210 Pa. 105 | Pa. | 1904
Opinion by
The proceedings to condemn the bridge of the appellant company were instituted in the court of quarter sessions of Beaver county under the Act of May 8, 1876, P. L. 131, as amended by the Act of May 3, 1878, P. L. .41. The original act is entitled “ An act to authorize the acquisition by the several counties of this commonwealth for the use of the county, of bridges erected over rivers, creeks and rivulets, and for the abolition of tolls thereon.” The supplement of 1878, according to its title, is “ designed to amend the third section,” of the act of 1876.
No question is raised as to the constitutionality of the act of 1876, and if the proceedings had been conducted under it as unamended and in accordance'with its requirements, we do not understand that any question would be raised by the appellants as to their validity. After the viewers appointed by
If the act of 1876 embraces but one subject, as it does, and the same is clearly expressed in the words “ the acquisition by the several counties in this commonwealth for the use of the county, of bridges erected over rivers, creeks and rivulets, and for the abolition of tolls thereon, ” the only question is whether the third, section as amended is germane to the subject.
The appellants ask us to say that, from the title of the act, no notice was given that the county commissioners should not
If the title fairly gave notice of the subject of the act, so as to reasonably direct inquiry into its body, the constitutional requirement was not violated: State Line & Juniata Railroad Company’s Appeal, 77 Pa. 429; Carothers v. Phila. Co., 118 Pa. 468 ; Dailey v. Potter County, 203 Pa. 593. If the commissioners had made inquiry into the amendment, they would have learned from it that, though their duties were to be ministerial in connection with the condemnation of bridges after action by the court and grand jury, as has been the case for more than half a centurj^ in matters relating to roads after action taken by the court, they would also have learned from the act that provision was made for the protection, through them, of the county against excessive awards of damages in the reports of viewers, even if approved by court and grand jury. They would -have discovered in it no “ departure, almost revolutionary, from the settled policy of the state on the administration of the affairs of counties,” as we were compelled to s¡ey was contemplated by the Act of May 5, 1899, P. L. 231: Stegmaier v. Jones, 203 Pa. 47. In speaking of that act the present Chief Justice said: “But passing over the conflict between sections 6 and 7, as to the duties of the county commissioners and the grand jury and conceding that they may be reconciled, the body of the act puts the final authority in the grand jury. The most important feature in the act, therefore, the power to impose on the county the very serious burden of debt which would be involved for example in this petition, is thus without any notice in the title transferred to a shifting and uncertain body, not usually if ever exercising such powers, not elected by the voters, but drawn by
The decree of the court below, based upon the constitutionality of the act, is affirmed and the appeal dismissed at the costs of appellants.