Court Opinion

ID: 9747115
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-27 14:57:19.012607+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:25:20.249912
License: Public Domain

POMEROY, Justice
(dissenting).
The appellants in their complaint have not alleged how any rights or interests of theirs would be injured by appellees’ proposed action. I must therefore dissent from the Court’s action today.
The Act of June 19, 1871, P.L. 1360, § 1, 15 P.S. § 117, cited by the majority, by its very terms requires that in order for parties to seek relief under that statute it must be “alleged that the private rights of individuals or the rights or franchises of other corporations are injured or invaded”. In the case of Gingrich v. Blue Ridge Memorial Gardens, 444 Pa. 420, 282 A.2d 315 (1971), we interpreted this requirement in the following manner: “The statute simply grants an individual or corporate body the right in a court of equity to inquire whether or not a corporation is exceeding its charter powers, and, thereby, *479inflicting an injury upon such individual as distinguished from the public.” (Emphasis added.) Id. at 424, 282 A.2d at 317.*
Appellant Philadelphia Community Cable Coalition avers in its complaint, as an injury, that “The citizens would suffer”. The complaint makes clear the Coalition’s conviction that the proposed acts of appellees would be detrimental to the community; it seeks an injunction to vindicate the community’s interest. Its brief explains that the acts complained of “infringe upon the rights of the individual taxpayer and the community at large as represented by [the Coalition\ ”. (Emphasis added.) Thus, in its view, the interests of the 40-mem-ber Coalition and those of the community are the same. The Coalition’s president testified (at a hearing on the prayer for preliminary injunction) that the group had not sought, and did not intend to seek, a cable television franchise. Coalition has clearly not asserted any injury different from that which it believes the public at large will suffer. It thus has no standing under the Act of 1871.
Appellant Zeh is in no better position. As a resident of one of the wards covered by the franchise ordinances, he claims he will be damaged by appellee’s proposed action in that he would be denied his right to have public hearings into the qualifications of the cable television company which is to operate in his area. Without passing on the merits of whether any such right exists, it is apparent that Zeh, like the Coalition, has failed to allege *480that any right of his, distinct from that of the community at large, is about to be invaded or injured by appellees. He also, in my opinion, lacks standing to seek this injunction.-
Accordingly, I would affirm the decree of the lower court sustaining appellees’ preliminary objections.
JONES, C. J., and ROBERTS, J., join in this dissent.

 For similar statements of the requirements of the Act, see Penna. R. R. Co. v. Greensburg, Jeannette & Pittsburg Street Railway Co., 176 Pa. 559, 578, 35 A. 122, 130 (1896) (“The act of 1871 applies to direct interference with rights, not consequential injury to interests . . .”); Andel v. Duquesne Street Railway, 219 Pa. 635, 639, 69 A. 278, 279 (1908) (“The private rights of individuals referred to in this act are rights of property of some character”). See also Blankenburg v. Phila. Rapid Transit Co., 228 Pa. 338, 341, 77 A. 506 (1910); Edwards v. Pittsburg Junction R. R. Co., 215 Pa. 597, 603, 64 A. 798 (1906).