Consumers Company v. Albert Hatch

• Decision Date: 01 April 1912
• Docket Number: No. 184,184
• Citation: 224 U.S. 148,32 S.Ct. 465,56 L.Ed. 703
• Parties: CONSUMERS' COMPANY, Limited, Plff. in Err., v. ALBERT L. HATCH
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

224 U.S. 148

32 S.Ct. 465

56 L.Ed. 703

CONSUMERS' COMPANY, Limited, Plff. in Err.,

v ALBERT L. HATCH.

No. 184.

Argued and submitted March 4, 1912.

Decided April 1, 1912.

Messrs. Myron A. Folsom, Edward S. Elder, and Robert H. Elder for plaintiff in error.

Messrs. Eugene V. Boughton and Frank W. Reed for defendant in error.

Mr. Chief Justice White delivered the opinion of the court:

Omitting reference to matters not pertinent to the alleged Federal questions relied upon, the facts are these: Although it was optional with it to do so, the plaintiff in error, a water supply corporation, operating under a franchise granted in 1903, laid a water main in Third street, an ungraded street within the corporate limits of the then village—now city—of Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. While the company was supplying residents on the street with water for domestic use, upon payment of the regular monthly rates established by the water commission provided for by the statutes of Idaho, Albert L. Hatch, defendant in error, erected a dwelling upon a lot situated on the street, and laid a water pipe to the curb in front of his property. He them applied to the water company to connect the pipe at the curb line with its service main, so that a regular supply of water might be obtained. The water company, however, declined to make the desired connection because of the refusal to Hatch to pay, as required by the regulations of the company, $8.50, the cost of making the connection, or to comply with alternative regulations adopted for the purpose of enabling the water company to recover such cost. This action in mandamus was then commenced in the supreme court of Idaho, and culminated in a judgment in substance finding the regulations requiring a consumer to pay for service connections unreasonable, and ordering the water company to make the connection at its own cost, and to supply water to the premises of Hatch upon payment of the established monthly rate. 17 Idaho, 204, ——L.R.A.(N.S.) ——, 104 Pac. 670. This writ of error was then prosecuted upon the assumption that rights of the water company, protected by the Constitution of the United States, had been wrongfully invaded.

The grounds for the claim in question are in substance that, as the water company was not required by its charter in express terms to make a service connection, and the benefits of such connection would inure solely to the house owner, to compel the water company to bear the cost of the connection would amount to a confiscation of its property, in violation of the due-process clause of the 14th Amendment, and also would be to impair the obligation of its contract. A further claim of impairment of contract is based upon the contention that, as it was optional with the water company, under its franchise, to lay mains in ungraded streets, there was no duty to supply water from a main voluntarily placed in an ungraded street.

The contentions are devoid of merit. The charter of the company was...