City of New York v. William Sage
| Decision Date | 08 November 1915 |
| Docket Number | No. 34,34 |
| Citation | 36 S.Ct. 25,60 L.Ed. 143,239 U.S. 57 |
| Parties | CITY OF NEW YORK, Petitioner, v. WILLIAM SAGE, Jr |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Messrs, Louis C. White, William Mcm. Speer, and Frank L. Polk for petitioner.
[Argument of Counsel from page 58 intentionally omitted] Mr. Edward A. Alexander for respondent.
[Argument of Counsel from page 59 intentionally omitted] Mr. Justice Holmes delivered the opinion of the court:
This is a proceeding for the taking of land for the Ashokan reservoir, similar to the one before us in McGovern v. New York, 229 U. S. 363, 57 L. ed. 1228, 46 L.R.A.(N.S.) 391, 33 Sup. Ct. Rep. 876. After commissioners were appointed to ascertain the compensation to be paid, the case was removed to the circuit court, diverse citizenship being alleged. There was a motion to remand which was overruled, and subsequently the commissioners reported that 'the sum of $7,624.45 for land and buildings and the further sum of $4,324.45 for reservoir availability and adaptability, being a granted total of the sum of $11,948.90, is the sum ascertained and determined by us . . . to be paid to the owners of and all persons interested in said land for the taking of the fee thereof, designated . . . as Parcel 733.' They also recommended the allowance of 5 per cent on the above award for legal fees and expenses, and of $1,372.31 to named witnesses in specified sums. The report was confirmed by the circuit judge (190 Fed. 413), and afterwards by the circuit court of appeals (124 C. C. A. 251, 206 Fed. 369).
Upon an inspection of the record it appears to us, as the language of the commissioners on its face suggests, that their report does not mean that the claimant's land had a market value of $11,948.90,—that it would have brought that sum at a fair sale,—but that they considered the value of the reservoir as a whole and allowed what they thought a fair proportion of the increase, over and above the market value of the lot, to the owner of the land, subject to the opinion of the court upon the point of law thus raised. Upon that point we are of opinion that they were wrong.
The decisions appear to us to have made the principles plain. No doubt when this class of questions first arose it was said in a general way that adaptability to the purposes for which the land could be used most profitably was to be considered; and that is true. But it is to be considered only so far as the public would have considered it if the land had been offered for sale in the absence of the city's exercise of the power of eminent domain. The fact...
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