Case Name: MUTUAL IRRIGATION CO. v. BAKER CITY
Court: Oregon Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Oregon
Decision Date: 1910-08-03
Citations: 58 Or. 306
Docket Number: 
Parties: MUTUAL IRRIGATION CO. v. BAKER CITY.
Judges: Mr. Chief Justice Eakin and Mr. Justice McBride concur.
Reporter: Oregon Reports
Volume: 58
Pages: 306–329

Head Matter:
Submitted on motion to correct transcript July 12,
decided Aug. 3, 1910.
Argued on the merits Oct. 6, 1910, decided Jan. 10, rehearing denied April 4, 1911.
MUTUAL IRRIGATION CO. v. BAKER CITY.
[110 Pac. 392: 113 Pac. 9.]
Appeal and Error — Transcript — Curing Defects — Supplying Omitted Papers.
1. Section 553, B. & C. Comp., requires appellant to file a transcript containing copies of the decree appealed from, etc.; and Section 554 provides that, when it appears by affidavit that the transcript filed is incomplete, the Supreme Court may rule the clerk of the trial court to certify as to the alleged omission, and, if papers have been omitted to transmit a copy thereof to the Supreme Court. Held, that a copy of the decree unintentionally omitted from the transcript can be supplied on application, by directing- the clerk of the trial court to send up a certified copy thereof.
Injunction—Equitable Estoppel.
2. An irrigation company maintaining ditches on the sides of city streets was seasonably notified of an ordinance providing for the improvement of the streets and permitting it to apply for plans, if it desired to continue the use of the ditches, but it made no request for plans. The president of the company, at a conference with the city council, protested against the destruction of any of its ditches. Held, that a delay of two months in suing to enjoin interference with its ditches during the construction of the improvement by the city under the ordinance did not equitably estop the company; it not deriving any benefit from the improvements.
Municipal Corporations — Public Improvements — Ordinance — Validity.
3. An ordinance providing for a public improvement at the cost of the immediate property benefited, or at the expense of the owner of the property, must specify the general character and extent of the improvement, and where the ordinance is so uncertain as not to be susceptible of performance, the ordinance is inadequate.
Municipal Corporations—Public Improvements—Power to Make.
4. The power of a city to make public improvements must be found in the charter conferring the right, either by express grant or by necessary implication.
Municipal Corporations—Powers—Delegation of Authority.
5. The power of a city to make public improvements cannot be delegated when it involves the exercise of discretion and judgment, unless permission to do so is expressly granted.
Municipal Corporations—Powers—Delegation op Authority.
6. Baker City charter (Sp. Laws 1903, p. 547), providing that when it shall be deemed expedient to change an existing street, a resolution must be adopted directing the city engineer to make a survey of the proposed alteration, draw a plat thereof, and submit a written report, which declaration, if considered satisfactory by the council, shall be adopted by ordinance, does not permit the city to delegate the power to determine the nature or extent of any contemplated improvement, except that the engineer, in pursuance of a resolution demanding information as a basis for an ordinance, must report on the question of the advisability of the proposed change; and an ordinance requiring an owner of irrigation ditches in streets to be improved to apply for plans to be prepared by the city engineer, and declaring that a failure of the owner of the ditches to agree to pay the cost of the contemplated changes shall amount to an abandonment of the right to occupy any part of the streets, is invalid, as delegating power to determine plans for the ditches, and the failure of an owner of ditches to demand plans, or to covenant to pay the cost of making the alterations, does not relieve the council from the necessity of adopting an ordinance prescribing generally the kind and size of the pipe or other means considered requisite, and directing the manner of laying it.
Dedication—Conveyances—Highways.
7. A conveyance by a proprietor of a town site of lots therein, with reference to an existing plat thereof indicating streets as a boundary, is an irrevocable parol dedication of the streets when no express grant thereof to the public has been made, notwithstanding Section 5338, B. & C. Comp., declaring that no covenant shall be implied in any conveyance of real estate.
Dedication—Conveyances—Highways.
8. Where the federal government resurveyed a town site laid out by an individual on government land, and then sold lots as represented on the map, disclosing lots, blocks, and streets, and the sales were made by officers acting within their authority, the streets were dedicated to a public use, and as long as they were employed for that purpose, they could not become the property of an individual, and no right to interfere with the streets could thereafter be secured from the federal government.
Dedication—Highways.
9. Where an owner laid out an addition to a town site without noting on the plat of the survey drainage ditches previously dug on the land, he thereby acknowledged that he did not propose to interfere with the streets indicated on the plat in any manner inconsistent with the use thereof by the p\iblie, and his act disclosed an intention to assert merely a license by sufferance to employ the water for irrigation in his addition.
Municipal Corporations — Streets — Obstructions — Legislative Authority.
10. In the absence of constitutional inhibition, the legislature may authorize obstructions in the streets of a municipality which, without such sanction, may become nuisances, but statutes of that kind must be strictly construed.
Municipal Corporations ■— Control op Streets ■— Charter Provisions.
11. Under Baker City charter (Sp. Laws 1874, p. 151), as originally enacted and as re-enacted by Sp. Laws 1878, p. 192, empowering the board of trustees to remove all obstructions from highways, provided that they shall not interfere with existing improvements within the lines of the streets, the trustees may not interfere with existing drainage ditches on the sides of streets; but the charter does not grant any right to maintain such ditches, but merely recognizes a mere license, revocable at the pleasure of the legislature, and the maintenance of the ditches cannot, while the charter provisions are in force, ripen into title by prescription, because the city may not interfere with them.
Municipal Corporations—Powers—Regulation op Streets.
12. Where a city charter empowers a regulation of the use of streets, the grant is not limited to the mere right to put the streets in order for travel or to keep them in repair, hut also authorizes the laying of pipes for gas, water, and other public conveniences.
Municipal Corporations—Powers—Regulation op Streets.
13. Baker City charter (Sp. Laws 1874, p. 151), as amended by Sp. Laws 1878, p. 192, and Sp. Laws 1882, p. 87, defining the powers of the municipal authorities over the streets of the city, does not, either expressly or by necessary implication, authorize the municipal authorities to permit the construction of drainage ditches in any of the streets, and an ordinance granting such a concession is a nullity, and no right is secured thereby.
Estoppel—Equitable Estoppel—Municipal Corporations.
14. No estoppel arises from an act of a municipal corporation or its officers done in violation of, or without authority of, law even though money has been expended on the faith of the act.
Municipal Corporations—Rowers—Regulation op Streets.
15. Under Baker City charter (Sp. Laws 1903, p. 609) subd. 59, authorizing the city council to regulate, provide for, and prohibit the construction, building, use, or operation of irrigating ditches, on any of the streets of the city, and to provide for the removal of the same, the city council may make such reasonable regulations by ordinance for conducting water along the streets as may be reasonably necessary, and when that has been done an irrigation company maintaining irrigation ditches along the streets must comply therewith.
Constitutional Law—Police Power—Property Subject to.
16. All property is subject to the exercise of the state’s police power.
Constitutional Law—Police Power—Surrender op Power.
17. The police power of the state is a sovereign prerogaitve which cannot be alienated or ultimately surrendered, because it is essential to the existence and self-preservation of the state.
Constitutional Law—Police Power—Delegation op Power.
18. The police power of the state may in part be delegated to, and exercised by, a municipal corporation, which has the power to preserve the health, protect the morals, and promote the safety of its citizens.
Corporations—Police Regulations.
19. A corporation impressed with the performance of a public duty is subject to police regulations, requiring it to make such reasonable changes in its mode of the use of streets as may be demanded by public necessity.
[110 Pac. 392.]
Corporations—Police Regulations.
20. A corporation furnishing water generally for irrigation only when there is a surplus in its ditches after supplying the needs of its stockholders is impressed with a public character, and holds its property subject to an exercise of the police power of the state to a greater degree than a private person.
From Baker: William Smith, Judge.
This is a suit by The Baker City Mutual Irrigation Company, a corporation, against Baker City, a municipal corporation, William Pollman, as mayor, O. P. Ison, D. L. Wyatt, A. Hansen, W. H. Shoemaker, E. T. Beers, George Chandler, M. F. Bennett and E. E. Dobbins, as councilmen of Baker City, Jerry' White and Warren Construction Company, a corporation.
Motion on defendants appeal to correct defective transcript.
Allowed.
Mr. Gustav Anderson for the motion.
Mr. Julius N. Hart, contra.

Opinion:
Decided August 3, 1910.
Motion to Correct Transcript.
Opinion by
Mr. Chief Justice Moore.
This is an application to correct a defect in a transcript. It appears by affidavit that the defendants perfected an appeal from an adverse decision, and within the time limited therefor filed with our clerk a transcript, from which was unintentionally omitted a copy of the decree undertaken to be reviewed.
The appellant is required to send up a transcript on appeal, containing copies of the judgment or decree appealed from, of the notice of appeal and proof of service thereof, and of the undertaking on appeal, where upon jurisdiction of the cause is secured. Section 553, B. & C. Comp. When, however, it satisfactorily appears by affidavit that the transcript is incomplete in any particular, the Supreme Court is authorized to make a rule on the clerk of the trial court, requiring him to certify as to such alleged omission, and, if true, to transmit a copy of the paper so left out. Section 554, B. & C. Comp. It has been the constant practice of this court for many years to construe these clauses of the statute with reference to each other, and when it has been made satisfactorily to appear that an appeal was perfected and a transcript filed in due time, from which some paper, order, judgment, or decree was inadvertently omitted, to supply the defect by rule on the clerk of the lower court. Thus in Byers v. Ferguson, 41 Or. 77 (65 Pac. 1067: 68 Pac. 5), a transcript on appeal contained a copy of a judgment lien docket, instead of a copy of the judgment complained of, whereupon the defect was remedied in the manner indicated.
[113 Pac. 9.]
Statement by Mr. Justice Moore.
This is a suit to enjoin interference with irrigating ditches in city streets. The facts constituting the basis of plaintiff's right and the foundation for its attempted invasion are that R. A. Pierce caused to be laid out into lots, blocks, streets, and alleys, a tract of land which he designated as Baker City, a plat of which was filed in the proper office October 20, 1865. His right to the land having been contested, it was determined that the United States held the title to the premises, whereupon the Secretary of the Interior caused the lines run by Pierce to be retraced and a plat to be made October 8, 1868, but no express dedication of the streets appears to have been made. The United States, however, sold and conveyed lots in Baker City. J. M. Boyd secured the title to a tract of land joining the city boundary on the north, and in 1870 a ditch was dug from Powder River, a stream flowing northerly east of the platted land, commencing at a point near the southeast corner of the town site, and water thus diverted was conducted in ditches dug along the curbs of streets and furnished for irrigation. At the time of the diversion a ditch was constructed north along what would have been an extension of First Street to land joining the town site on the north, which tract was laid out as Boyd's Addition to Baker City. A plat of this accession was filed February 20, 1872, but no lines appear thereon indicating the location or reservation of any ditches.
The principle thus announced is controlling, and hence the clerk of the lower court is directed to send up a certified copy of the decree from which this appeal is taken. Allowed.