Colby University v. Village of Canandaigua

• Decision Date: 26 August 1895
• Citation: 69 F. 671
• Parties: COLBY UNIVERSITY et al. v. VILLAGE OF CANANDAIGUA et al.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of New York

69 F. 671

COLBY UNIVERSITY et al. v. VILLAGE OF CANANDAIGUA et al.

United States Circuit Court, N.D. New York.

August 26, 1895

John Gillette (Howard Mansfield and J. H. Metcalf, of counsel) for complainants.

James C. Smith and Thomas H. Bennett, for defendants.

WALLACE Circuit Judge.

The complainants, owners of mortgage bonds issued by the Canandaigua Waterworks Company, have brought this suit to restrain the village of Canandaigua and its board of water commissioners from building, maintaining, or operating a system of waterworks for the purpose of supplying the village and its inhabitants with water, and they now move for an injunction restraining the defendants from doing so pending a final determination of the cause. The theory of the suit is that the defendants are proceeding, in violation of the rights of the complainants to construct such waterworks, with a view to operating them and if this is permitted the value of the property mortgaged to the bondholders will be practically destroyed, and the complainants will thereby sustain irreparable injury, for which an action at law will afford no adequate remedy. The case for the complainants rests upon the fundamental proposition that the village authorities are under legal obligation to acquire the company's system before they can rightfully proceed to install one of their own. Inasmuch as the complainants concede that if this proposition is unsound their case must fail, and it seems to me to be unsound, the present decision will be placed upon that ground, without considering the subordinate objections to the relief sought which have been raised by the defendants.

The Canandaigua Waterworks Company was incorporated in 1883 pursuant to the provisions of chapter 737 of the Laws of 1873 of this state, and the acts amendatory thereof; and in September, 1884, having duly acquired a franchise from the authorities of the village, giving it permission to place its pipes in the streets for the purpose of furnishing a supply of water to the inhabitants, it completed its system of waterworks in accordance with the conditions of the franchise. The system then consisted of about nine miles of mains, and later, at the request of the village authorities, and to promote better fire protection to the village, it has extended its system of mains. It has continued to furnish an adequate supply of water to the village and its inhabitants ever since, having expended upwards of $150,000 in the construction of its system.

Although the company's system was constructed and completed in conformity with the...