People ex rel. Williams Eng'g & Contracting Co. v. Metz

• Decision Date: 13 October 1908
• Citation: 85 N.E. 1070,193 N.Y. 148
• Parties: PEOPLE ex rel. WILLIAMS ENGINEERING & CONTRACTING CO. v. METZ, Comptroller.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

193 N.Y. 148

85 N.E. 1070

PEOPLE ex rel. WILLIAMS ENGINEERING & CONTRACTING CO.

v.METZ, Comptroller.

Court of Appeals of New York.

Oct. 13, 1908.

Appeal from Supreme Court, Appellate Division, First Department.

Mandamus by the people of New York, on relation of the Williams Engineering & Contracting Company, against Herman A. Metz, as comptroller of the city of New York. From an order of the Appellate Division (126 App. Div. 912,110 N. Y. Supp. 1141) affirming an order of the Special Term granting a peremptory writ, respondent appealed. Order reversed, and proceeding dismissed.

Francis K. Pendleton, Corp. Counsel (Theodore Connoly, of counsel), for appellant.

L. Laflin Kellogg, for respondent.

VANN, J.

This proceeding was initiated by an order made at a Special Term of the Supreme Court, requiring the comptroller of the city of New York to show cause why he should not be required to pay to the relator the sum of $9,634.75, as well as the further sum of $4,545.37, each being a partial payment upon a contract to complete the storm relief sewer in the borough of the Bronx. The facts were undisputed. It appeared that a prior contract, dated March 6, 1906, had been made by one Flanagan to construct said sewer at unit prices estimated to amount to the sum of $635,844.36. After Mr. Flanagan had been paid $310,718.35 for partial performance of said contract it was declared abandoned by the city under a provision thereof authorizing such action in certain cases, and on the 6th of November, 1907, a new contract was made with the relator, as the lowest bidder after due advertisement, to complete the sewer for the lump sum of $428,831.50. Thereupon the relator entered upon the performance of its contract, and the sums mentioned in the order to show cause are respectively 85 per cent. of the earliest amounts earned thereunder. They were payable as soon as earned, and were the only sums that had been earned when this proceeding was commenced.

Payment was refused by the comptroller upon the ground that the relator had violated a statute known as the ‘Labor Law,’ in that it allowed its workmen to work more than eight hours a day when there was no extraordinary emergency, and had failed to pay wages at the rate prevailing in the locality where the work was done. Both of these specifications were supported by proof, and neither was denied by the relator. No explanation was given and no excuse presented. The relator, however, sought to justify its position on the grounds, first, that the labor law did not apply to the contract in question, because it was a continuation of that made with Flanagan before the Labor Law was passed; second, that the labor law is unconstitutional. The comptroller admitted the allegations of the relator that it had performed the work and earned the compensation claimed, but resisted payment solely upon the grounds mentioned.

The court at Special Term granted a writ of peremptory mandamus commanding the comptroller to pay the sums claimed by the relator, and upon appeal to the Appellate Division the order was affirmed. Two of the justices, however, dissented upon the ground that the labor law is constitutional and absolutely prohibits payment on the facts disclosed by the record.

The first ground upon which the comptroller resisted payment merits little attention. Whatever the rights of Flanagan, the first contractor, or his sureties may be as against the city, as to the relator the new contract is independent of the old, and stands the same as if no other had been made. The relator sustains no relation to Flanagan or his sureties that is recognized by law. It is entitled to nothing for what he did, and is responsible for no default of his. The old contract may be of importance to the old contractor in his relation to the city, but it is of no concern to the new contractor in its relations to the city. The contract of the relator is with the city alone, and the old contract is referred to in the new only to measure the work to be done thereunder. The relator agreed to do the work thus described, and the city agreed to pay a fixed price therefor. The work has been partly done according to the contract, and partial payment must be made as agreed unless the labor law now in force, which was passed after the date of the first contract and before the date of the second, intervenes and prevents. The only question, therefore, worthy of estended discussion is whether that statute is valid in so far as it regulates wages and hours of labor on public work.

The first labor law was passed in 1897, was twice amended in 1899, and once in 1900. Laws 1897, p. 461, c. 415; Laws 1899, pp. 350, 1172, cc. 192, 567; Laws 1900, p. 638, c. 298. In 1901 it was adjudged unconstitutional according to the Constitution as it then stood, first, because it required the expenditure of money of the city or that of the local property owners for other than city purposes; second, because it invaded rights of liberty and property, in that it denied to the city and the contractor the right to agree with their employés upon the measure of their compensation. People ex rel. Rodgers v. Coler, 166 N. Y. 1, 59 N. E. 716,52 L. R. A. 814, 82 Am. St. Rep. 605;People ex rel. Treat v. Coler, 166 N. Y. 144, 59 N. E. 776.

After these adjudications, and owing thereto, the Constitution was amended for the purpose, as contemporary history and discussion in the Legislature show, of authorizing such legislation. Prior to the amendment, section 1 of article 12 was as follows: ‘It shall be the duty of the Legislature to provide for the organization of cities and incorporated villages, and to restrict their power of taxation, assessment, borrowing money, contracting debts, and loaning their credit, so as to prevent abuses in assessments and in contracting debt by such municipal corporations.’ By concurrent resolutions passed by the Senate and Assembly in 1902 and 1903, an amendment to said section was proposed, which was adopted by the people in 1905 and took effect on the 1st of January, 1906. Laws 1903, p. 1453. That amendment added to the section as it previously stood the following: ‘And the Legislature may regulate and fix the wages or salaries, the hours of work or labor, and make provision for the protection, welfare and safety of persons employed by the state or by any county, city, town, village or other civil division of the state, or by any contractor or sub-contractor performing work, labor or services for the state, or for any county, city, town, village or other civil division thereof.’

In 1906 acting under the authority of this amendment the Legislature promptly re-enacted the material part of the statute which had been declared unconstitutional. Laws 1906, p. 1395, c. 506. After referring to section 3 of that statute, and reciting that the same ‘or a part thereof was heretofore declared unconstitutional by the Court of Appeals,’ it proceeded to re-enact said section in every substantial particular. The first sentence is as follows: ‘Eight hours shall constitute a legal day's work for all classes of employés in this state except those engaged in farm and domestic service unless otherwise provided by law.’ After thus fixing the number of hours which constitute a legal day's work in the absence of any agreement upon the subject, the Legislature continued: ‘This section does not prevent an agreement for overwork at an increased compensation except upon work by or for the state or a municipal corporation, or by contractors or sub-contractors therewith. Each contract to which the state or a municipal corporation is a party which may involve the employment of laborers, workmen or mechanics shall contain a stipulation that no laborer, workman or mechanic in the employ of the contractor, sub-contractor or other person doing or contracting to do the whole or a part of the work contemplated by the contract shall be permitted or required to work more than eight hours in any one calendar day except in cases of extraordinary emergency caused by fire, flood or danger to life or property. The wages to be paid for a legal day's work as hereinbefore defined to all classes of such laborers, workmen or mechanics upon all such public works, or upon any material to be used upon or in connection therewith shall not be less than the prevailing rate for a day's work in the same trade or occupation in the locality within the state where such public work on, about or in connection with which such labor is performed in its final or completed form is to be situated, erected or used. Each such contract hereafter made shall contain a stipulation that each such laborer, workman or mechanic, employed by such contractor, sub-contractor or other person on, about or upon such public work, shall receive such wages herein provided for. Each contract for such public work hereafter made shall contain a provision that the same shall be void and of no effect unless the person or corporation making or performing the same shall comply with the provisions of this section; and no such person or corporation shall be entitled to receive any sum nor shall any officer, agent or employé of the state or of a municipal corporation pay the same or authorize its payments from the funds under his charge or control to any such person or corporation for work done upon any contract, which in its form or manner of performance violates the provisions of this section, but nothing in this section shall be construed to apply to persons regularly employed in state institutions, or to engineers, electricians and elevator men in the department of public buildings during the annual session of the Legislature nor to the construction, maintenance and repair of highways outside the limits of cities and villages.’ Laws 1906, p. 1395, c. 506, § 3.

The importance of this statute leads us to proceed slowly in construing it, and to pass upon no questions except such as are essential to the...