Ford v. Thrailkill

• Decision Date: 16 December 1889
• Citation: 84 Ga. 169,10 S.E. 600
• Parties: Ford v. Thrailkill et al.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

10 S.E. 600

(84 Ga. 169)

Ford

v.Thrailkill et al.

Supreme Court of Georgia.

Dec. 16, 1889.

Municipal Corporations—Fire Limits.

1. The Dalton city charter, § 6, which gives the mayor and common council power to abate nuisances, public and private, and to pass all ordinances they may deem necessary for preserving the good order and good government of the city, confers, by necessary implication, authority on the mayor and council to establish fire limits.

2. As Code Ga. § 786, expressly authorizes mayors and councils of towns and villages "to make regulations for guarding against danger or damage by fire, " an ordinance establishing Are limits is not inconsistent with the general laws of the state.

Error from superior court, Whitfield county; Milner, Judge.

W. C. Glenn, by Harrison & Peeples, for plaintiff in error. McCutchen & Shumate, for defendants in error.

Simmons, J. In 1886 the mayor and city council of Dalton adopted the following ordinance: " Be it ordained by the mayor and council of the city of Dalton, that from and after the passage of this ordinance it shall be unlawful for any person or persons to erect or build a wooden or frame building on the lot fronting Hamilton street, running north from Morris street to the Western & Atlantic Railroad crossing, near the novelty works." The second section prescribes the punishment, and the third section makes it lawful for the marshal to enter upon the premises with sufficient force to remove such building, at the expense of the owner or owners. In 18S9, Ford, the plaintiff in error, erected a wooden or frame building within the limits prescribed in the ordinance. He was cited to appear before the mayor for a violation of the ordinance, and was fined $50, and an order was issued by the mayor to the marshal to remove said building. Ford then filed his petition to the judge of the superior court, praying an injunction against the marshal from carrying out the order of the mayor in removing the building, upon the ground that the judgment of the mayor was void, — that the mayor had no jurisdiction to render it; and he prayed an adjudication that the ordinance was void, and an order " restraining the mayor from tearing down his house without having proceeded against the same as a nuisance, and interfering in any manner with the erection of the building, and his occupancy or use of the same." On the hearing before the trial judge the injunction was denied, and Ford excepted.

The only question argued before us...