Delaware, L. & WR Co. v. MAYOR, ETC., OF TOWN OF MORRISTOWN

• Decision Date: 03 September 1926
• Docket Number: No. 3391.,3391.
• Citation: 14 F.2d 257
• Parties: DELAWARE, L. & W. R. CO. v. MAYOR AND BOARD OF ALDERMEN OF TOWN OF MORRISTOWN.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit

14 F.2d 257 (1926)

DELAWARE, L. & W. R. CO. v. MAYOR AND BOARD OF ALDERMEN OF TOWN OF MORRISTOWN.

No. 3391.

Circuit Court of Appeals, Third Circuit.

March 26, 1926.

Rehearing Denied September 3, 1926.

N. C. Toms, of Morristown, N. J. (Conover English, of Newark, N. J., of counsel), for appellants.

M. M. Stallman, of Newark, N. J., and John L. Seager, of New York City, for appellee.

Before BUFFINGTON, WOOLLEY, and DAVIS, Circuit Judges.

DAVIS, Circuit Judge.

This is an appeal from a final decree of the District Court declaring an ordinance of the town of Morristown, N. J., designating a taxicab stand on property belonging to the railroad company near the station, unconstitutional, and enjoining the town from enforcing the ordinance and Henry Laden and 16 other taxicab drivers from entering upon the property of the company at or near its passenger station for the purpose of soliciting custom or patronage, and from standing or parking their taxicabs and vehicles upon the station grounds of the company.

The company operates a railroad from New York City through Morristown, to Buffalo, N. Y. The land in question was leased in 1868 by the company, which handles about 3,000 passengers daily in and out of Morristown. The tracks and station are flanked on both sides by areas and driveways for ingress to and egress from the station. The tracks of the company through Morristown were formerly at grade, but on September 24, 1912, the company and the town entered into a contract in accordance with which the tracks were elevated. This contract defined the relative rights and duties of the parties in respect to the elevation of the tracks. It provided, inter alia, that "each and every of the acts and things to be done and performed by each of the parties hereto is essential consideration for the acts and things to be done and performed by the other party, and that each of the terms of this contract is a necessary and proper part of the work of improvement herein provided for."

The contract was admittedly performed by both parties. The company in its contract agreed to lay out the driveway where the parking place, designated in the ordinance, is now located. The main station building is on the west side of the tracks, and a roofed-over platform is on the east side, and constitutes what is called a "shelter house." There is a driveway on the easterly side of the shelter house, and the cab stand is along the curb of the driveway just north of the shelter house. This same place was designated as a cab stand by Mayor Tood shortly after the tracks were elevated, pursuant to the contract between the town and the company of September 24, 1912, and had been so used until December 28, 1922, when the railroad company entered into a contract with La Clare L. Welsh, whereby it purported to give him the exclusive right of parking taxicabs at the old cab stand, and of soliciting business as a cabman on the station grounds.

The railroad company filed a bill in the Court of Chancery of New Jersey, and obtained from it an order enjoining taxicab drivers from parking their cabs on the property of the company, including the cab stand and driveway. The town then by ordinance established a parking place just south of the driveway, and abolished the old parking place originally established by Mayor Tood, which was then used exclusively by Welsh. Thereupon Welsh applied to the Supreme Court of New Jersey for a writ of certiorari to set aside the ordinance abolishing the parking place which he occupied by virtue of his contract with the railroad company. The court sustained the ordinance, and on appeal its judgment was affirmed by the Court of Errors and Appeals. Welsh v. Morristown, 121 A. 697, 98 N. J. Law, 630; Welsh v. Potts, 124 A. 926, 99 N. J. Law, 528.

The town then by the ordinance in question re-established the old parking stand, and the railroad company, being a Pennsylvania corporation, filed its bill of complaint in the federal court of New Jersey praying for an injunction restraining the town from enforcing the ordinance and the taxicab drivers from soliciting custom or parking their taxicabs on its premises as above stated. The District Court granted a temporary injunction, which after hearing was made final. The railroad company contends that the ordinance is unconstitutional, in that its effect is to deprive it of its property without due process of law and without just compensation.

The town did not condemn the property designated as a taxicab stand, as it had the inherent power to do by virtue of its right of eminent domain. It is a fundamental principle of law, recognized in both the state and federal Constitutions, that private property may not be taken for public use, the only use for which it may be taken under any circumstances, without due process of law and just compensation. Neither may an owner be deprived of any of the essential attributes of his property without like process and compensation. Bill Posting Sign Co. v. Atlantic City, 58 A. 342, 71 N. J. Law, 72; Ignaciunas v. Risley, 121 A. 783, 98 N. J. Law, 712; Pennsylvania Coal Co. v. Mahon, 43 S. Ct. 158, 260 U. S. 393, 67 L. Ed. 322, 28 A. L. R. 1321. The property of a railroad company is private property, and entitled to constitutional protection, just as any other private property. Spottiswoode v. Morris & Essex R. Co., 40 A. 505, 61 N. J. Law, 322; Skaggs v. Kansas City Terminal Railway Co. (D. C.) 233 F. 827; Western Union Telegraph Co. v. Pennsylvania Railroad Co., 25 S. Ct. 133, 195 U. S. 540, 49 L. Ed. 312, 1 Ann. Cas. 517. But every citizen holds his property subject to the proper exercise of the police power of the state Legislature, directly or by public or municipal corporations to which the Legislature has delegated it. Laws and ordinances relating to health, good order, public safety, and general welfare are police laws or regulations. It is well settled that such laws, though they may disturb the enjoyment of individual rights, are constitutional, although compensation is not made for such disturbance. The deprivation of the enjoyment of property under such circumstances is not, within the meaning of the Constitution, a taking of private property for public use, but is simply a regulation of its use and enjoyment by the owner.

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