State v. Guertin

• Decision Date: 24 June 1937
• Citation: 193 A. 237
• Parties: STATE v. GUERTIN.
• Court: New Hampshire Supreme Court

193 A. 237

STATE

v. GUERTIN.

Supreme Court of New Hampshire. Hillsborough.

June 24, 1937.

Transferred from Superior Court, Hillsborough County; James, Judge.

Eugene Guertin was convicted in the municipal court for operating a taxicab without a license in violation of a city ordinance of Manchester and appealed to the superior court where the facts were agreed and question of law arising thereon were transferred without ruling.

Appeal dismissed.

Appeal, from a conviction in the municipal court of Manchester for operating a taxicab without a license in violation of a city ordinance. In the superior court the facts were agreed and all questions of law arising thereon were transferred without ruling by James, J.

The city ordinance here in question provides that no taxicab shall be operated upon the streets of Manchester unless it has been licensed by the board of mayor and aldermen. The defendant was denied a license because he refused to equip his automobiles with taximeters as the ordinance requires and because he refused to adhere to the rates of fare therein prescribed.

Thomas P. Cheney, Atty. Gen., and Dudley Orr, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State. Emile Lemelin and Ernest R. D'Amours, both of Manchester, for defendant.

WOODBURY, Justice.

The defendant does not contend that the business in which he is engaged is one which the state is without power to regulate. His. position, as stated in his brief, is as follows: "(1) The city of Manchester has no power to fix rates. (2) Power to license and regulate does not include authority to require taximeter. (3) The ordinance is discriminatory. (4) The ordinance leaves too much to the discretion of the licensing authorities. (5) The ordinance is generally unreasonable."

The defendant, by his own admission, is engaged in the business of a common carrier for hire. The rates of fare which he may charge are therefore subject to legislative control by the state without infringing any of his constitutional rights. State v. Maine Cent. Railroad, 77 N.H. 425, 426, 427, 92 A. 837; Terminal Taxicab Co. v. Public Utilities Commission, 241 U.S.. 252, 36 S.Ct. 583, 60 L.Ed. 984, Ann.Cas.. 1916D, 765; Yellow Taxicab Co. v. Gaynor, 82 Misc. 94, 143 N.Y.S. 279. The defendant contends, however, first, that these regulatory powers cannot be delegated by the state to a municipality, and, second, that the statutes of this state do not authorize either cities or towns to regulate any common carrier in respect to rates of fare.

The ordinance in question does not, by its terms, apply to all common carriers by automobile who operate within the city. It excludes from its provisions all motor vehicles "subject to regulation by the Public Utilities Commission (sic. Public Service Commission) of the State of New Hampshire sight-seeing busses designed to carry eight or more persons from a fixed place to places of interest about the City, motor vehicles collecting fares by tickets or coupons sold for interstate transportation." It includes within its terms only such motor vehicles as may be used "for the conveyance of persons for hire from place to place within the city of Manchester." The ordinance is clearly applicable to the business of operating taxicabs as that business is ordinarily conducted, and as the defendant does in fact conduct it, and it applies only to the prosecution of that business within the geographical limits of the city of Manchester. That this is a matter primarily of local concern is not open to question, and as to such matters "The Legislature may constitutionally authorize city councils to legislate." Coleman v. School District, 87 N.H. 465, 471, 183 A. 586, 589; Sherburne v. Portsmouth, 72 N.H. 539, 542, 58 A. 38; State v. Noyes, 30 N.H. 279, 293.

We need not inquire whether towns (P.L. c. 42, § 30), and in consequence cities (P.L. c. 54, § 1; Lucier v. Manchester, 80 N.H. 361, 362, 117 A. 286), have been authorized by the Legislature to fix rates for the kind of transportation here involved. Such powers as cities have in the premises spring from a statute applicable to. cities alone. P.L. c. 54, § 12, par. 6. By virtue of this paragraph of the above statute cities are given power "To license and regulate porters, cartmen and cartage, runners for boats, stages, cars and public houses, hackney coaches, cabs and carriages, and their drivers." The regulatory powers here granted are not limited to horse-drawn vehicles, but may be exercised by city governments in respect to taxicabs (State v. Dunklee, 76 N.H. 439, 84 A. 40, Ann.Cas. 1913B, 754), but the question remains as to whether or not the powers granted include the power to regulate rates. We believe that such power is included within the meaning of the words used.

The word "regulate" is a broad one. It means "Adjust or control by rule, method or established mode; to direct by rule or restriction; to subject to governing principles or laws." Webster, New International Dictionary. The word itself contains no suggestion of any limitation as to the features which may be...