Court Opinion

ID: 9538912
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:43:53.50963+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:58:14.875195
License: Public Domain

FOSTER, Justice
(dissenting).
Taking the project here contemplated as a whole, I think it violates section 94 of the Constitution. That feature of the Constitution prohibits the Legislature from authorizing' a city to lend its credit or grant' public money or thing of value in aid of or to any individual, association or corporation. That means one engaged in a private enterprise, and not one which is for a public use. It is not confined to lending of. money to any such private person, association or corporation, but embraces anything of value.
The expression in our older cases of the purpose sought to be accomplished by this provision of the Constitution should not be construed as limiting it to monetary transactions. Prior to the first appearance of this provision, which was in the Constitution of 1875, a city’s power was embraced within its charter provisions and their implication. At that time it was held by this Court that the provisions of the charter which authorized a city to purchase all the real estate and personal property as may be required for the use, convenience and improvement of the city, did not authorize a city to purchase property to be used as a county fair ground by a fair association. City of Eufaula v. McNab, 67 Ala. 588.
Section 94, supra, prohibits the Legislature from authorizing a city to do that. So that, subsequent to the adoption of section 94, a city has occupied a status similar to that which it occupied prior to the adop-' tion of section 94, when it was under a charter provision which did not authorize it to acquire property for other than a public use.
It is my belief that the plan outlined, now before us, shows the acquisition of property by the City of Andalusia for the purpose of turning it over to a private enterprise not for public use, and therefore the principles laid down in the case of City of Eufaula v. McNab, supra, are analogous to those which apply at the present time under section 94, supra. If a county fair is not a public enterprise, certainly an enterprise whose object is to extract resin and turpentine from pine stumps for sale to the public is not a public enterprise.
By this transaction a private corporation, not affected with a public interest, would obtain benefits which are not otherwise available as follows: (1) freedom from ad *64valorem taxation; (2) income tax benefits; by assuming that the payments to be made of the bonds and other cost of constructing the plant are for its use as a current operating expense, though the amount of it is not conditioned upon or affected by the rental value of the property; and (3) the designation of the bonds as municipal bonds, whereas the city is in no way responsible for their payment and has assumed no duty in respect to them which imposes a liability on it, and they are for the sole benefit of a private business corporation. The city will obtain a deed to the property in question and apparently lease it to a private corporation, as if the lease were substantial in fact.
I think that section 94 of the Constitution prohibits the legislature from authorizing a city to acquire property for the purpose of turning it over to a private corporation to enable it to receive benefits which are only available to the city as a municipal corporation.
I am authorized to say that Mr. Justice BROWN concurs in this dissent, and that he also wishes to include in his dissent the reasons expressed by him in a dissenting opinion from that of other members of the Court in Re Opinion of the Justices, 256 Ala. 162, 53 So.2d 840.