Court Opinion

ID: 9418046
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 20:47:24.522426+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:19:13.347452
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Harlan,
dissenting. I cannot agree to the opinion and judgment in this case.
In my opinion the city of Vicksburg had no authority, under the constitution and laws of Mississippi, to give an exclusive right to any person or corporation to maintain a system of waterworks for the benefit of that city and its people.
But if I am wrong in this view, it ought not, in my judgment, to be held upon the present record that the city has, by ordinance or otherwise, precluded itself from establishing and maintaining, at its own expense, a system of waterworks for the benefit of its people. The contrary cannot be maintained, unless we hold that a municipal corporation may, by mere implication, bargain away its duty to protect the public health and- the public safety as they are involved in supplying the people with sufficient water. Nothing can be more important or vital to any people than that they should be supplied with *473pure, wholesome water. And yet it is now held that it was competent for the city of Vicksburg, by mere implication, to so tie its hands that it cannot perform the duty which it owes in that regard to its people.