Delaware, L. & W. R. Co. v. Cent. Stock-Yard & Transit Co.

• Decision Date: 02 February 1888
• Citation: 12 A. 374,43 N.J.E. 605
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court
• Parties: DELAWARE, L. & W. R. Co. v. CENTRAL STOCK-YARD & TRANSIT CO.

12 A. 374

43 N.J.E. 605

DELAWARE, L. & W. R. Co.

v. CENTRAL STOCK-YARD & TRANSIT CO.

Court of Errors and Appeals of New Jersey.

February 2, 1888.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Appeal from court of chancery.

The Central Stock-Yard & Transit Company, defendants in this action, is a corporation carrying on a general stock-yard and market business with yards located in Jersey City fronting on Hudson river, where wharves are built for the reception of live-stock carried by water, and tracks are laid connecting with the roads of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company and the Erie Railroad Company. The complainants, the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railroad Company, control a continuous line of railway from Chicago to Hoboken, one mile from defendants' yards, with which they have no connection by rail. Formerly they secured the services of the Erie Railroad Company to transport the live-stock consigned to them for delivery at the defendants' yards; but on the fifteenth of July, 1887, the Erie Company increased their charges for this service from three to five dollars per car. The complainants then arranged with the New York, Susquehanna & Western Railroad Company, who were using the track of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company to perform the same service. Subsequently the Pennsylvania Railroad Company refused to allow their track to be used for this purpose, and the complainants then arranged to deliver the stock by means of floats at defendants' wharves. Defendants thereupon notified complainants that they would not receive live-stock transported over their road, nor permit complainants' floats to land at their wharf. Upon receiving this notice, the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railroad Company made application for an injunction to compel the Central Stock-Yard & Transit Company to receive, at their stock-yards, live freight carried over their road, and consigned for delivery at defendant's yards. The injunction was refused, on the grounds that the question of defendants' duty to accept such freight was, as a matter of law, unsettled, and that the writ asked for was mandatory in its character, and could not be granted until final hearing. Prom this decree of the court of chancery, as contained in the opinion of Vice-Chancellor VAN FLEET, (see 10 Atl. Rep. 490,) the complainants appeal.

J. D. Bedle, for appellant. Leon Abbett, for respondent.

BEASLEY, C. J. This court concurs with the vice-chancellor that the facts exhibited in the bill of complaint will not justify the allowance, in limine, of a mandatory injunction. The case will be found fully stated in the opinion of the vice-chancellor, upon inspection of which it will appear, in the estimation of this court, that, at the present stage of procedure, no such pressing necessity is shown to exist as is requisite, by a rule of practice that is perfectly established, as a basis for an application for the writ that is here sought. The appellant, by its own showing, is not absolutely excluded from these stock-yards; it is only prevented from delivering its cattle in a certain mode. At an increased expense, it can obtain access to the yards as it formerly did, and this increased expense would plainly be recoverable from the respondent in the event of a decision against it on the general merits of the controversy. There does not seem to have been any difficulty in putting the proceeding at once on final hearing. Under such circumstances, we cannot depart from the Settled course of practice. Let the decree be affirmed.

(February 17, 1888.)

MAGIE, J., (dissenting.)

The refusal of the preliminary injunction prayed for was put by the court below upon two grounds: (1) That the right claimed by appellant had never been settled at law, and (2) that an injunction of a mandatory character such as was asked for, ought not to issue before final hearing. The majority...