Atlantic Coast Line Railroad Company v. City of Goldsboro

• Citation: 34 S.Ct. 364,58 L.Ed. 721,232 U.S. 548
• Decision Date: 24 February 1914
• Docket Number: No. 112,112
• Parties: ATLANTIC COAST LINE RAILROAD COMPANY, Plff. in Err., v. CITY OF GOLDSBORO, North Carolina
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

232 U.S. 548

34 S.Ct. 364

58 L.Ed. 721

ATLANTIC COAST LINE RAILROAD COMPANY, Plff. in Err.,

v CITY OF GOLDSBORO, North Carolina.

No. 112.

Argued December 10, 1013.

Decided February 24, 1914.

Messrs. Frederic D. McKenney, George B. Elliott, and George M. Rose for plaintiff in error.

[Argument of Counsel from page 549 intentionally omitted] Messrs. Robert W. Winston, J. Crawford Biggs, D. C. Humphrey, J. D. Langston, and M. H. Allen for defendant in error.

Mr. Justice Pitney delivered the opinion of the court:

The Atlantic Coast Line Railroad Company, plaintiff in error, has succeeded to the ownership of the property, franchises, and rights of the Wilmington & Raleigh Railroad Company, which was chartered by the general assembly of North Carolina in the year 1833, and whose name was afterwards changed to Wilmington & Weldon Railroad Company. Under its charter powers the original company constructed its railroad from Wilmington to and into Wayne county, North Carolina, passing through the place which later, and in the year 1847, became incorporated as the town of Goldsboro, now the city of Goldsboro, defendant in error.

For the purposes of its railroad, the Wilmington & Raleigh Company acquired a strip of land 130 feet wide, extending through Goldsboro from north to south, and constructed its road upon it before the incorporation of the town. The land was acquired in part under deeds conveying title in fee simple, in part by condemnation proceedings which conferred upon the company, as is claimed, the equivalent of a fee simple. Afterwards, two other companies, designated respectively as the North Carolina Railroad Company and the Atlantic & North Carolina Railroad Company, with the consent and permission of the Wilmington & Raleigh, or Wilmington & Weldon, and under agreements with that company, constructed their railroad tracks upon the same 'right of way.'

The town naturally grew along the railroad, and the right of way, so far as not occupied by the tracks, was and still is used for the ordinary purposes of a street, without objection by plaintiff in error or its predecessors in title. In laying out the town, this right of way was designated as a street 130 feet wide; the portion lying east of the tracks being designated as East Center street, the portion on the west of the tracks as West Center street. Cross streets were laid out, designated successively (commencing at the north) as Holly, Beech, Vine, Oak, Ash, Mulberry, Walnut, Chestnut, Spruce, Pine, and Elm streets. East and West Center streets have become the principal business streets of the town and the portion between Ash and Spruce—four blocks—is the heart of the city.

During the years since the incorporation of Goldsboro numerous industries have been and are now located on East and West Center streets, and the track of plaintiff in error, in addition to its use as a part of the main line, has been and is used by the company in shifting cars into and out of these industries, and also for reaching the freight terminals of the other two railroads, which are in the northerly part of the town; the terminal of plaintiff in error being in the southerly part. A belt line has been built around the city, over which through passenger trains and some freight trains are moved, but the use of the old main line for connecting with the other terminals, for shifting cars into industries, and loading tracks along the right of way, and for the passage of certain of its trains, is claimed by plaintiff in error to be still essential to its business.

The municipal corporation has for many years worked and maintained its streets and cross streets, including so much of the surface of East and West Center streets as lies outside of the space actually occupied by the railroad tracks. More recently it has instituted a system of street grades and of drainage extending throughout the city, and has paved a considerable part of East and West Center streets in conformity to the grade so established. From Chestnut street north the railroad tracks are (or, at least, prior to the municipal action complained of they were) from 6 to 18 inches above the established street grade; the tracks south of Chestnut street being in a cut from 1 to 8 feet deep.

In November, 1909, the board of aldermen passed an ordinance or ordinances containing the following provisions: Section 1 rendered it unlawful for any railroad company to run any freight or passenger train on East or West Center streets at a rate of speed exceeding 4 miles per hour, and required the companies to have flagmen proceed 50 feet in front of every train to warn persons of its approach. Section 2 provided that the shifting limits on East and West Center streets should be from Spruce street to the city limits on the south, and from Ash street to the city limits on the north; thus excluding the four blocks between Spruce and Ash streets. Section 3 declared it to be unlawful for any railroad company to do any shifting within those four blocks at any other time than between the hours of 6:30 and 8:30 A. M., and between 4:30 and 6:30 P. M. Section 4 rendered it unlawful for any railroad company to place any car and allow it to stand for a longer period than five minutes at any point on East and West Center streets within the same four blocks. Section 5 required all railroad companies owning tracks on East and West Center streets between Walnut and Vine (four blocks) to lower the tracks so as to make them conform to the grade line of the streets, and to fill in the tracks between the rails; the required lowering being specified as 6 inches from Walnut to Mulberry, 10 inches between Mulberry and Ash, and 18 inches between Ash and Vine streets. Substantial penalties were prescribed for violations of these prohibitions.

Plaintiff in error began this action against the city of Goldsboro in the superior court of Wayne county, seeking to restrain the enforcement of the ordinances. A temporary restraining order was granted. At the hearing, the objection to the enforcement of § 1 was abandoned by plaintiff; as to the other sections the court vacated the restraining order. Upon appeal, the supreme court of North Carolina affirmed the judgment. 155 N. C. 356, 71 S. E. 514. The present writ of error under § 709, Rev. Stat., U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 575 (Judicial Code, § 237 [36 Stat. at L. 1156, chap. 231, U. S. Comp. Stat. Supp. 1911, p. 227]), is based upon the insistence, made in the state courts and there overruled, that the ordinances impair the obligation of the contract contained in the charter of the company, in contravention of § 10 of art. 1, of the Federal Constitution, and deprive the company of its property without due process of law, in contravention of the 14th Amendment.

The supreme court of the state construed the section forbidding shifting as having reference to the 'cutting out and putting in' of cars in the making up of a train before it is despatched upon its journey, and not as referring to the 'transfer' of a train of cars, already made up by plaintiff in error, to another railroad company for transportation. In view of the fact that plaintiff in error has shifting yards farther from the center of the city, where its trains can be made up and at least the chief part of the necessary shifting done, the court held it to be a reasonable exercise of the police power to forbid car shifting, except within the limited hours specified, on the four blocks of the plaintiff's track that lie in the heart of the city; declaring this regulation to be necessary for the convenience and safety of the public at the crossings.

With reference to the section requiring the lowering of the tracks between Walnut and Vine streets so as to make them conform to the grade lines of the streets, the court held that the Company took its charter subject to the right of the state to lay out new roads and streets, and to require the company to make such alterations as would prevent the public passage over its tracks from being impeded; and that there was no contract exempting the railroad from changing its grade at crossings when required.

In this court, plaintiff in error abandons its attack upon the right of the city to require a change of grade at the street crossings. The controversy, therefore, is now limited to (a) the restrictions imposed by §§ 2 and 3 upon shifting operations on East and West Center streets between Spruce and Ash streets; (b) the prohibition of § 4 against the standing of cars for a longer period than five minutes within the same four blocks; and (c) the requirement under § 5 that the tracks from Walnut to Vine streets shall conform to the grade of East and West Center streets, and shall be filled in between the rails, elsewhere than at the crossing streets. Upon the argument, it was stated by counsel representing the city that plaintiff in error had complied with the decision of the state court as to § 5, at least, to the extent of lowering its tracks. But there was no clear admission of the fact in behalf of plaintiff in error, and we shall therefore disregard the supposed compliance.

It is, among other things, contended by plaintiff in error that the ordinances are not within the powers conferred by the legislature of North Carolina upon the municipal corporation. This is a question of state law, which, for present purposes, is conclusively settled by the decision of the supreme court of North Carolina in this case. Merchants' & M. Nat. Bank v. Pennsylvania, 167 U. S. 461, 462, 42 L. ed. 236, 237, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 829, and cases cited; Lombard v. West Chicago Park Comrs. 181 U. S. 33, 43, 45 L. ed. 731, 737, 21 Sup. Ct. Rep. 507.

A municipal by-law or ordinance, enacted by virtue of power for that purpose delegated by the legislature of the state, is a state law within the meaning of the Federal Constitution. New Orleans Waterworks Co. v. Louisiana Sugar Ref. Co. 125 U. S. 18, 31, 31 L. ed. 607, 612, 8...