Case ID: serg-rawl_16/html/0317-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Per Curiam.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

[Pittsburg,
    September 18,1827.]
    The COMMONWEALTH, at the Relation of the Inspectors of the Philadelphia Prison, against The Commissioners of Allegheny County.
    A mandamus -will not be granted against the commissioners of the county to pay an account which is disputed, until the amount due is ascertained by an action against them in their corporate capacity.,
    In obedience to a rule to show cause why a mandamus should not issue to compel the respondents to pay an account for keeping certain convicts in the penitentiary at Philadelphia, they showed for cause that the charges were unreasonable, and that the account was disputed.
    
      Blair, for the relators.
    
      Burke, for the respondents.
   Per Curiam.

The extraordinary powers of this court, are to be put in requisition, only where a remedy is not to be had in the usual course of the law. The account presented to the respondents, although duly authenticated, is not conclusive; and a jury alone is competent to determine the propriety of the charges. The remedy, in the first instance, is by action against the respondents in their corporate capacity; after which a mandamus to enforce the judgment, might be altogether proper: but, before the merits are determined in the usual way, an application like the present is premature.

Rule discharged.