State v. Mayor

• Decision Date: 17 February 1887
• Citation: 8 A. 123,49 N.J.L. 303
• Parties: STATE (HUDSON Telephone Co.) v. MAYOR, ETC., OF JERSEY CITY.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

8 A. 123

49 N.J.L. 303

STATE (HUDSON Telephone Co.)

v. MAYOR, ETC., OF JERSEY CITY.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

February 17, 1887.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

This writ brings up an ordinance to repeal an ordinance entitled "An ordinance to authorize the Hudson Telephone Company to erect posts or poles in certain streets of Jersey City."

Vrederiburgh & Garretson, for plaintiffs.

R. B. Seymour, for defendants.

REED, J. The prosecutors are a corporation by reason of a certificate filed under the provisions of an act entitled "An act to incorporate and regulate telegraph companies," contained in the Revision, (page 1174,) and thesupplement thereto to be found in P. L. 1880, p. 201. The eighth section of the original act is as follows: "Any telegraph company organized by virtue of this act shall have full power to use the public roads or highways in the state, on the line of their route, for the purposes of erecting posts or poles on the same to suspend wires and other fixtures, upon first obtaining consent in writing of the owner of the soil: provided, however, no posts or poles shall be erected on any street of any incorporated city or town without first obtaining from the incorporated city or town a designation of the streets in which the same shall be placed, and the manner of placing the same."

In accordance with these provisions an ordinance was passed by the common council of Jersey City, and approved by the mayor, April 1, 1884. The ordinance gave the company permission to erect posts and poles, and to lay an under-ground cable in certain streets, or portions of several streets. It contained conditions that no post should be erected in front of any building so as to interfere with the approach to the entrance of said building, nor without the permission of the property owner; that the company should conform to provisions of an ordinance concerning telegraph poles in the public street; that they should not interfere with gas, water, or sewer pipes; and that, before they commenced to excavate for the purpose of laying cable, they should give a bond conditioned that the company would comply with all the conditions named in the ordinance, and save the city harmless from such acts as might injure third persons. These are, briefly stated, some of the conditions contained in the said ordinance. It appears from the evidence taken in the cause that the company proceeded to place poles along the route marked out by the ordinance. They had placed from 35 to 45 poles at an expense of about $10 a pole, and had expended other moneys in and about the erection of the poles. Then was passed the ordinance brought up before us, which repeals the ordinance which confers permission to place the poles as above mentioned.

I am of the opinion that, as a general rule, a designation of streets by a city gives the company an irrevocable right to use the streets so designated for the purposes indicated in the statute. Certainly, after the expenditure of money in the erection of poles made in reliance upon the municipal designation, the company obtains a vested right, of which they cannot be stripped by a subsequent revocation of such designation. The notion that a corporation which, under provisions similar to the present act, has, upon the strength of a permission to use a certain route, spent thousands of dollars in laying railway tracks or subterranean cables, or in erecting posts and stretching wires, is at the mercy of the city authorities continually and entirely, is not...