Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/196/539/
Timestamp: 2019-04-19 00:46:09+00:00

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Justia › US Law › US Case Law › US Supreme Court › Volume 196 › Worcester v. Street Railway Co.
The city is the creature of the state. A municipal corporation is simply a political subdivision of the state existing by virtue of the exercise of the power of the state through its legislative department.
While a municipal corporation may own property not of a public or governmental nature which is entitled to constitutional protection, the obligation of a railroad company to pave and repair streets occupied by it based on accepted conditions of a municipal ordinance granting rights of location is not private property beyond legislative control.
Chapter 578, Laws of Massachusetts of 1898, providing for taxation of street railway companies, is not void, as violating the impairment of obligation clause of the federal Constitution, so far as this case is concerned, because it relieved a railroad company from the obligation to pave and repair streets under the terms and conditions of certain municipal ordinances which the company had duly accepted.
company, which petitions were demurred to, and the demurrers sustained. Of the three other cases, two were suits in equity, and were brought by the city against the railroad company, and were heard upon the bills and demurrers thereto, the court sustaining the demurrers; the fifth case was an action on contract originally brought by the city against the railroad company, in the superior court, and heard upon demurrer to the complaint, which was sustained and judgment ordered for defendant, from which judgment plaintiff appealed to the Supreme Judicial Court of the commonwealth.
"under such restrictions as they deem the interests of the public may require, and the location thus granted shall be deemed and taken to be the true location of the tracks of the railway, if an acceptance thereof by said directors in writing is filed with said mayor and aldermen or selectmen within thirty days after receiving notice thereof."
Section 7 of chap. 113 of the Massachusetts Public Statutes.
company whose charter has been duly accepted, and whose tracks have been located and constructed, or its lessees and assigns, to extend the location of its tracks within their city or town without entering upon or using the tracks of another street railway company, and such extended location shall be deemed to be the true location of the tracks of the company, if its acceptance thereof in writing is filed in the office of the clerk of the city or town within thirty days after receiving notice thereof."
"the paving, upper planking, or other surface material of the portions of streets, roads, and bridges occupied by its tracks, and if such tracks occupy unpaved streets or roads [the company] shall, in addition, so keep in repair eighteen inches on each side of the portion occupied by its tracks,"
"Second. That block paving shall be laid and 'maintained between the rails of its track, and for a distance of eighteen inches outside of said rails, for the entire distance covered by this location.'"
between the rails and outside thereof to the street curb, and these conditions were accepted and the acceptance duly filed in the city clerk's office.
"SEC. 11. Street railway companies shall not be required to keep any portion of the surface material of streets, roads, and bridges in repair, but they shall remain subject to all legal obligations imposed in original grants of locations, and may, as an incident to their corporate franchise, and without being subject to the payment of any fee or other condition precedent, open any street, road, or bridge, in which any part of their railway is located for the purpose of making repairs or renewals of the railway, or any part thereof, the superintendent of streets or other officer exercising like authority, or the board of aldermen or selectmen, in any city or town where such are required, issuing the necessary permits therefor."
of the railroad company to do so, and one of these actions was brought to recover the expenses thus incurred by the city in making such repairs and renewing such pavement.
which the question to be decided comes before us. Whether one or the other action or proceeding is proper and appropriate need not, therefore, be considered.
The contention on the part of the plaintiff in error is that, by virtue of the restrictions or conditions placed by it upon granting the various extensions of locations of the tracks of the railroad company, and by the acceptance of the same by the company, a contract was entered into between the city and the railroad company which could not be altered without the consent of both parties, and that as the city had never consented to any alteration of the obligation of the railroad company to make the repairs in the streets, as provided for in those restrictions or conditions, the subsequent legislation contained in the act of 1898 impaired the obligation of that contract, and was therefore void as a violation of the Constitution of the United States.
In the view we take of this subject, it may be assumed, for the purpose of argument, that the City of Worcester had power, under the legislation of the state, to grant the right to extend the location of the railroad company's tracks upon the restrictions or conditions already mentioned. It may also be assumed, but only for the purpose of the argument, that the restrictions or conditions contained in the orders or decrees of the board of aldermen, upon their acceptance by the company, became contracts between the city and the company.
legislature could at any time terminate the existence of the corporation itself, and provide other and different means for the government of the district comprised within the limits of the former city. The city is the creature of the state. East Hartford v. Hartford Bridge Co., 10 How. 511, 51 U. S. 533-534.
As is stated in United States v. Railroad Company, 17 Wall. 322, 58 U. S. 329, a municipal corporation is not only a part of the state, but is a portion of its governmental power.
"It is one of its creatures, made for a specific purpose, to exercise within a limited sphere the powers of the state. The state may withdraw these local powers of government at pleasure, and may, through its legislature or other appointed channels, govern the local territory, as it governs the state at large. It may enlarge or contract its powers, or destroy its existence. As a portion of the state, in the exercise of a limited portion of the powers of the state, its revenues, like those of the state, are not subject to taxation."
"A city is only a political subdivision of the state, made for the convenient administration of the government. It is an instrumentality, with powers more or less enlarged according to the requirements of the public, and which may be increased or repealed at the will of the legislature. In directing, therefore, a particular tax by such corporation, and the appropriation of the proceeds to some special municipal purpose, the legislature only exercises a power through its subordinate agent which it could exercise directly, and it does this, only in another way, when it directs such corporation to assume and pay a particular claim not legally binding for want of some formality in its creation, but for which the corporation has received an equivalent."
charters under which such corporations are created may be changed, modified, or repealed as the exigencies of the public service or the public welfare may demand; that such corporations were composed of all the inhabitants of the territory included in the political organization, and the attribute of individuality is conferred on the entire mass of such residents, and it may be modified or taken away at the mere will of the legislature, according to its own views of public convenience, and without any necessity for the consent of those composing the body politic.
"public duties are required of counties as well as of towns, as a part of the machinery of the state; and, in order that they may be able to perform those duties, they are vested with certain corporate powers; but their functions are wholly of a public nature, and they are at all times as much subject to the will of the legislature as incorporated towns, as appears by the best text writers upon the subject, and the great weight of judicial authority."
"Were the transaction one between the state and a private individual, the invalidity of the act would not be a matter of serious doubt. Private property cannot be taken from individuals by the state except for public purposes, and then only upon compensation or by way of taxation, and any enactments to that end would be regarded as an illegitimate and unwarranted exercise of legislative power. . . . But, between the state and municipal corporations, such as cities, counties, and towns, the relation is different from that between the state and the individual. Municipal corporations are mere instrumentalities of the state, for the convenient administration of government, and their powers may be qualified, enlarged, or withdrawn at the pleasure of the legislature."
that, where no constitutional restriction is imposed, the corporate existence and powers of counties, cities, and towns are subject to the legislative control of the state creating them.
In New Orleans v. New Orleans Water Works Co., 142 U. S. 79, it was also held that a municipal corporation was the mere agent of the state in its governmental character, and was in no contract relations with its sovereign at whose pleasure its charter may be amended, changed, or revoked without the impairment of any constitutional obligation. It was also therein held that such a corporation, in respect of its private or proprietary rights and interests, might be entitled to constitutional protection. The Massachusetts courts take the same view of such a corporation. Browne v. Turner, 176 Mass. 9.
Enough cases have been cited to show the nature of a municipal corporation as stated by this Court. In general, it may be conceded that it can own private property, not of a public or governmental nature, and that such property may be entitled, as is said, "to constitutional protection." Property which is held by these corporations upon conditions or terms contained in a grant, and for a special use, may not be diverted by the legislature. This is asserted in Tippecanoe County v. Lucas, 93 U. S. 115, and in Mount Hope Cemetery v. Boston, 158 Mass. 509, the Supreme Court of Massachusetts held that cities might have a private ownership of property which could not be wholly controlled by the state government.
terminate it, with the consent of the railroad company, that the city itself would have. These restrictions and conditions were of a public nature, imposed as a means of collecting from the railroad company part, or possibly the whole, of the expenses of paving or repaving the streets in which the tracks were laid, and that method of collection did not become an absolute property right in favor of the city, as against the right of the legislature to alter of abolish it, or substitute some other method with the consent of the company, even though, as to the company itself, there might be a contract not alterable except with its consent. If this contention of the city were held valid, it would very largely diminish the right of the legislature to deal with its creature in public matters in a manner which the legislature might regard as for the public welfare. In Springfield v. Springfield Street Railway, 182 Mass. 41, this question was before the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, and the contention of the city to the same effect as the plaintiff in error contends in this case was overruled. It was therein held that the city acted in behalf of the public in regard to these extensions of locations, and that the legislature had the right to modify or abrogate the conditions on which the locations in the streets and public ways had been granted, after such conditions had been originally imposed by it. The case at bar was decided at the same time as the Springfield case (182 Mass. 49), and the proposition that the legislature had the power to free the company from obligations imposed upon it by the conditions in the grant of the extended locations was adhered to, and the Springfield case cited as authority for the same. We concur in that view.
any part of said road for use, to purchase all its franchises, property, rights, etc. That right is not affected by the legislation in question, even assuming (which we do not for a moment intimate) that the act of 1898 affected the right of the city to make the purchase under the sections above cited.

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