Edmund Chadwick v. John Kelly

• Decision Date: 05 January 1903
• Docket Number: No. 63,63
• Citation: 23 S.Ct. 175,187 U.S. 540,47 L.Ed. 293
• Parties: EDMUND H. CHADWICK, Plff. in Err. , v. JOHN M. KELLY
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

187 U.S. 540

23 S.Ct. 175

47 L.Ed. 293

EDMUND H. CHADWICK, Plff. in Err.,

v JOHN M. KELLY.

No. 63.

Submitted November 3, 1902.

Decided January 5, 1903.

In April, 1897, John M. Kelly filed his petition in the the civil district court for the parish of Orleans against Edmund H. Chadwick, to enforce payment of a lien on a certain square of ground in the city of New Orleans, created and arising out of a contract between one A. J. Christopher and said city for paving Hagan avenue. The petition alleged due completion of the work, an assignment or transfer by Christopher, of all his rights and claims under the contract, to the petitioner, and a liability of Chadwick for the amount of $638.80, with interest thereon from September 24, 1896; and also alleged that for the payment of said sum he had by law a lien and pledge upon said property.

Chadwick answered this petition, wherein he pleaded the general issue and certain special pleas, in one of which he denied that his property was benefited by the paving, and alleged that, if it was so benefited, he could only be made to pay the amount of benefit to an increased value of property, and that no personal judgment should be rendered against him. He also filed, in September, 1899, a supplemental answer in which, among other things, he alleged that the ordinance under which the work was done required the contractor to employ only bona fide resident citizens of the city of New Orleans as laborers on the work, thus depriving the citizens of the state and of each and every state of the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several states, secured to them by the Constitution of the United States, which, by the 2d section of its 4th article, provides that the citizens of each state shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of the citizens of the several states; and he also alleged that the ordinance was likewise illegal and unconstitutional because it imposed a liability on the property owner, irrespective of the question whether or not his was benefited or damaged by the pavement; and he alleges that the paving of the street in front of his property had been of no benefit to it, and that the rendition of any judgment against him would be taking his private property for public purposes contrary to the Constitution of the state of Louisiana and to that of the United States.

Evidence was taken, and the cause was so proceeded in that on March 5, 1900, judgment was rendered against the defendant, Chadwick, in the sum of $638.80, with interest from September 24, 1896, with costs of suit, with recognition of plaintiff's lien and privilege for the payment thereof on the said property, the same to be sold and the proceeds to be applied to the payment of plaintiff's claim.

A suspensive appeal was thereupon allowed to the supreme court of Louisiana, and that court, on February 4, 1901, affirmed the judgment of the trial court, and subsequently allowed a writ of error to bring the cause to this court.

Mr. George L. Bright for plaintiff in error.

No brief was filed for defendant in error.

Mr. Justice Shiras delivered the opinion of the court:

In this record, Chadwick, the plaintiff in error, complains of the judgment of the supreme court of Louisiana in two particulars: First, in upholding as valid the statutes of Louisiana and the ordinances of the city of New Orleans, which provide and regulate the method for the paving of streets at the cost of the owners of abutting lots; and, second, in upholding as valid the ordinance of the council of the city of New Orleans, which provides that, in all the contracts let by the city for public works, of any kind and nature, the contractor shall not employ any other but bona fide resident citizens of the city as laborers on such public works.

Of course, this court is restricted to a consideration of these questions in their Federal aspect.

The brief of the counsel of the plaintiff in error contends that, by the statutes of the state of Louisiana, the property owner is made to pay the cost of the improvement irrespective of the question of benefit, is made personally responsible for the cost of the improvement, although it may largely exceed, not only the benefit to his property, but the value thereof, and his property is made subject to a lien to secure the payment.

So far as it is complained that by the statutes the property owner is made personally responsible for the cost of the improvement, we learn from the opinions of the supreme court in the present case and in the case of Barber Asphalt Paving Co. v. Watt, reported in 51 La. Ann. 1345, 26 So. 70, that 'for the sum assessed against their property no personal liability attached to the abutting owners beyond the value of the property affected, that the proceeding was purely one in rem, acting on the property benefited, and none other,' and that 'the property owner's proportion of the cost of paving a street should be determined by ascertaining the entire cost of the work assessable to the property fronting thereon, and apportioning the same to said property in proportion to foot frontage.' [104 La. 725, 726, 29 So. 297.]

This construction of the state statutes by the supreme court of the state must, of course, in a case like the present, be accepted by us; and we have only to consider, in this branch of the case, whether the statutes of Louisiana, so construed, which provide and regulate a method of improving and paving streets in the city of New Orleans, and apportioning the cost thereof by assessment upon the abutting property, are obnoxious, under the facts of the present case, to the provisions of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

We do not feel constrained to enter at large upon a subject which has received such frequent and recent consideration by this court. It is, perhaps, sufficient to say that we do not perceive in the statutes of Louisiana, as construed and applied in this case by the supreme court of that state, any provisions which we must condemn as being in disregard of the constitutional rights of the plaintiff in error. In view of our decisions, we certainly cannot say that, as matter of law, a state statute...