Riggs v. Board of Education of the City of Detroit

• Decision Date: 07 May 1873
• Citation: 27 Mich. 262
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court
• Parties: Alida Riggs v. The Board of Education of the City of Detroit

27 Mich. 262

Alida Riggs v. The Board of Education of the City of Detroit

Supreme Court of Michigan

May 7, 1873

Submitted on Briefs May 6, 1873.

Appeal in Chancery from Wayne Circuit.

Decree reversed, and bill dismissed, with costs of both courts.

D. B & H. M. Duffield, for complainant.

Alfred Russel, for defendant.

OPINION

Campbell J.

The bill in this cause was filed to prevent the erection of a public library upon a space of ground of a triangular shape bounded by Gratiot, Farrar, and Farmer streets, in Detroit and spoken of as "Centre Park," in section seven of said city. Complainant avers that she owns a house and lot, which she purchased and erected under the belief that the land was to be continued as a park.

The bill contains a recital of many facts, upon some of which we have information as recognized or fixed by public laws. The history of the parcel of land referred to appears to be substantially this:

In 1807, it is averred, the Governor and judges adopted the plan of this section, under an act of Congress of April 21, 1806, to provide for the adjustment of land titles in Detroit. Reference was made to this proceeding in People v. Jones, 6 Mich. 176, and it will be unnecessary here to review the whole subject, beyond what may be required for this particular case. The date of the adoption of this section was April 16, 1807.

The act of Congress authorized them to lay out a town and adjust titles and make grants, and after satisfying all claims, to use the proceeds of the lands sold to build a court house and jail. The law required them to report their proceedings to Congress, which, it appears from the statutes of the United States, was not done until required a second time by a statute of 1830. Their report is found in Vol. 5, State Papers, "Public Lands."

In 1806 a law was passed by the Governor and judges, laying down a very vague outline of their proposed plan, defining one triangular section as section 1, and providing for other sections to be planned from time to time, subject to such deviation as might be found necessary. The portion of ground adopted by that act as the general basis of the city, was a triangle to be divided into six sections consecutively numbered. As the section where the place in controversy is situated, is section 7, and yet was included in that triangle, it is evident--as it is also very well known--that the plan was subjected to the deviations which had been anticipated. That act is only important in this controversy, as showing that the court house was to be placed in the Grand Circus, the largest public ground on the plan, and the jail was to be built in the vicinity of the court house. It was not until 1815 that this designation was repealed.--See Territorial Laws, 143, 284.

In May, 1807, about the time when more of the sections were surveyed, and just after this section was adopted, a further law was passed, making regulations concerning the uses of the various public grounds, and the privileges of lot owners in the streets adjacent to their lots. Some portions of this act are quite important. By section 6 it was provided, "that the squares or other spaces where six and twelve avenues intersected should be planted with trees, as the lot owners fronting thereon should direct, or as the city council should at any time by law provide; but so as not to impede or obstruct the purpose to which such public space of ground shall be converted, or may be designed," p. 288. At this time, as already seen, one of these purposes was declared by law to be the erection of a court house and jail. The Campus Martius and Grand Circus were the only spaces coming within this section.

By section 7, of the same act, provision was made for such triangular spaces as the one now under consideration. It is provided: "The internal space of ground, in the middle of every section, shall be reserved for public wells and pumps, for markets, for public schools, for houses for the reception of engines or other articles for the extinction of fires, and the preservation of the property of the inhabitants, for houses for the meeting of religious, moral, literary or political societies, or other useful associations, and, generally, for such purposes of utility or ornament as the city council of Detroit may at any time, by law, provide; or as, otherwise, the inclination and tastes of the proprietors of the lots in such section, or the major part of them, may direct; and in the same manner shall be paved, graveled, planted with trees, or otherwise improved and ornamented." P. 288.

It will be observed that the regulations in regard to the large and small spaces differ in some remarkable particulars. In the large spaces the primary purpose is adornment with trees, subject to the other uses, and the power is given to the lot owners fronting on them, to see to the work until the city take it in hand. In the smaller spaces the primary purpose is for public improvements and buildings, and the ornamentation is secondary, and entrusted, until the city interfere, not to the adjoining lot owners, but to the proprietors of the entire section, or a majority of them. And in both of these sections the action of the city is contemplated as not a single and final and unchangeable determination, but action to be had "at any time, by law," or, in other words, legislative action, which is not in its nature concluded by one exercise. Neither was immediate improvement contemplated.

Under this state of things, the first use to which this land was put was the erection of a jail upon it, in 1819, or there-abouts, which remained until removed, as the bill states, in 1849, by a decree of the circuit court for the county of Wayne. It...