City of Chicago v. Frank Sturges

• Decision Date: 18 December 1911
• Docket Number: No. 39,39
• Parties: CITY OF CHICAGO, Plff. in Err., v. FRANK STURGES
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

222 U.S. 313

32 S.Ct. 92

56 L.Ed. 215

CITY OF CHICAGO, Plff. in Err.,

v FRANK STURGES.

No. 39.

Argued November 6, 1911.

Decided December 18, 1911.

Messrs. John W. Beckwith, Joseph F. Grossman, William H. Sexton, Edward J. Brundage, and Robert N. Holt for plaintiff in error.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 314-318 intentionally omitted] The court declined to hear Messrs. Almon W. Bulkey, Frank J. Loesch, James Stillwell, and Timothy J. Scofield for defendant in error.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 318-321 intentionally omitted] Mr. Justice Lurton delivered the opinion of the court:

The only question under this writ of error is as to the validity of a statute of the state of Illinois entitled, 'An Act to Indemnify the Owner of Property for Damages by Mobs and Riots.' Laws of 1887, p. 237.

The defendant in error recovered a judgment against the city under that statute, which was affirmed in the supreme court of the state. 237 Ill. 46, 86 N. E. 683. The validity of the law under the Illinois Constitution was thus affirmed, and that question is thereby foreclosed. But it was urged in the Illinois courts that the act violated the guaranty of due process of law and the equal protection of the law, as provided by the 14th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States.

By the provisions of the statute referred to, a city is made liable for three fourths of the damage resulting to property situated therein, caused by the violence of any mob or riotous assemblage of more than twelve persons, not abetted or permitted by the negligent or wrongful act of the owner, etc. If the damage be to property not within the city, then the county in which it is located is in like manner made responsible. The act saves to the owner his action against the rioters, and gives the city or county, as the case may be, a lien upon any judgment against such participants for reimbursement, or a remedy to the city or county directly against the individuals causing the damage, to the amount of any judgment it may have paid the sufferer.

It is said that the act denies to the city due process of law, since it imposes liability irrespective of any question of the power of the city to have prevented the violence, or of negligence in the use of its power. This was the in- terpretation placed upon the act by the supreme court of Illinois. Does the law as thus interpreted deny due process of law? That the law provides for a judicial hearing and a remedy over against those primarily liable narrows the objection to the single question of legislative power to impose liability regardless of fault.

It is a general principle of our law that there is no individual liability for an act which ordinary human care and foresight could not guard against. It is also a general principle of the same law that a loss from any cause purely accidental must rest where it chances to fall. But behind and above these general principles which the law recognizes as ordinarily prevailing, there lies the legislative power, which, in the absence of organic restraint, may, for the general welfare of society, impose obligations and responsibilities otherwise nonexistent.

Primarily, governments exist for the maintenance of social order. Hence it is that the obligation of the government to protect life, liberty, and property against the conduct of the indifferent, the careless, and the evil-minded may be regarded as lying at the very foundation of the social compact. A recognition of this supreme obligation is found in those exertions of the legislative power which have as an end the preservation of social order and the protection of the welfare of the public and of the individual. If such legislation be reasonably adapted to the end in view, affords a hearing before judgment, and is not forbidden by some other affirmative provision of constitutional law, it is not to be regarded as denying due process of law under the provisions of the 14th Amendment.

The law in question is a valid exercise of the police power of the state of Illinois. It rests upon the duty of the state to protect its citizens in the enjoyment and possession of their acquisitions, and is but a recognition of the obligation of the...