Cavanaugh v. Gerk

• Decision Date: 15 March 1926
• Docket Number: No. 26936.,26936.
• Citation: 280 S.W. 51
• Parties: CAVANAUGH v. GERK, Chief of Police.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

280 S.W. 51

CAVANAUGH v. GERK, Chief of Police.

No. 26936.

Supreme Court of Missouri, in Banc.

March 15, 1926.

Habeas corpus proceeding by Edward M. Cavanaugh against Joseph A. Gerk, Chief of Police of the City of St. Louis, to obtain petitioner's release from custody. Petitioner discharged.

Gustave Vahlkamp, of St. Louis, for petitioner.

Julius T. Muench and Charles J. Dolan, both of St. Louis (Arthur H. Bader, of St. Louis, of counsel), for respondent.

WHITE, J.

Habeas corpus. The petitioner alleges that he is unlawfully restrained of his liberty by the respondent in the city of St. Louis. By agreement of the parties, service of the writ and the production of the body of the petitioner were waived. The respondent filed his return setting up the reasons for holding the petitioner in custody.

There is no disagreement as to the facts in the case. The petitioner was arrested for driving his automobile in the city of St. Louis in disregard of an automatic stop signal at Fourteenth and Locust streets, and for going in the wrong direction on St. Charles street, a one-way street.

Ordinance No. 32846, creating the traffic council of the city of St. Louis, has the following provisions:

"Section 1. The president of the board of police commissioners, the director of streets and sewers, and the chairman of the legislative committee of the board of aldermen shall constitute a traffic council whose function it shall be to codify existing traffic ordinances, to harmonize the traffic ordinances of the city with the state law, to propose changes in the ordinances regulating traffic as the needs of the city may require, and to advise the board of aldermen regarding proposed changes."

Section 2 provides for the organization and places of meeting of the traffic council. Section 3 is as follows:

"Section 3. The recommendations of the traffic council shall be embodied in the forte of bills, and shall be introduced in the board of aldermen by the chairman of the legislative committee, to be considered in the same manner as any other bills. No recommendation of the traffic council shall have any binding force until it shall have been passed in the regular way by the board of aldermen and approved by the mayor."

Ordinance No. 23926 contains section 6. defining the powers of the traffic council, which in part is as follows:

"Section 6. Powers of Traffic Council.—(a) Powers in General.—The traffic council, as created by ordinance number thirty-two thousand eight hundred forty-six, approved February twenty-eighth, nineteen hundred twenty-four, shall have power by rules and regulations adopted by it to:

"(1) Designate the streets or parts of streets upon which there shall be no parking of vehicles or upon which there shall be parking for a limited time.

"(2) Exclude or restrict parking on designated streets during certain hours.

"(3) Permit angle parking in designated places.

"(4) Establish one-way streets.

"(5) Cause limit lines to be marked upon pavements and sidewalks for the direction of pedestrians and others.

"(6) Prohibit left-hand turns by vehicles at street corners.

"(7) Establish and cause to be erected traffic signals and signs and parking and no-parking signs at such places as may be designated by it, and such signals and signs so established shall be recognized and the directions followed by all operators of vehicles."

Other regulations similar in character follow:

"(b) The rules and regulations established by the traffic council, as hereinbefore provided, shall be published in the city journal, and upon their publication therein they shall become effective and shall govern the regulation of traffic for a period of ninety days after the date of publication, within which time there shall be introduced in the board of aldermen a bill embodying such rules and regulations, and such rules and regulations shall continue in full force and effect during such time as such bill shall be pending in the board of aldermen: Provided, however, that if no bill embodying such rules and regulations shall have been introduced in the board of aldermen within the period of ninety days after the publication of such rules and regulations, as hereinbefore provided, or if any such bill shall fail of final passage in the board of aldermen, then such rules and regulations shall cease to be in force and effect."

The traffic council caused to be erected at the intersection of Fourteenth and Locust streets automatic traffic signals, which display at intervals the words "Go," "Wait-No Left Turn," and "Stop." The signals were synchronized so as to regulate the traffic at that point. The traffic council also promulgated, September 15, 1925, this regulation:

"St. Charles street from Third street to Fourteenth street shall be a one-way street and for west-bound traffic only."

These regulations were published as required by ordinance.

On December 14, 1925, the petitioner operated his motor vehicle east on Lanust street, across Fourteenth street, disregarding the stop signal at that point. He turned east at Thirteenth street, then continued north on Thirteenth street and St. Charles street, where he was charged with driving east instead of west. For these two offenses he was arrested.

No bill for an ordinance, provided for by section 3 of Ordinance No. 32846, and by clause (b) of section 6, in Ordinance No. 32926, was passed or introduced in the board of aldermen.

I. The petitioner asserts that the traffic council had no right to promulgate traffic rules, nor to determine the territory to which they should apply; that only the aldermen of the city of St. Louis have such authority, which they could not delegate to an administrative body like the traffic council. The question for consideration is whether the authority which the board of aldermen attempted to vest in the council by Ordinance No. 32926 is a delegation of the legislative authority. No doubt the city of St. Louis possesses legislative power, derived directly from the Constitution, as claimed by the respondent, citing Haeussler Inv. Co. v. Bates, 267 S. W. loc. cit. 637, 306 Mo. 392. As a police regulation, the city could provide for the safety and convenience of its inhabitants, by ordinance,...