Source: http://masscases.com/cases/sjc/204/204mass607.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 17:58:14+00:00

Document:
Present: KNOWLTON, MORTON, HAMMOND, LORING, BRALEY, SHELDON & RUGG, JJ.
The Legislature cannot authorize a city to exercise the right of eminent domain in connection with the laying out of a public thoroughfare by taking land adjoining but outside the proposed thoroughfare with a view to its subsequent use by private individuals under conveyances, leases or agreements, although such use is intended to promote trade and perhaps also manufacturing by the erection of suitable buildings on the land, the purpose not being a public one within the meaning of the Constitution of the Commonwealth.
THE following order was passed by the House of Representatives on February 23,1910, and on the following day was transmitted to the Justices of the Supreme Judicial Court. On March 4, 1910, the Justices returned the answer which is subjoined.
side of said thoroughfare or between the same and said rear streets, as may be reasonably necessary for the purposes hereinbefore set out, with a view to the subsequent use by private individuals of so much of the property taken as lies on either side of said thoroughfare, under conveyances, leases, or agreements which shall embody suitable provisions for the construction on said land of buildings suited to the objects and purposes hereinbefore set out, and for the use, management and control of said lands and buildings in such manner as to secure and best promote the public interests and purposes hereinbefore referred to; assuming that the act provides just compensation for all persons sustaining damage by the said takings?
The question relates to the proposed laying out of a thoroughfare or street through a part of the city of Boston. The power of the city, by its officers, to lay out and construct a street or thoroughfare in any place within the city, or of any width or mode of construction, if it is found that the public necessity and convenience require it, is undoubted. Rev. Laws, c. 48, § 1; St. 1891, c. 323; St. 1902, c. 521; St. 1904, c. 443.
and commerce. The question is whether such land can be taken with a view to the subsequent use of it by private individuals, under conveyances, leases or agreements which shall embody suitable contracts for the construction on the land of buildings adapted to use in domestic and foreign trade and commerce, and for the use, management and control of the lands and buildings in such manner as to secure and promote such trade and commerce. The proposed legislation to which the inquiry relates, necessarily would contemplate action by the city in the procurement, management and control of land along a street within the city, for no other purpose than to induce and promote a use of it by merchants or traders. It would contemplate a taking of private property in the exercise of the right of eminent domain, and an expenditure of money to pay for it and fit it for occupation.
It is a rule of law universally recognized in this country, that neither of these things can be done unless the taking or expenditure is for a public use. This has been stated so often, and the principles on which it is founded have been considered so fully, that it is unnecessary to discuss it or to cite authorities. The only question about which there is a possibility of doubt is whether the proposed use of the land outside of the thoroughfare is a public use. It is plain that a use of the property to obtain the possible income or profit that might inure to the city from the ownership and control of it would not be a public use. The city cannot be authorized to take the property of a private owner for such a purpose, nor can the city tax its inhabitants to obtain money for such a use. It could as well tax them to raise money to carry on any other private business with a hope of gain. Such proceedings are entirely outside the functions of a state or of any subdivision of a state.
Minnesota Sugar Co. v. Iverson, 91 Minn. 30; Eufaula v. McNab, 67 Ala. 588; Manning v. Devil's Lake, 13 N. D. 47; Michigan Sugar Co. v. Auditor General, 124 Mich. 674; Deal v. Mississippi County, 107 Mo. 464; Feldman & Co. v. City Council of Charleston, 23 S.C. 57; Sutherland-Innes Co. v. Evart, 86 Fed. 597.
furnished by the decisions that the establishment of irrigation districts under legislative authority, for the improvement of large areas of arid and worthless land is allowable. Fallbrook Irrigation District v. Bradley, 164 U. S. 112; Talbot v. Hudson, 16 Gray 417, was treated by the court as governed by similar principles.
The decision in Moore v. Sanford, 151 Mass. 285, rests upon the ground that the work done was in a true sense for the promotion of commerce, through its direct and close relation to the improvement of Boston Harbor, in making connections between the great highways used for interstate commerce and the numerous ships that are passing back and forth between Boston and foreign ports. All that was done was held to be fairly incidental to the main purpose of promoting commerce between the United States and distant countries. The improvement of harbors and the construction of public docks, wharves, and possibly of warehouses, to be used under governmental authority as a part of the facilities for the transportation of merchandise in commercial enterprises, and the building of railroads to be used for the same object, may all affect the public so directly as to constitute a public purpose for which money raised by taxation may be expended.
The question before us refers to trade and commerce in connection with the use of land for buildings along the sides of a street through a busy part of Boston. In Webster's International Dictionary commerce is defined as the exchange of merchandise on a large scale between different places or communities. Under the Constitution of the United States, Congress is given the exclusive right to legislate for the regulation of interstate or foreign commerce. The use of buildings along such a thoroughfare as is proposed presumably would be chiefly for trade, the buying and selling of goods, and perhaps, to some extent, for the business of manufacturing. We do not think this is commerce, in such a sense that money can be raised by taxation for the promotion of it, as it can be raised for the improvement of a harbor or the construction of a railroad. In reference to the interest of the public in it, it stands no differently from other useful kinds of business.
for the city to take the home of a resident near the line of the thoroughfare, or the shop of a humble tradesman, and compel him to give up his property and go elsewhere, for no other reason than that, in the opinion of the authorities of the city, some other use of the land would be more profitable, and therefore would better promote the prosperity of the citizens generally. We know of no case in which the exercise of the right of eminent domain or the expenditure of public money has been justified on such grounds.
A statute of New York authorized a corporation to construct and maintain basins, docks, wharves and piers, and to erect thereon suitable warehouses, mills, furnaces, foundries, factories, shops, and such other buildings as might be necessary and proper for docking, loading and unloading vessels, for the storage of goods and for carrying on generally the business of a dock, warehousing and manufacturing company, and in any and every other proper and suitable way promoting and increasing the facilities for commerce, manufacture, and business generally, and to take lands for that purpose. In Matter of Eureka Basin Warehouse & Manufacturing Co., 96 N. Y. 42, 48, 49, the statute was held unconstitutional. The court said: The fact that the use to which the property is intended to be put, or the structure intended to be built thereon, will tend incidentally to benefit the public by offering additional accommodations for business, commerce or manufactures, is not sufficient to bring the case within the operation of the right of eminent domain, so long as the structures are to remain under private ownership and control, and no right to their use or to direct their management is conferred upon the public. The court expressly refrained from considering whether, if the authority were to construct a basin and wharves to the use of which the public would be entitled, under regulations to be established by public authority, the use would be a public one, and whether the addition to such powers of the right to establish private warehouses, shops, mills or factories, and to carry on the business of a dock, warehousing and manufacturing company would invalidate the delegation to the company of the right of eminent domain.
s. c., 28 App. Div. 143, has little relevancy to the subject before us. In the city of New York the fee of the land in the public streets is in the city when they are laid out in the ordinary way, and is in private ownership when they are ways by dedication. A statute providing for the disposition of the land in connecting streets, which are discontinued in the laying out of a new street, was held constitutional. It was a reasonable provision for the disposition of this land, the fee of which, in most cases, would be in the city, subject to easements of adjacent owners. It was entirely incidental to the main purpose of the statute, and in principle, although unlike it in detail, it was similar to our St. 1904, c. 443.
We answer the question in the negative.

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