Finks v. Maine State Highway Commission

• Decision Date: 21 November 1974
• Citation: 328 A.2d 791
• Parties: Henry B. FINKS and Nancy C. Finks v. MAINE STATE HIGHWAY COMMISSION et al.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

Page 791

328 A.2d 791

7 ERC 1547

Henry B. FINKS and Nancy C. Finks v. MAINE STATE HIGHWAY COMMISSION et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Nov. 21, 1974.

Seymour Nathanson, Portland, for plaintiffs.

Preti & Flaherty, by David M. Cohen, John J. Flaherty, Portland, for defendants.

Before DUFRESNE, C. J., and WEATHERBEE, POMEROY, ARCHIBALD, and DELAHANTY, JJ.

DUFRESNE, Chief Justice.

The defendant, Maine State Highway Commission (Commission), on or about April 8, 1969 caused to be recorded at the Cumberland County Registry of Deeds a 'Notice of Layout and Taking' pursuant to 23 M.R.S.A. §§ 153 and 154 for the purpose of acquiring for the State of Maine easement rights in and to certain lands of the plaintiffs in Falmouth, Maine as part of a comprehensive plan to 'preserve and develop the natural scenic beauty along and adjacent to any state or state aid highway (State Highway-295) to integrate the public improvement with the aesthetics of the area traversed by the highway' as authorized by 23 M.R.S.A. § 651. The individual defendants are the members of the Commission. By complaint dated May 27, 1969 the plaintiffs sought injunctive relief against the taking on the ground that the enabling legislation was unconstitutional on its face or, if constitutional, did not sanction the condemnation of any part of the plaintiffs' land, nor did it permit a taking of such magnitude as was done in this case. The issue is before us on report pursuant to M.R.C.P., Rule 72(b) for this Court to render such decision as the rights of the parties may require.

The statute, authorizing the taking of the plaintiffs' land by eminent domain, under which the Commission purported to act and entitled an Act Relating to Roadside Beautification, was passed by the Legislature in 1965 (P.L.1965, c. 295) as an emergency measure in recognition of the fact, as stated in the preamble, that

'efforts on the national level are being made to beautify the roadsides of highways under the program of the President of the United States to beautify America; and

'* * * the following legislation is vitally necessary to implement this program in Maine in the spring and summer of 1965 for the benefit of the inhabitants of Maine and our summer visitors who use our highways; . . .'

As amended by the 1965 and 1966 legislation (P.L.1965, c. 295-P.L.1966, c. 492, § 1) the law on eminent domain at the time of the taking of the plaintiffs' land read in pertinent part as follows:

23 M.R.S.A. § 153:

'The State Highway Commission, on behalf of the State of Maine, may take over and hold for the state of Maine, such property as it may beem necessary to:

1. State and state aid highways. Lay out and establish, construct, improve or maintain, or to provide a change of location or alignment of, or to provide drainage for state and state aid highways.

2. Roadside development. Provide rest areas, parking strips, roadside and landscape development for the preservation and development of natural scenic beauty.

3. Safety of public. Provide for the health, safety and welfare of the public using any state or state aid highway.

. . ..

(Emphasis supplied)

23 M.R.S.A. § 651:

'The commission may preserve and develop the natural scenic beauty along and adjacent to any state or state aid highway to integrate the public improvement with the aesthetics of the area traversed by the highway and may setablish and maintain rest areas, turnouts and parking strips for the suitable accommodation of the public whenever in its judgment the public exigency may require.' (Emphasis added)

I

PRESERVATION AND DEVELOPMENT OF SCENIC BEAUTY ALONG HIGHWAYS

A PUBLIC USE

It is fundamental law that the exercise of the State's power of eminent domain, to come up to constitutional requirements, must be for a public use and upon public exigency, Article I, § 21 of the Constitution of Maine provides:

'Private property shall not be taken for public uses without just compensation; nor unless the public exigencies require it.'

The Constitution of the United States, Amendment XIV, mandates:

'* * * nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; * * *'

Thus, as a threshold issue, we must decide whether the taking of land beyond the right of way of a state highway, as provided by the Act, for the purpose of preserving and developing the natural scenic beauty along, and adjacent to, the highway is a valid public use justifying the State's exercise of the power of eminent domain. If such is a public use, then the Act is constitutional on its face, otherwise not.

In Wes Outdoor Advertising Company v. Goldberg, 1970, 55 N.J. 347, 262 A.2d 199, at 202, the New Jersey Court had this to say:

'We have no hesitancy in stating that the restoration, preservation and enhancement of scenic beauty adjacent to public highways is a public use for the public welfare, filling a social need of our times.'

In Kamrowski v. State, 1966, 31 Wis.2d 256, 142 N.W.2d 793, at 797, the Wisconsin Court expounded in similar fashion:

'More importantly, however, we consider that the concept of preserving a scenic corridor along a parkway, with its emphasis upon maintaining a rural scene and preventing unsightly uses is sufficiently definite so that the legislature may be said to have made a meaningful decision in terms of public purpose, and to have fixed a standard which sufficiently guides the commission in performing its task.'

We fully agree. ¹

II LEGISLATIVE DETERMINATION OF PUBLIC EXIGENCY

The plaintiffs contend that the reference statute is unconstitutional on its face, because, nowhere in the Act, does the the Legislature specifically declare that there is a necessity in the public interest for the enactment of the provisions respecting highway beautification. Such an express legislative determination was incorporated in the Slum Clearance and Redevelopment Authority Law. See, Crommett et al. v. Portland, 1954, 150 Me. 217, 221, 107 A.2d 841, 845. But a legislative finding of public exigency or necessity may be established impliedly by the very enactment of the statute authorizing the taking. See, State v. Noyes, 1859, 47 Me. 189, 204; Hayford v. Bangor, 1907, 102 Me. 340, 343, 66 A. 731, 11 L.R.A., N.S., 940. For other cases in which the principle of implied legislative judgment to establish public exigency was applied, see, Moseley v. York Shore Water Company, 1900, 94 Me. 83, 46 A. 809; Rumford & Mexico Bridge District v. Mexico Bridge Company, 1916, 115 Me. 154, 98 A.625. See also, Smith v. Speers, 1969, Me., 253 A.2d 701.

It is true that section 651 does not speak in specific terms of taking for the purpose of preserving and developing the natural scenic beauty along and adjacent to any state or state aid highway, but, as stated in Rubin v. W. H. Hinman, Inc., 1969, Me., 253 A.2d 708, both sections 153 and 651 must be read in conjunction with each other.

Every statute must be construed in connection with the whole system of which it forms a part and all legislation on the same subject matter must be viewed in its overall entirety in order to reach an harmonious result which we presume the Legislature intended. Palmer v. Inhabitants of Town of Sumner, 1935, 133 Me. 337, 177 A. 711, 97 A.L.R. 1292; Inhabitants of Town of Amity v. Inhabitants of Town of Orient, 1957, 153 Me. 29, 134 A.2d 365.

Applying this rule of construction to these pertinent sections of the statute relating to the exercise by the Commission of the power of eminent domain in connection with the laying out and improvement of state and state aid highways, we readily discern that the preservation and development of the natural scenic beauty aspect of both sections 153 and 651, originally adopted together by the 1965 Legislature, was so intimately related to the Commission's right to take and hold property for the purposes enumerated as to evince an implicit finding by the Legislature of a public exigency.

III LEGISLATIVE STANDARDS

The plaintiffs further press their claim that the statute, in its scenic beautification feature, is facially unconstitutional for failure to provide adequate standards to guide the Commission in its exercise of the delegated power of eminent domain. While we have recently expressed concern about standard-less delegations of power by legislative bodies, ² we do recognize that in some areas of legitimate and necessary legislative undertakings, it may not be feasible to supply precise standards to guide the discretion of the agency to whom the powers to take by eminent domain have been delegated, without frustrating the purposes of the particular legislation. We are of the opinion that, in such cases in which the statutory enactment of detailed specific standards is impossible, the presence of adequate procedural safeguards to protect against an abuse of discretion by the administrators of the law, compensates substantially for the want of precise legislative guidelines and may be taken into consideration in resolving the constitutionality of the delegation of power. ³

Specifically, the plaintiffs contend that the statutory terminology 'scenic beauty' and 'along and adjacent' to a state or state aid highway provides an inadequate set of standards to control the discretion of the highway commissioners.

With regard to the statute's grant of power to the commissioners to acquire land along and adjacent to the highway 'to provide roadside and landscape development for the preservation and development of natural scenic beauty' and 'to integrate the public improvement with the aesthetics of the area traversed by the highway' (emphasis added), it would seem, and we so hold, that the concept-natural scenic beauty-, although more generally used in a subjective sense, connotes, in terms of highway beautification, a sufficiently definite concrete image when tested objectively so as to furnish in and of itself an adequate standard for the measurement of a proper exercise of...