Danville Water Company v. City of Danville

• Decision Date: 25 March 1901
• Docket Number: No. 373,373
• Citation: 45 L.Ed. 696,21 S.Ct. 505,180 U.S. 619
• Parties: DANVILLE WATER COMPANY, Plff. in Err. , v. CITY OF DANVILLE
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

180 U.S. 619

21 S.Ct. 505

45 L.Ed. 696

DANVILLE WATER COMPANY, Plff. in Err.,

v CITY OF DANVILLE.

No. 373.

Submitted November 12, 1900.

Decided March 25, 1901.

Messrs. Alexander Pope Humphrey and William W. Davies for plaintiff in error.

Messrs. G. F. Rearick and John H. Lewman for defendant in error.

Mr. Justice McKenna delivered the opinion of the court:

The parties to this action were respectively plaintiff and defendant in the courts of the state, and we will so denominate them. The plaintiff is a private corporation, and the defendant is a municipal corporation organized and existing under the general laws of the state. The action was brought by the plaintiff to recover the sum of $5,000, alleged to be due for the rental of certain fire hydrants.

The cause of action relied on is based on an ordinance passed on the 9th of November, 1882, by the defendant, granting the plaintiff the privilege of constructing and maintaining waterworks for supplying the city of Danville, Illinois, with water. The ordinance provided in detail for the character of the works and the supply, the rates to consumers, whether furnished by meter or otherwise, and the purchase by defendant of the works at the expiration of five, ten, and twenty years, and at the expiration of thirty years of any renewed term.

Section 8 and section 14 are respectively as follows:

'In consideration of the benefits which will be derived by the said city and its inhabitants from the construction and operation of the said waterworks, and in further consideration of the water supply hereby secured for public uses, and as the inducement to said water company to accept the provisions of this ordinance and contract, and to enter upon the construction of said waterworks, the rights and privileges hereby granted to and vested in said water company shall remain in force and effect for thirty years from the passage of this ordinance; and for the same consideration and as the same inducement the city of Danville hereby rents of the Danville Water Company, for the uses hereinafter stated, 100 fire hydrants of the character hereinafter described, and for and during the term of thirty years from passaged of this ordinance, and agrees to locate them promptly along the line of the street mains, on demand of said water company, and on submission by it to said city of a plan of the location of said street mains, and agrees to use the said hydrants carefully and to pay said water company for any injury which may happen to any of them when used by any officer, servant, or member of the fire department of said city, and agrees to pay rent for said 100 hydrants at the rate of $75 each per year, and agrees to pay during the unexpired term of said ordinance and privilege, for any additional fire hydrants which city may hereafter locate at the rate of sixty-two and fifty one-hundreths dollars each, per year, for the next forty additional hydrants, and for all fire hydrants in excess of 140 at the rate of $50 each, per year; all of which sum shall be paid by said city to said water company, beginning from the dates when each of such hydrants shall be put into successful operation, in quarter-yearly instalments on the 1st days of February, May, August, and November of each year, and terminating upon the expiration of said term of thirty years, or upon the purchased of said works and their privileges and property by the said city.

'This ordinance shall become binding as a contract on the said city of Danville in the event that the said Danville Water Company shall, within ten days from the passage and publication of this ordinance, file with the city clerk of said city its written acceptance of the terms, obligations, and conditions of this ordinance, and upon such acceptance this ordinance shall constitute the contract, and shall be the measure of the rights and liabilities of the said city and the said water company.

The acceptance was duly filed by plaintiff. On the 1st of May, 1883, another ordinance was passed amending the first ordinance, for the construction of the works, the streets where the mains should be laid, and the place where the fire hydrants should be put, and how constructed.

Section 2 provided as follows:

'This ordinance shall become binding as a part of the contract existing between the city of Danville and the Danville Water Company in the event that said water company shall, within ten days from the passage and publication of this ordinance, file with the city clerk of said city its written acceptance of it.'

Between the 8th of June, 1883, and the 18th of October, 1894, twelve other ordinances were passed, requiring the extension of the mains of the water system to other streets and the erection of fifty-seven additional fire hydrants; all of the ordinances were declared binding as contracts upon acceptance by the plaintiff, and all were accepted. The rental of the hydrants was fixed, as to some of them at $62.50 per annum, and others at $50 and $40 per annum. In the ordinance fixing the latter sums it was provided that nothing therein should ...