Court Opinion

ID: 9751555
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 16:35:42.656518+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:26:51.304562
License: Public Domain

Markell, J.,
delivered the following dissenting opinion.
Title to the Mt. Washington branch library building of the Pratt Library, like the other branch buildings and the main library itself, is held by the City, in express trust for the Library (a corporation). By the terms of the trust the City and the Library “may by joint deed sell and convey” the land, with the improve*84ments, and “the proceeds of sale shall be paid to the * * * Library * * * to be invested by it with the approval of the * *■* City * * * in other property for the purposes of this trust, the legal title to such other property to be vested in the * * * City * * The original Pratt gift, and likewise the Carnegie gift were expressly accepted by the City by ordinance. The question presented to us is whether this express power of sale must be exercised only by an ordinance of the City. No such requirement is to be found in the terms of the trust, in the charter of the Library or the City Charter or any City ordinance. Nor do the purposes of the trust furnish any reason for such a requirement.
Section 3 of the City Charter provides, “The City may receive in trust, and may control for the purposes of such trust, all moneys and assets which may have been or shall be bestowed upon it by will, deed or any other form of gift or conveyance in trust for any corporate purpose, or in aid of the indigent poor, or for the general purposes of education or for charitable purposes of any description. All such trust funds now held or subsequently received shall be administered with respect to investment and reinvestment, subject to any limitations in the trust, by the Commissioners of Finance.” Baltimore City Charter (1949 Ed.), sec. 3. Code of 1860, P. L. L., Art. 4, sec. 2; Code of 1888, Art. 4, sec. 2. The first sentence just quoted orginated in Chapter 86 of the Acts of 1842. McDonough v. Murdock, 15 How. 367, 412-413, 14 L. Ed. 732; Barnum v. Mayor, etc., of City of Baltimore, 62 Md. 275, 293-295. The sentence last quoted originated in the New Charter adopted in 1946, effective in 1947. Though this express power to hold in trust is, to some extent, declaratory of previous implied powers of the City, it may be not altogether declaratory. It may have conferred powers to hold on trusts which, without such statutory authority, could not have been validly created before the charitable uses act of 1931. Barnum v. Baltimore, supra, 62 Md. at pages 294-295; Code, Art. 16, sec. 279. Before 1946 *85the administration of trusts was not put in charge of any particular City instrumentality. Since 1946 this power and duty has been imposed upon the Commissioners of Finance, “subject to any limitations in the trust”. The Mayor “shall see that the ordinances and resolutions are duly and faithfully executed”, and “shall have general supervision over all municipal officers and agencies.” Baltimore City Charter (1949 Ed.), sec. 10. If these general powers of the Mayor are not sufficient for the purpose, the powers of the Commissioners of Finance are clearly adequate for them to join, or request and authorize the Mayor to join, in the execution of a deed under the express power conferred by the terms of the trust.
Section 169 of the Charter provides, “169. Property— Sale or Lease. Nothing contained in the Charter shall prevent the City from in any manner disposing of any building or parcel of land no longer needed for public use; provided, that such disposition shall be authorized and provided for by ordinance, and shall be approved by the Board of Estimates, which approval shall be evidenced by the execution of the conveyance thereof by a majority of said Board, and shall be made at public sale, unless a private sale be expressly authorized by the Board of Estimates and so entered on their minutes. Unless otherwise provided by ¡ ordinance, the Comptroller is authorized to lease such property not needed for public purposes on a month to month basis. He is authorized to lease such property for fixed terms provided such leases are first approved by the Board of Estimates.” It is not necessary to express any opinion as to whether the City and the Library, in a proper case, have express or implied power to lease Library property temporarily. It is clear that the provisions as to leasing, and likewise the other provisions of section 169 relate only to municipal property and not to trust property.
There is no basis (a) for assuming that Mr. Pratt and the City bargained, he to obtain the largest possible powers for the Library, the City to give the narrowest *86possible powers or (b) to read into the trust a limitation that the power of sale can be exercised only by ordinance of the City. The largest reasonable interpretation of the City’s power and duty to “join” in a deed is that the City has the duty and power to refuse to join in a deed which is contrary to the purposes of the trust, not that the City has power to interfere with the judgment of the Library in the conduct of its affairs, including the disposition of a branch library building or change of location of a library. For reasons that had their origin in the feudal system, are now obsolete and have been superseded, largely by statute and generally by the terms of modern trust instruments, like those now before us, the courts were slow to imply a power of sale of real estate, even from a broad power of management. No such question of construction is presented by the broad provisions of this express trust. There is no indication of any intention on the part of the City, the State (in incorporating the Library), Mr. Pratt or Mr. Carnegie that the location of branch libraries, or any other part of the management of the Library, should be determined by ordinance of the City. There is no more reason why the location of a branch library should be determined by ordinance than that the question whether or not “Forever Amber” or any of thousands of other books, new or old, shall be acquired or retained by the Library. The City has appropriated millions for the Library, but there is no reason to think that the City would prefer to have its millions managed by ordinance rather than by the constituted authorities, the Library itself. The City Council is not the City.
I think the decree should be affirmed.