Case Title: Pappas v. City of Eufaula

Citation: 210 So. 2d 802

Docket Number: 

State: alabama

Court: Alabama Supreme Court

Date: 1968-05-23T00:00:00Z

Document:
210 So. 2d 802 (1968)
Gregory H. PAPPAS et al.
v.
CITY OF EUFAULA.
4 Div. 223.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
May 23, 1968.
*803 George B. Azar, Azar, Campbell & Azar, Montgomery, Christie G. Pappas, Eufaula, for appellants.
Grubb & Le Maistre, Eufaula, for appellee.
COLEMAN, Justice.
The plaintiffs appeal from a judgment of voluntary nonsuit. The court sustained defendant's demurrer to the complaint. This caused plaintiffs to take the nonsuit and seek reversal of the ruling sustaining the demurrer.
The allegations of the complaint are to effect that plaintiffs claim the right to recover from the City of Eufaula, a municipal corporation, damages and attorney's fees sustained by plaintiffs as the result of the institution of eminent domain proceedings by the city against property of the plaintiffs, and the dismissal of the eminent domain proceedings by the city prior to the assessment of damages and compensation for plaintiffs' property. In short, the city instituted the eminent domain proceedings against the property of plaintiffs; plaintiffs employed counsel and incurred expense in defending the suit; but the city dismissed the proceedings before the court assessed the amount of damages and compensation which the city would be required to pay before the city could take plaintiffs' property.
Plaintiffs rest their right to recover on § 25 of Title 19, Code 1940, which recites:
The parties appear to concede that, under the statute, where the condemnation proceedings are instituted, the court proceeds to grant the application to condemn and assesses the damages and compensation, but, the condemnor fails to pay the amount of the award within six months after the assessment or within six months after the appeal is determined, then the condemnor is liable to the owner for all damages he may have sustained by institution of the proceedings, including a reasonable attorney's fee for defending the same. See Grief v. City of Homewood, 257 Ala. 181, 58 So. 2d 120.
In the instant case, however, the proceedings were dismissed before the court assessed the damages and compensation to which the landowners were entitled. The city contends that, because the proceedings were dismissed before the assessment was made, and because the statute does not provide that the condemnor shall pay the owner's damages and attorney's fee until after assessment has been made, the owner is not, under the statute, entitled to recover *804 his damages and attorney's fee in the instant case.
The plaintiffs contend that:
The question thus presented for decision is: Does the statute require the condemnor to pay the owner's damages and attorney's fee in a case where the damages and compensation, for the property sought to be condemned, have not been assessed and the condemnation proceedings have been dismissed?
If the statute requires the condemnor to pay only in cases where the damages and compensation have been assessed, then the plaintiffs have not shown a right to recover and the court did not err in sustaining the city's demurrer. On the other hand, if the statute requires the condemnor to pay in a case where damages and compensation have not been assessed and the condemnation proceedings have been dismissed, then the plaintiffs have shown a right to recover and the court erred in sustaining the demurrer.
In thus stating the case, we have pretermitted consideration of other objections which might be raised against plaintiffs' right to recover. Our decision is limited to the construction of the statute and consideration of the proposition asserted in argument by plaintiffs, on which proposition the city has joined issue.
We have accepted the principle in this state that, in the absence of contract, statute, or recognized ground of equity, there is no right to have an attorney's fee paid by the opposing party. Low v. Low, 255 Ala. 536, 52 So. 2d 218; Inland Mutual Ins. Co. v. Hightower, 274 Ala. 52, 145 So. 2d 422.
A statute in modification or derogation of the common law will not be presumed to alter it further than is expressly declared. Cook v. Meyer Bros., 73 Ala. 580, 583.
A statute which is an innovation upon the common law will not be extended further than is required by the letter of the statute. Lock v. Miller, 3 Stewart & Porter 13; Atlantic Coast Line R. Co. v. Kines, 276 Ala. 253, 258, 160 So. 2d 869.
§ 25 of Title 19 is an innovation on the common law and, therefore, is to be strictly construed. The statute provides that condemnor shall pay the owners' damages, including attorney's fee, when damages and compensation for the property to be taken have been assessed. The statute does not provide that condemnor shall pay where the damages and compensation have not been assessed. Such is the instant case. We are of opinion that the owners' right to recover is limited to the circumstances provided by the statute and that those circumstances are not shown here.
In 92 A.L.R.2d 357, will be found an annotation on the liability of condemnor for expenses incurred by the property owner where the eminent domain proceedings are abandoned. The general rule is summarized by the annotator as follows:
We take the majority view that there can be no recovery without statutory authority, and hold that § 25, Title 19, is not authority for recovery by the plaintiffs under the circumstances of the instant case.
Plaintiffs rely on DeSoto County v. Highsmith, (Fla.), 60 So. 2d 915, where the court held the property owner entitled to recover reasonable attorney's fees where the condemnation proceedings were dismissed by the condemnor. The Florida statute provided:
In allowing the recovery of attorney's fees, the court relied on its older case, Jacksonville Terminal Co. v. Blanshard, 85 Fla. 500, 96 So. 286, in which the court had allowed attorney's fees under the same statutory provision. In Blanshard, the court had said:
§ 25 of Title 19 makes the condemnor's liability dependent "upon such failure," that is, condemnor's failure to pay "the damages and compensation assessed" within the specified six months. The Florida statute does not make condemnor's liability for defendant's attorney's fee dependent "upon such failure" to pay the assessment. The Florida statute places no conditions or limitations on the petitioner's (condemnor's) liability for all costs, including fee for defendant's attorney. Because of the difference in the statute, the Florida court reached a result different from the result we reach under § 25 of Title 19.
We do not question the justice of allowing the owner to recover expenses and attorney's fees incurred in defending the condemnation proceedings. The legislature, however, and not this court, is the authority authorized to change the law in this respect.
The judgment sustaining the demurrer is in accord with the views herein expressed and is affirmed.
Affirmed.
LIVINGSTON, C. J., and LAWSON and KOHN, JJ., concur.