State v. Suffield & Thompsonville Bridge Co.

• Decision Date: 17 December 1909
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: STATE v. SUFFIELD & THOMPSONVILLE BRIDGE CO.

74 A. 775

82 Conn. 460

STATE

v. SUFFIELD & THOMPSONVILLE BRIDGE CO.

Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut.

Dec. 17, 1909.

Appeal from Superior Court, Hartford County; Silas A. Robinson, Judge.

Proceedings by the State against the Suffield & Thompsonville Bridge Company to condemn certain toll bridge properties for the purpose of establishing public highways. From the judgment, petitioner appeals. Reversed and remanded, with directions.

See, also, 81 Conn. 56, 70 Atl. 55.

Proceeding for the appraisal of damages for the taking for public use of the toll bridge of the defendant The case was before this court at a former term upon a reservation for advice as to the judgment to be rendered upon a remonstrance to the report of the committee which had been appointed to assess damages. Many of the facts essential to an understanding of the present case will be found in the report of that case. 81 Conn. 56, 70 Atl. 55. Pursuant to the advice there given, the case was by the superior court recommitted to the committee for a hearing de novo as to the compensation to be awarded to the defendant for the taking of its bridge with its approaches and appurtenances, with instructions to assess upon such rehearing "the sum which will justly compensate the defendant for its property proposed to be taken by the state, including in that sum such amounts as the committee shall find have been paid by the defendant, as provided in its charter, to the owners of the Thompsonville ferry and the Enfield Bridge Company as damages." The committee, after such rehearing, reported that, "having considered all the evidence and claims of counsel," they found, "the structure or physical value of this bridge with its appurtenances, including said tollhouse, determined by its original cost and what it would cost to replace it now in its present physical condition, to be $63 370.29 and said approaches are of the value of $2,690.44, making a total of $66,000.73 as the value at the present time of said bridge with its approaches and appurtenances as determined in the manner aforesaid." They also reported that they found that the amounts paid by the defendant as damages to the Enfield Bridge Company and the Thompsonville Ferry Company were, respectively, $1,250 and $9,400. They close their report as follows: "Wherefore, upon all the evidence in the case, the committee assesses as compensation and damages to the Subacid & Thompsonville Bridge Company for its bridge above described $63,370.29 and as compensation in damages on account of the approaches the sum of $2,690.44, making a total which the committee assesses as just compensation for said bridge, its approaches, and appurtenances the sum of $636,060.73, which amount including the sums, to wit, $1,250 and $9,400, which the committee finds have been paid by the defendant as provided by its charter to the Enfield Bridge Company and the owners of said ferry makes a total sum of $76,710.73, which the committee finds upon its hearing de novo to be the compensation to be awarded to the said Suffield & Thompsonville Bridge Company for the taking of its bridge, approaches, and appurtenances, as prayed for in the petition, including the amount paid to the Thompsonville Ferry Company and the Enfield Bridge Company as damages."

Included in the report is this finding regarding certain evidence offered by the state and its claims in connection therewith: "Upon the hearing the state made the following claim: That, in determining the 'value' of the bridge, its approaches, and appurtenances to the defendant, the uses to which the property was put and was capable of, and the income from its use received by the defendant were necessarily controlling, that 'just compensation' to the defendant company for the property which the state takes is what the property is worth to its owners, the holders of the six hundred shares of its capital stock, and that the earning power of the property to the shareholders determines the value of the shares and consequently the value of the property, and that, when the shareholders receive in money the value to them of their shares, they receive an exact equivalent for the property taken, and that, when the property is taken away from the bridge company, the amount that will justly compensate it for its loss is that sum which paid over to it will equal the value of its capital stock as a source of income; that, while the value of the physical property ascertained as hereinbefore stated is an element to be considered, the real and controlling elements in the case are those embodied in the above claim. The state in pursuance of the claim as above stated offered evidence to prove what the net income of the property had been from year to year since the operation of the bridge; what dividends had been declared upon the capital stock; what sales of stock had been made; and what was its market value. All said testimony was objected to on the part of the defendant. The committee decided to hear said testimony, reserving the right at the conclusion of the trial to exclude it or not to give it the consideration claimed for it. This course was not objected to and said testimony in support of the claim of the slate was admitted, and, having heard all said testimony, the committee overruled the said claim of the state, and did not give the evidence the effect claimed for it by the state, and, in view of it, did not alter the values hereinbefore stated." When this report was filed in the superior court, a remonstrance to its acceptance was filed by the state upon several grounds. The second ground was, in substance, because the $66,060.73 assessed as compensation for the bridge, approaches, and appurtenances is the amount found to be the structural or physical cost of the property determined solely by ascertaining its original cost of construction and what it would cost to replace it, and because in determining and assessing said amount the committee excluded and gave no weight or effect to the evidence which was received by the committee regarding the income received by the defendant from the use of the property, and regarding the actual market value of the capital stock of the company. A demurrer to the first, second, and fifth grounds of remonstrance and to the prayer for relief was filed by the defendant. This was sustained so far as it related to the first ground of remonstrance and the prayer for relief and overruled as to the other grounds. The prayer for relief was afterward so amended as to ask that the report be not accepted, and a denial of each paragraph of the remonstrance was then filed by the defendant. Upon the issues thus joined a hearing was had to the court. Robinson, I who found all the paragraphs of the remonstrance untrue, overruled the remonstrance, accepted the report, and awarded to the defendant the sum assessed by the committee. The state appeals, assigning as error the sustaining of the demurrer to the prayer for relief and the overruling of its claims of law made on the trial, and asks for a correction of the finding.

Marcus H. Holcomb and Hugh M. Alcorn, for the State.

Charles E. Perkins, J. Warren Johuson, and Charles H. Briscoe, for appellee.

THAYER, J. (after stating the facts as above). The report which was accepted by the court was signed by only two of the members of the committee, the remaining member refusing to sign it and filing a separate report wherein he assigns, as the cause of his disagreeing action, the refusal of the other members to admit the evidence which was offered by the slate, referred to in the portion of...