Bloomfield v. Thompson

• Decision Date: 26 May 1913
• Docket Number: 19,925
• Citation: 133 La. 209,62 So. 634
• Parties: BLOOMFIELD v. THOMPSON, Com'r of Public Utility, et al
• Court: Louisiana Supreme Court

62 So. 634

133 La. 209

BLOOMFIELD v. THOMPSON, Com'r of Public Utility, et al

No. 19,925

Supreme Court of Louisiana

May 26, 1913

Rehearing Denied June 30, 1913

Charles Rosen, of New Orleans (J. D. Hill, of New Orleans, of counsel), for appellants.

I. D Moore, City Atty., J. J. Reilley, Asst. City Atty., and John F. C. Waldo, all of New Orleans, for appellee.

OPINION

PROVOSTY, J.

Ordinance 2683, N. C. S., by which the public Belt commission of the city of New Orleans was organized, of which a certified copy is alleged to be annexed to the petition of plaintiff and made a part thereof, is not in the record; and, as a consequence we are left in doubt as to whether the action of the commission council, of which plaintiff complains in this suit, consisted of the reorganization in toto of the said Belt commission, or merely of the addition of the commissioner of public utility to its membership, and the investing of that member with the function theretofore intrusted to the president pro tem. of the said Belt commission. We do not know however, that the point is material, since the complaint of plaintiff is not that the Belt commission was reorganized, but that the office of president pro tem. was abolished and the functions thereof transferred to the commissioner of public utilities, who is made a member of the commission.

The case is now before us only on the motion to dismiss the appeal, the ground of the motion being that the amount in dispute does not exceed $ 2,000, and that the case is not one of those of which this court has jurisdiction irrespective of amount in dispute.

The suit is an injunction to prevent the carrying out of Ordinance 741, Commission Council Series, by which the change just stated in the composition of the Belt commission was made; and plaintiff brings it in his double capacity of holder of two bonds of the Belt commission of $ 1,000 each alleged to be worth over $ 2,000, and of a taxpayer of the city of New Orleans.

Plaintiff argues that the value of the bonds is the test of the jurisdiction, because the allegation is made in the petition and sworn to; that as an effect of the carrying out of said ordinance the value of the bonds will be impaired and destroyed.

Suffice it to say of this that by a settled jurisprudence this court is not bound by allegations of value, even if sworn to, where the contrary of the allegation is manifest (Nick v Bensberg, 123 La....