Case Name: In the Matter of the Petition of the Brooklyn Elevated Railroad Company Relative to Acquiring Title to Real Estate, or a Right of Way on Sands Street in the City of Brooklyn and County of Kings. Thomas Browne, Appellant; Brooklyn Elevated Railroad Company, Respondent
Court: New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division
Jurisdiction: New York
Decision Date: 1898
Citations: 32 A.D. 221
Docket Number: 
Parties: In the Matter of the Petition of the Brooklyn Elevated Railroad Company Relative to Acquiring Title to Real Estate, or a Right of Way on Sands Street in the City of Brooklyn and County of Kings. Thomas Browne, Appellant; Brooklyn Elevated Railroad Company, Respondent.
Judges: 
Reporter: Appellate Division Reports
Volume: 32
Pages: 221–222

Head Matter:
In the Matter of the Petition of the Brooklyn Elevated Railroad Company Relative to Acquiring Title to Real Estate, or a Right of Way on Sands Street in the City of Brooklyn and County of Kings. Thomas Browne, Appellant; Brooklyn Elevated Railroad Company, Respondent.
Eminent domain — commissioners of appraisal are not disqualified because they were incorporators and stockholders of a predecessor in interest of the applicant.
Commissioners of appraisal appointed to condemn property for the purposes of a railroad are not. rendered incompetent to act by the fact that they were incorporators of, and for a long time stockholders in, a railroad company, the predecessor in interest of the company making the application for the condemnation of the land, where it appears that they have not been for many years stock- , holders or bondholders of either corporation, nor in any wise directly or indirectly interested in said corporations or either of them.
Appeal by Thomas Browne from an order of the Supreme Court, made at the Kings County Special Term and entered in the office of the clerk of the county of Kings on the 1st day of June, 1898, denying his motion to vacate an order entered in said clerk’s office on tne 5th day of January, 1898, appointing commissioners of appraisal in the proceeding.
Stephen M. Hoye [ James A. Sheehan with him on the brief], for the appellant.
Alexander S. Hyman, for the respondent.

Opinion:
Per Curiam :
There are two grounds upon which the appellant insists that the order appointing commissioners in this proceeding should be vacated. The first is that different commissioners had previously been nominated by another judge. It distinctly appears, however, that these nominations were made under a misapprehension, and were canceled by the learned judge who made them upon his attention being called to the fact that an issue had been raised by the. interposition of an answer, which must be determined before any commissioners could be appointed.
The second ground of appeal is that the commission named in the order under review is not a 'disinterested commission. There is no allegation or suggestion that any' one of. the commissioners has exhibited any partiality, prejudice or unfairness, in word or deed, but it is urged that one of the commissioners is incompetent to act. because he was an incorporator of the Union Elevated Railroad Company, the predecessor in interest of the Brooklyn Elevated Railroad Company, and was also for a long time a stockholder in the said Union Elevated Railroad Company. The affidavit of this commissioner, however, verified on April 25, 1898, declares that " deponent is not and for many years has not been a stockholder or bondholder of the Union Elevated Railroad Company or .of the Brooklyn Elevated Railroad Company, the plaintiff herein, nor been in any wise directly'or indirectly interested in said companies or either of them."
In view of this statement, which is in no wise controverted, we are of the opinion that his former ownership of stock in the Union Elevated Railroad Company constitutes no disqualification whatever. There are many judges on the bench, in this and other States, who were formerly stockholders in corporations which-now figure as litigants in their courts, and who have parted with their stock in order that they might not be disqualified from acting judicially in the suits to which such corporations are parties. No one has ever yet suggested, so far as we know, that such judges could not act impartially in these litigations, or that there was any impropriety in the coiirse which, they pursued in selling their stock for the purpose.
The order appealed from is affirmed, with ten dollars costs and disbursements.
All concurred, except Culeen, J., not sitting.
Order affirmed, with ten dollars costs and disbursements.