Town of Tonawanda v. James Lyon

• Decision Date: 29 April 1901
• Docket Number: No. 214,214
• Citation: 181 U.S. 389,21 S.Ct. 609,45 L.Ed. 908
• Parties: TOWN OF TONAWANDA and John K. Patton, Appts. , v. JAMES B. LYON
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

181 U.S. 389

21 S.Ct. 609

45 L.Ed. 908

TOWN OF TONAWANDA and John K. Patton, Appts.,

v JAMES B. LYON.

No. 214.

Argued February 25, 26, 27, 1901.

Decided April 29, 1901.

This was the case of a bill in equity filed in the circuit court of the United States for the northern district of New York on September 9, 1899, by James B. Lyon, a citizen of the state of New York, against the town of Tonawanda, a municipal corporation of that state, and John K. Patton, supervisor of said town. The object of the bill was to restrain the defendants from enforcing payment of a certain assessment against tracts or parcels of land belonging to the complainant, situated in the town of Tonawanda, and abutting on Delaware street in said town. The assessment was levied against said tracts of land to meet the expense of grading and paving said street, in pursuance of the provisions of statutes of the state of New York and of an order of the town board of Tonawanda. The principal matter complained of was that the method of meeting the expense of grading and paving the said street was by assessing the same against the lots abutting on the street according to frontage thereon, and that the statutes and proceedings thereunder, which provided for that method, were contrary to the provisions of the Constitution of the United States, in that thereby the land of the complainant would be taken for public use without just compensation, and he be deprived of his property without due process of law.

The case came on for final hearing on bill, answer, and a stipulation of facts, and on January 17, 1900, the circuit court decreed, among other things, as follows:

'That those parts of the acts of the legislature of the state of New York mentioned and set forth in plaintiff's bill of complaint, to wit, of chapter 550 of the laws of the state of New York for the year 1893, and of chapter 816 of the laws of the state of New York for the year 1895, which authorize and require the town board of said town to levy the assessment for the entire expense of paving said Delaware street, set forth in the bill of complaint, upon the complainant's said parcels of land described in said bill of complaint and the other lands fronting on said Delaware street, and the acts of the said defendant, the town of Tonawanda, by its town board, mentioned in said bill of complaint, in levying said assessments upon said lands according to the rule prescribed in said acts of said legislature, to wit, in the proportion which the number of front feet of each of said lots and parcels of land bounding and fronting on said Delaware street in front of which said improvement of paving said street was made, and which are assessed therefor in and by said assessment, bear and are to the aggregate number of feet of frontage of all the lots of land so bounding on the portion of said street in front of which said improvement was made, was and were, and each and every of said provisions of said acts of the legislature of the state of New York, and all acts of said defendant, the town of Tonawanda, in levying said assessment in the manner and form aforesaid, are wholly unconstitutional and void as being contrary to the provisions of the Constitution of the United States.'

And thereupon the town of Tonawanda and John K. Patton as supervisor of said town were forever enjoined and restrained 'from in any manner collecting or enforcing payment of such assessments against said complainant or his land or propety.' 98 Fed. Rep. 361.

On January 17, 1900, an appeal from said decree to this court was prayed for and allowed.

Mr. John Cunneed for appellants.

Mr. Tracy C. Becker for appellee.

Messrs. Edward C. Mason and Ralph T. Kellogg, counsel for other landowners on this brief.

Mr. Justice Shiras delivered the opinion of the court:

The complainant in the court below did not put his claim for equitable relief upon any allegation that, in the proceedings to pave Delaware street and to assess the cost of the improvement upon the abutting property, there had been any departure from the provisions of the statute, or that there had been attempted any discrimination against him or his property. Nor was it denied that it is the settled law of the state of New York that the method prescribed, of meeting the expense by apportioning the entire cost of such an improvement upon the abutting land according to the foot-front rule, is a valid exercise of legislative power. People ex rel. Griffin v. Brooklyn, 4 N. Y. 419, 55 Am. Rep. 266; Spencer v. Merchant, 100 N. Y. 585, 3 N. E. 682.

What was claimed was that a state statute which directs municipalities to assess the whole expense of paving any highway therein upon the lands abutting upon the highway so improved in proportion to the feet frontage of such lands, without providing for a judicial inquiry into the value of such lands and the benefits actually to accrue to them by the proposed improvement, is unconstitutional and void. And it was held by the court below that, notwithstanding the courts of the state may have held otherwise, it was its duty to follow the decision of this court in the case of Norwood v. Baker, 172 U. S. 269, 43 L. ed. 443, 19 Sup. Ct. Rep. 187, which was regarded by the...