin, P. J., and Martin, J., concur.