The State ex rel. Crow v. Boonville Bridge Company and Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railway Company
| Decision Date | 13 July 1907 |
| Parties | THE STATE ex rel. CROW, Attorney-General, v. BOONVILLE BRIDGE COMPANY and MISSOURI, KANSAS & TEXAS RAILWAY COMPANY |
| Court | Missouri Supreme Court |
Peremptory writ denied.
Edward C. Crow, Attorney-General, and Sam B. Jeffries, Assistant Attorney-General, for relator; J. W. Jamison, W. M. Williams and W. Hall Trigg of counsel.
(1) The State of Missouri had full right and power to authorize the respondent bridge company to erect and maintain its bridge over the Missouri river. 1. The mere grant to Congress of the power to regulate commerce among the States must not be taken, in all cases, to imply a prohibition on the States to exercise the same power. Under their reserved powers, the several States may rightfully legislate on matters of a local nature, as, for instance, the regulation of their internal commerce, inspection, quarantine, and health laws, and laws relating to bridges, ferries and highways. And these laws have full force and operation until circumscribed by direct action of Congress in effectuation of its general power over interstate commerce. Leisy v. Hardin, 135 U.S. 108. (a) State laws regulating pilots: Cooley v. Board of Wardens, 12 How. 299; Steamship Co. v. Joliffe, 2 Wall. 450; Ex parte McNiel, 13 Wall. 236; Wilson v McNamee, 102 U.S. 572. (b) State laws regulating inspection and the policing of harbors, etc: Gibbons v Ogden, 9 Wheaton 203; New York v. Milne, 11 Peters 102; Turner v. Maryland, 107 U.S. 38; Steamship Co. v. Louisiana, 118 U.S. 455. (c) State laws providing for improvements of navigable channels County of Mobile v. Kimball, 102 U.S. 691; Escanaba Transportation Co. v. Chicago, 107 U.S 678; Huse v. Glover, 119 U.S. 543. (d) State laws regulating wharfs, piers and docks: Cannon v. New Orleans, 20 Wall 577; Packet Co. v. St. Louis, 100 U.S. 423; Packett Co. v. Catlettsburg, 105 U.S 559; Transportation Co. v. Parkersburg, 107 U.S. 691; Ouachita Packet Co. v. Aiken, 121 U.S. 444. (e) State laws authorizing the construction and maintenance of bridges over navigable streams. 2. The Congress of the United States not having legislated on the subject of the erection and maintenance of bridges over the Missouri river, the State of Missouri had plenary power to authorize the respondent bridge company to erect and maintain its bridge; and the bridge company became, by its charter from the State, invested with the right and franchise so to do without any authorization therefor being first had from Congress. Willamette Iron Bridge Co. v. Hatch, 125 U.S. 1; Rhea v. Railroad, 50 F. 16; Gilman v. Philadelphia, 3 Wall 713; Passaic Bridges, 3 Wall, 782; Escanaba Transportation Co. v. Chicago, 107 U.S. 678; Cardwell v. Bridge Co., 113 U.S. 205; Hamilton v. Railroad, 118 U.S. 86. (2) The charter granted by the State of Missouri to the respondent bridge company invested the latter with authority to maintain a toll bridge for the crossing of ordinary road travel. 1. The law under which the respondent bridge company was, on the nineteenth day of December, 1870, organized, expressly provided that, in the articles of association for the formation of a bridge company, should be stated the purposes for which the bridge was to be used, whether for railroads or ordinary road travel, or both. And, in addition to other rights and powers secured to such a company, the statutes conferred the right of eminent domain. 1 Wagner's Statutes 1870, secs. 16 and 17 of article 7, ch. 37. 2. In designating to the State of Missouri the uses to which its bridge was to be dedicated and employed, the bridge company elected to specify that "the said bridge is to be a public toll one for crossing persons and property, and to be used for both railroad and ordinary road travel at reasonable rates." For both of these franchises it made application, and with both of them it became clothed. 3. The signing of articles of association, and the filing of same with the Secretary of State, constitute an acceptance of a charter from the State, and a consequent investiture with the franchises therein named. Railroad v. Shambaugh, 106 Mo. 567; Railroad v. Abell, 17 Mo.App. 645; Queen City F. & C. Co. v. Crawford, 127 Mo. 364; Glymont Improvement & Excursion Company v. Toler, 80 Md. 278; Benbow v. Cook, 115 N.C. 324. (3) The Act of Congress of May 11, 1872, is not repugnant to the charter granted by the State of Missouri to the respondent bridge company, on December 19, 1870. 1. As indicated above, the right of a State to legislate with respect to the erection of bridges over the navigable streams which lie within its borders is a part of its reserved power. Gillman v. Philadelphia, 70 U.S. 726; Leisy v. Hardin, 135 U.S. 108; United States v. Bridge Co., 1 Woodbury & Minot's Rpts. (U.S.) 409; Silliman v. Hudson River Bridge Co., 4 Blatch. 404; Story on the Constitution (5 Ed.), sec. 1070. 2. The Act of Congress does not purport to deal with matters purely internal to the State of Missouri. It leaves to the State -- as it justly should -- the regulation of travel of a local nature for which the charter granted to the bridge company provides, and confines itself wholly to two matters, both of which concern interstate commerce, viz: (1) The right of all railroads, so desiring, to use the bridge; (2) provision that the bridge structure shall not interfere with navigation. "It is the settled rule that a statute enacted in execution of a reserved power of the State is not to be regarded as inconsistent with an Act of Congress passed in execution of a clear power under the Constitution, unless the repugnance or conflict is so direct and positive that the two acts cannot be reconciled or stand together." Railroad v. Haber, 169 U.S. 623; Sinnot v. Davenport, 63 U.S. 243; Railroad v. Bridge Co., 8 F. 190; United States v. Bridge Co., 1 Woodbury & Minot's Rpts. (U.S.) 418; Transportation Co. v. Parkersburg, 107 U.S. 705. (4) The levy and collection of toll by the respondents is the exercise of a power and franchise referable only to the charter granted by the State of Missouri. 1. The franchise of collecting tolls upon bridges is a part of the sovereign power reserved to the States, and not delegated to the general government. Therefore, the appropriate source of a grant of such a franchise would be the State of Missouri rather than the Federal Government. Gould on Waters, sec. 142; St. Louis v. Turnpike & Ferry Co., 14 Mo.App. 219. 2. Furthermore, the Act of Congress confessed no authority to maintain a toll bridge, and as that right can not be claimed from the act by implication -- the sovereign being the grantor -- the collection of tolls by the respondents on traffic passing over the bridge on the trains of the railway company is a right conferred only by the charter granted the bridge company by the State of Missouri. This being so, the respondent bridge company can not now, after the exercise for years of the franchise of taking tolls, be heard to say that it does not, nor ever has, derived or claimed any right or privilege from the charter granted by the State. (5) Quasi-public corporations, being invested with public functions, may not, at their own election, refuse to exercise the same. 1. The public interests involved in the franchises conferred on public-service corporations forbid them, in the absence of express legislative authority, to alienate their property by either sale, lease or mortgage, if, by so doing, they will become disabled, in any degree, from performing the duties they owe to the public. And, for the same reason, their property is not subject to levy under execution. 1 Clark & Marshall on Corporations, secs. 162 and 773; Morawetz on Corporations (2 Ed.), secs. 1120 and 1125; 4 Thompson's Commentaries on Corporations, sec. 5355; St. Louis v. St. Louis Gas Light Co., 70 Mo. 117; Overton Bridge Co. v. Means, 33 Neb. 857. 2. Likewise, the paramount interests of the public have led the courts to subordinate the legal lien of mortgages on the property of the quasi-public corporations to an equity raised in behalf of persons who, by their labor or the furnishing of materials, have enabled the corporation to discharge its duty to the public of a continuous service. Douglass v. Cline, 12 Bush (Ky.) 628; Central Trust Company v. Railroad, 23 F. 863; Bound v. Railroad, 47 F. 30; Fosdick v. Schall, 99 U.S. 235; Miltenberger v. Railroad, 106 U.S. 286; Union Trust Company v. Souther, 107 U.S. 591; Burnham v. Bowen, 111 U.S. 776; Union Trust Company v. Railroad, 117 U.S. 434; Kneeland v. Brass Foundry, etc., 140 U.S. 592; Railroad v. Carnegie Steel Co., 176 U.S. 257; Reyburn v. Consumers Gas Co., 29 F. 561; Ellis v. Vernon Ice, Light and Water Co., 23 S.W. 858. 3. The franchises conferred upon public-service corporations are granted to them in contemplation of the supposed benefit to accrue to the public from a continuous user of the same. Having accepted the franchise, the corporation may not, of its own caprice and choice, disregard its duties to the State by an abandonment of the exercise of the public functions which constituted the consideration upon which the grant was obtained. 7 Am. and Eng. Ency. Law (2 Ed.), 702; Morawetz on Corporations (2 Ed.) sec. 414; 7 Thompson's Commentaries on Corporations, sec. 8392. (6) The respondent bridge company having accepted the franchise to operate a toll bridge for ordinary road travel, is compellable by mandamus to exercise the same according to the provisions of its charter. 1. The application to, and obtaining from, the State of the franchise to erect and maintain a toll bridge open to both railway and ordinary road travel; the subsequent building and equipping of the structure for both kinds of travel; and the exercise of the right to take tolls, all conclusively evidence an acceptance...
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