KOHL ET AL. v. UNITED STATES
Supreme Court of the United States
Oct. 1875
91 U.S. 367
MR. CHIEF JUSTICE WAITE delivered the opinion of the court.
The depositions in question were taken since the appeal, under a commission issued from the Circuit Court. Further proof in the case has not been ordered by this court. No such order would have been granted if application therefor had been made, unless a sufficient excuse was shown for not taking the evidence in the usual way before the courts below. This was the rule established in the case of The Mabey, 10 Wall. 419. We cannot admit depositions taken under a commission from the Circuit Court, except upon a similar showing. That has not been made. Leave is granted to renew the motion if this defect can be supplied.
Motion denied.
KOHL ET AL. v. UNITED STATES.
- The right of eminent domain exists in the government of the United States, and may be exercised by it within the States, so far as is necessary to the enjoyment of the powers conferred upon it by the Constitution.
- Where Congress by one act authorized the Secretary of the Treasury to purchase in the city of Cincinnati a suitable site for a building for the accommodation of the United States courts and for other public purposes, and by a subsequent act made an appropriation “for the purchase at private sale, or by condemnation of such site,” power was conferred upon him to acquire, in his discretion, the requisite ground by the exercise of the national right of eminent domain; and the proper Circuit Court of the United States had, under the general grant of jurisdiction made by the
act of 1789 , jurisdiсtion of the proceedings brought by the United States to secure the condemnation of the ground. - Where proceedings for the condemnation of land are brought in the courts of Ohio, the statute of that State treats all the owners of a parcel of ground as one party, and gives to them collectively a trial separate from the trial of the issues between the government and the owners of other parcels; but each owner of an estate or interest in each parcel is not entitled to a separate trial.
This was a proceeding instituted by the United States to appropriate a parcel of land in the city of Cincinnati as a site for a post-office and other public uses.
The plaintiffs in error owned a perpetual leasehold estate in a portion of the property sought to be appropriated. They moved to dismiss the proceeding on the ground of want of jurisdiction; which motion was overruled. They then demanded a separate trial of the value of their estate in the property; which demand the court also overruled. To these rulings of the court the plaintiffs in error here excepted. Judgment was rendered in favor of the United States.
There are three acts of Congress which have reference to the acquisition of a site for a post-office in Cincinnati. The first, approved March 2, 1872, 17 Stat. 39, is as follows:—
“Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the Secretary of the Treasury be, and he is hereby, authorized and directed to purchase a central and suitable site in the city of Cincinnati, Ohio, for the erection of a building for the accommodation of the United States courts, custom-house, United States depository, post-office, internal-revenue and pension offices, at a cost not exceeding three hundred thousand dollars; provided that no money which may hereafter be appropriated for this purpose shall be used or expended in the purchase of said site until a valid title thereto shall be vested in the United States, and until the State of Ohio shall cede its jurisdiction over the same, and shall duly release and relinquish to the United States the right to tax or in any way assess said site and the property of the United States that may be thereon during the time that the United States shall be or remain the owner thereof.”
In the Appropriation Act of June 10, 1872, 17 Stat. 352, a further provision was made as follows:—
“To commence the erection of a building at Cincinnati, Ohio, for the accommodation of the United States courts, custom-house, United States depository, post-office, internal-revenue and pension offices, and for the purchase, at private sale or by condemnation, of ground for a site therefor, — the entire cost of completion of which
And in the subsequent Appropriation Act of March 3, 1873, 17 Stat. 523, a further provision was inserted as follows:—
“For purchase of site for the building for custom-hоuse and post-office at Cincinnati, Ohio, seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”
Mr. E. W. Kittredge for plaintiffs in error.
1. For upwards of eighty years, no act of Congress was passed for the exercise of the right of eminent domain in the States, or for acquiring property for Federal purposes otherwise than by purchase, or by appropriation under the authority of State laws in State tribunals. A change of policy by Congress in this regard should not be supposed, unless the act is explicit. We do not raise the question as to the existence of the right of eminent domain in the national government; but Congress has never given to the Circuit Court jurisdiction of proceedings for the condemnation of property brought by the United States in the assertion or enforcement of that right.
In view of the uniform practice of the government, the provision in the act of Congress “for the purchase at private sale or by condemnation” means that the land was to be obtained under the authority of the State government in the exercise of its power of eminent domain. This is apparent from the language of the same section of the act of Congress of June 10, 1872, which appropriated a further sum for the “purchase” of a site in Cincinnati, and also appropriated money “to obtain by purchase, or to obtain by condemnation in the courts of the State of Massachusetts,” a site for a post-office in Boston.
In this case, the State delegates its sovereign power of eminent domain. The United States, if it accepts this grant of power, accepts it as other corporations do, as the agent of the State, and must exercise it in the mode and by the tribunal which the State has prescribed.
2. If the proceeding was properly brought in the Circuit Court,
Mr. Assistant Attorney-General Edwin B. Smith, contra.
1. The right of eminent domain is an “inseparable incident of sovereignty.” Giesy v. C. W. & T. R.R. Co., 4 Ohio St. 308, 323, 324; West River Bridge v. Dix, 6 How. 507; 2 Kent, 339; Cooley, Const. Lim. 526.
Of course the right of the United States is superior to that of any State. Dobbins v. Comm‘rs, 16 Pet. 435, 447.
The authority to purchase includes the right of condemnation. 4 Kent‘s Com. 372; Burt v. Ins. Co., 106 Mass. 356, 364; 7 Opinions of Att‘y-Gen. 114.
Congress, by the use of the term “condemnation,” indicated an expectation that it might and would be resorted to.
The legislature of Ohio concurred in this view of the power and necessity of such action, and passed an act of expropriation. 69 Ohio Laws, 81. But the right of a State to act as an agent of the Federal government, in actually making the seizure, has been denied. 23 Mich. 471.
The power to establish post-offices includes the right to acquire sites therefor, and by aрpropriation if necessary. Dickey v. Turnpike Co., 7 Dana, 113; 2 Story on Const., sect. 1146.
Original cognizance “of all suits of a civil nature at common law or in equity,” where the United States are plaintiffs or petitioners, is given to the Circuit Court of the United States.
“The term [suit] is understood to apply to any proceeding in a court of justice by which an individual pursues that remedy which the law affords.” 2 Pet. 449, 464.
No provision of local law confining a remedy to a State court can affect a suitor‘s right to resort to the Federal tribunals. Hyde v. Stone, 20 How. 170; Payne v. Hook, 7 Wall. 425; Railway Co. v. Whitton, 13 id. 270.
Therefore the United States had the right to pursue in the
2. The power to consolidate different suits by various parties, so as to determine a general question by a single trial, is expressly given by
The statute of Ohio, 69 Ohio Laws, 88, requires that the trial be had as to each parcel of land taken, not as to separate interest in each parcel.
MR. JUSTICE STRONG delivered the opinion of the court.
It has not been seriously contended during the argument that the United States government is without power to appropriate lands or other property within the States for its own uses, and to enable it to perform its proper functions. Such an authority is essential to its independent existence and perpеtuity. These cannot be preserved if the obstinacy of a private person, or if any other authority, can prevent the acquisition of the means or instruments by which alone governmental functions can be performed. The powers vested by the Constitution in the general government demand for their exercise the acquisition of lands in all the States. These are needed for forts, armories, and arsenals, for navy-yards and light-houses, for custom-houses, post-offices, and court-houses, and for other public uses. If the right to acquire property for such uses may be made a barren right by the unwillingness of property-holders to sell, or by the action of a State prohibiting a sale to the Federal government, the constitutional grants of power may be rendered nugatory, and the government is dependent for its practical existence upon the will of a State, or even upon that of a private citizen. This cannot be. No one doubts the existence in the State governments of the right of eminent domain, — a right distinct from and paramount to the right of ultimate ownership. It grows out of the necessities of their being, not out оf the tenure by which lands are held. It may be exercised, though the lands are not held by grant from the government, either mediately or immediately, and independent of the consideration whether they would escheat to the government in case of a failure of heirs. The right is the offspring of political necessity; and it is inseparable
But, if the right of eminent domain exists in the Federal government, it is a right which may be exercised within the States, so far as is necessary to the enjoyment of the powers conferred upon it by the Constitution. In Ableman v. Booth, 21 How. 506, Chief Justice Taney described in plain language the complex nature of our government, and the existence of two distinct and separate sovereignties within the same territorial space, each of them restricted in its powers, and each, within its sphere of action prescribed by the Constitution of the United States, independent of the other. Neither is under the necessity of applying to the other for permission to exercise its lawful powers. Within its own sphere, it may employ all the agencies for exerting them which are appropriаte or necessary, and which are not forbidden by the law of its being. When the power to establish post-offices and to create courts within the States was conferred upon the Federal government, included in it was authority to obtain sites for such offices and for court-houses, and to obtain them by such means as were known and appropriate. The right of eminent domain was one of those means well known when the Constitution was adopted, and employed to obtain lands for public uses. Its existence, therefore, in the grantee of that power, оught not to be questioned. The Constitution itself contains an implied recognition of it beyond what may justly be implied from the express grants. The
“So far as the general government may deem it important to appropriate lands or other property for its own purposes, and to enable it to perform its functions, — as must sometimes be necessary in the case of forts, light-houses, and military posts or roads, and other conveniences and necessities of government, — the general government may exercise the authority as well within the States as within the territory under its exclusive jurisdiction: and its right to do so may be supported by the same reasons which support the right in any case; that is to say, the absolute necessity that the means in the government for performing its functions and perpetuating its existence should not be liable to be controlled or defeated by the want of consent of private parties or of any other authority.”
We refer also to Trombley v. Humphrey, 23 Mich. 471; 10 Pet. 723; Dickey v. Turnpike Co., 7 Dana, 113; McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316, 429.
It is true, this power of the Federal government has not heretofore been exercised adversely; but the non-user of a power does not disprove its existence. In some instances, the States, by virtue of their own right of eminent domain, have condemned lands for the use of the general government, and such condemnations have been sustained by their courts, without, however, denying the right of the United States to act independently of the States. Such was the ruling in Gilmer v. Lime Point, 18 Cal. 229, where lands were condemned by a proceeding in a State court and under a State law for a United States fortification. A similar decision was made in Burt v. The Merchants’ Ins. Co., 106 Mass. 356, where land was taken under a State law as a site for a post-office and sub-treasury building. Neither of these cases denies the right of the Federal government to have lands in the States condemned for its uses under its own power and by its own action. The question was, whether the State could take lands for any other public use than that of the State. In Trombley v. Humphrey, 23 Mich. 471, a different doctrine was asserted, founded, we think, upon better reason. The proper view of the right of eminent domain sеems to be, that it is a right belonging to a
It may, therefore, fairly be concluded that the proceeding in the case we have in hand was a proceeding by the United States government in its own right, and by virtue of its own eminent domain. The act of Congress of March 2, 1872, 17 Stat. 39, gave authority to the Secretary of the Treasury to purchase a central and suitable site in the city of Cincinnati, Ohio, for the erection of a building for the accommodation of the United States courts, custom-house, United States depository, post-office, internal-revenue and pension offices, at a cost not exceeding $300,000; and a proviso to the act declared that no money should be expended in the purchase until the State of Ohio should cede its jurisdiction over the site, and relinquish to the United States the right to tax the property. The authority here given was to purchase: If that were all, it might be doubted whether the right of eminent domain was intended to be invoked. It is true, the words “to purchase” might be construed as including the power to acquire by condemnation; for, technically, purchase includеs all modes of acquisition other than that of descent. But generally, in statutes as in common use, the word is employed in a sense not technical, only as meaning acquisition by contract between the parties, without governmental interference. That Congress intended more than this is evident, however, in view of the subsequent and amendatory act passed June 10, 1872, which made an appropriation “for the purchase at private sale or by condemnation of the ground for a site” for the building. These provisions, connected as they are, manifest a clear intention to confer upon the Secretary of the Treasury power to acquire the grounds needed by the exercise of the national right of eminent do-
But it is contended on behalf of the plaintiffs in error that the Circuit Court had no jurisdiction of the proceeding. There is nothing in the acts of 1872, it is true, that directs the process by which the сontemplated condemnation should be effected, or which expressly authorizes a proceeding in the Circuit Court to secure it. Doubtless Congress might have provided a mode of taking the land, and determining the compensation to be made, which would have been exclusive of all other modes. They might have prescribed in what tribunal or by what agents the taking and the ascertainment of the just compensation should be accomplished. The mode might have been by a commission, or it might have been referred expressly to the Circuit Court; but this, we think, was not neсessary. The investment of the Secretary of the Treasury with power to obtain the land by condemnation, without prescribing the mode of exercising the power, gave him also the power to obtain it by any means that were competent to adjudge a condemnation. The
It is argued that the assessment of property for the purpose of taking it is in its nature like the assessment of its value for the purpose of taxation. It is said they are both valuations of the property to be made as the legislature may prescribe; to enable the government, in the one case, to take the whole of it, and in the other to take a part of it for public uses; and it is argued that no one but Congress could prescribe in either case that the valuation should be made in a judiciаl tribunal or in a judicial proceeding, although it is admitted that the legislature might authorize the valuation to be thus made in either case. If the supposed analogy be admitted, it proves nothing. Assessments for taxation are specially provided for, and a mode is prescribed. No other is, therefore, admissible. But there is no special provision for ascertaining the just compensation to be made for land taken. That is left to the ordinary processes of the law; and hence, as the government is a suitor for the property under
The second assignment of error is, that the Circuit Court refused the demand of the defendants below, now plaintiffs in error, for a separate trial of the value of their estate in the property. They were lessees of one of the parcels sought to be taken, and they demanded a separate trial of the value of their interest; but the court overruled their demand, and required that the jury should appraise the value of the lot or parcel, and that the lessees should in the same trial try the value of their leasehold estate therein. In directing the course of the trial, the court required the lessor and the lessees each separately to state the nature of their estates to the jury, the lessor to offer his testimony separately, and the lessees theirs, and then the government to answer the testimony of the lessor and the lessees; and the court instructed the jury to find and return separately the value of the estates of the lessor and the lessees. It is of this that the lessees complain. They contend, that whether the proceeding is to be treated as founded on the national right of eminent domain, or on that of the State, its consent having been given by the enactment of the State legislature of Feb. 15, 1873 (70 Ohio Laws, 36, sect. 1), it was required to conform to the practice and proceedings in the courts of the State in like cases. This requirement, it is said, was made by the
The judgment of the Circuit Court is affirmed.
MR. JUSTICE FIELD dissenting.
Assuming that the majority are correct in the doctrine announced in the opinion of the court, — that the right of eminent domain within the States, using those terms not as synonymous with the ultimate dominion or title to property, but as indicating merely the right to take private property for public uses, belongs to the Federal government, to enable it to execute the powers conferred by the Constitution, — and that any other doctrine would subordinate, in important particulars, the national authority to the caprice of individuals or the will of State legislatures, it appears to me that provision for the exercise of the right must first be made by legislation. The Federal courts have no inherent jurisdiction of a proceeding instituted for the condemnation of property; and I do not find any statute of Congress conferring upon them such authority. The
I think that the decision of the majority of the court in including the proceeding in this casе under the general designation of a suit at common law, with which the circuit courts of the United States are invested by the eleventh section of the
Nor am I able to agree with the majority in their opinion, or at least intimation, that the authority to purchase carries with it authority to acquire by condemnation. The one supposes an agreement upon valuation, and a voluntary conveyance of the property: the other implies a compulsory taking, and a contestation as to the value. Beekman v. The Saratoga & Schenectady Railroad Co., 3 Paige, 75; Railroad Company v. Davis, 2 Dev. & Batt. 465; Willyard v. Hamilton, 7 Ham. (Ohio), 453; Livingston v. The Mayor of New York, 7 Wend. 85; Koppikus v. State Capitol Commissioners, 16 Cal. 249.
For these reasons, I am compelled to dissent from the opinion of the court.