Lead Opinion
The Constitution of this State (article 7, § 3), as amended in 1854, declares that “all contracts for work or materials on any canal shall be made with the person who shall offer to do .or provide the same at the lowest price, with adequate security for their performance.” The act of 1857 (vol. 1, p. 214) provides that the contracting board “ shall have power, and it shall be their duty to let by contract, under such regulations as said board shall prescribe, to the lowest bidder or bidders, who will give adequate security for the performance of the contract,” the repairs of any completed section of the canal. Under this law, the contracting board advertised for proposals to keep the Cayuga and Seneca canal in repair for four years and a half. This notice indicated the form and character of the. security, which the board would consider adequate, that is, it stated that every proposal must be accompanied by a certificate of deposit in some bank in good credit; that four thousand dollars in cash had been deposited therein to the credit of the auditor, which would be retained as *381 security for the- performance of the contract. The relator made a proposal which was somewhat lower in price than that of any other person, but it was not accepted. A contract was made with one Case, who seems to have been the next highest bidder. The relator delivered with his proposal a certificate that he had deposited in the Salt Springs Bank of Syracuse four thousand dollars, payable to the order of IT. S. Benton, auditor, but the certificate did not state in so many words that he had deposited such amount in cash. Case, whose bid was accepted, delivered a similar certificate, containing, however, the words “ in cash." It is to be inferred, although it is not distinctly stated that this difference in the form or phraseology of the certificate was the reason assigned for rejecting the' relator’s bid, and accepting a higher one. I confess I should be unable to justify such a decision, and I can hardly suppose that it was the true and only ground of the action of the board.
Yet I think the Supreme Court ought not to have compelled the board, by mandamus, to reverse their action, or to make a contract with the relator, after they had already made another contract with another person. The powers conferred upon the board necessarily involved and implied an exercise of discretion, although it seems exceedingly clear what decision their duty required them to make in this case. But they are to determine who is the lowest bidder, and what is adequate security; or if the amount and character of the security required is fixed by general regulation, then the contracting board are to decide whether the security offered in any given case conforms to the regulations. The principle is well settled, that whenever the act requires the exercise of discretion, this remedy will not lie. There must be a clear legal right not merely to a decision in respect to the thing sought, but to the thing itself.
(People, ex rel. Lynch,
v.
Mayor of New York,
If the case were clearer to my mind than it is, in favor of the jurisdiction to grant a mandamus, I should still feel bound to rpthhold it, and that, although the relator should have no other remedy, which I, by no means, admit. The writ of mandamus is to some extent, at least, in the discretion of the court to grant or refuse; especially where, as in this case, no property of the relator has been taken or affected, and his claims rests altogether upon the interests of the State to have its work done by the lowest bidder, and not upon a legal right on his part.
(People
v.
Canal
Board,
The judgment of the Supreme Court should be reversed, and judgment ordered for the defendants.
Denio, Ch. J., Davies, Wright, Balcom and Marvin, Js., were also for reversal—Denio, Ch. J., and Balcom, J., on the ground, among others, that the board, having executed a contract, could not execute another unless the first were abso *383 lately void; and they thought it good for the purpose of giving the relator his action against the members of the board.
Dissenting Opinion
(dissenting.) The objections made by the appellants’ counsel to the order appealed from, are all embraced in the following propositions: 1. That; the certificate of deposit furnished by the relator was not such as the notice issued by the contracting board required. 2. That the question whether the certificate was in compliance with the notice was a judicial question which the board was required to decide; and, if its decision was erroneous, the error could not be corrected by mandamus. 8. That the contract with Case, who had no notice of the rights of the relator, was valid, and, as he is not a party to these proceedings, will remain valid notwithstanding the judgment; and that, under such circumstances, the power of the court should not be used to compel the execution of another contract for the same work. 4. That, if a mandamus was proper, there should have been an alternative writ, and not a peremptory writ in the first instance.
I think neither of these objections furnishes ground for reversing the judgment of the Supreme Court. Unless substance is to be disregarded, and importance attached to mere phraseology, the certificate of deposit furnished by the relator was in perfect accordance with the terms of the notice. The addition of the words, “in cash,” to the expression, “has deposited four thousand dollars,” would add nothing to the legal effect of the certificate. The obligation of the bank would be the same, with those words or without them. ■ In neither case could it discharge that obligation without paying to the holder of it four thousand dollars in cash. Neither is it material that the deposit was in fact made in a check, and not in cash. It is, doubtless, to be presumed that the check was drawn against a cash deposit to the credit of the drawer already in the bank; in which case, the check constituted a cash deposit. It is, however, unimportant whether that was so or not. The notice contemplated only a general deposit of cash to the credit of the auditor; and, in such a transaction,
*384
the cash deposited becomes the property of the bank, and all the right which is acquired by the person to whose use the deposit is made, is a credit against the bank to the amount of the deposit.
(Chapman
v.
White,
2 Seld., 412.) It was, therefore, wholly immaterial whether the deposit was made in cash or credit, provided it was sufficient' to constitute a consideration for the certificate, and, perhaps, even that was immaterial. (
There was nothing of a judicial character in the action of the board in reference to the certificate of deposit. There are many questions requiring the decision of ministerial officers, which involve, to some extent, the exercise of legal discrimination in their solution, but which are not regarded as judicial questions, and consequently the decision of them, is not conclusive in collateral proceedings. A sheriff is required, when process is placed in his hands for service, to decide whether it is in conformity with law; but it was never claimed that his decision was a judicial one, or that it concluded any party affected by the process; and yet such a case presents quite as much the character of a judicial proceeding, as that involved in the present inquiry. It is a general, if not universal rule, that judicial proceedings cannot regularly be had (beyond their mere initiation), without notice to those to be affected by them, and giving them an opportunity to be heard. The necessity of such notice is probably the true test, by which to determine whether a proceeding is a judicial one or not. There is no evidence that such notice was given in the present case, and I am satisfied that none was necessary.
The remaining question is, whether a mandamus was the proper remedy under the circumstances disclosed by the affidavits. The statute made it the duty of the contracting board to let the work “to the lowest bidder” (1857, ch. 105, § 1),
*385
and the relator was the lowest bidder. The absolute duty in this respect, which the statute imposed upon the contracting board, distinguishes this case from that of
The People
v.
The Canal Board
(
It is urged, on the part of the defendants, that there is already a valid contract with Case, for the performance of this work, and that the court, for that reason, should not compel by mandamus the execution of another contract for the same work. Whether the contract with Case is valid or not, is a *386 question that cannot now be decided, as he is not a party to these proceedings, and has no opportunity to be heard. Assuming that it is, or may be, valid, it is obvious that inconvenience, and, to some extent, confusion, may result from a compliance with the mandamus, but it is not perceived how the probability of such inconvenience or confusion can affect the strict rights of the relator. It has been decided that, where an office is filled by a person, by color of right, a mandamus will not be issued to oust him and admit another ; and cases of this kind are referred to as authorities for holding that the writ should have been denied in 'this case. (3 Johns. Cases, 79; 2 id., 217-247, Shephard’s edition; 20. Barb., 302; 6 East, 356.) The reason on which those decisions rest is, that the proper remedy was by quo warranto, which shows that they are not applicable to the present case, in which no quo warranto would lie.
If the application for the mandamus was one of strict right, I can discover no ground upon which it could have been refused. The granting of the writ, however, is, to some extent, a matter of discretion (
It has been also insisted, that if a mandamus was proper, an alternative writ should have been first issued. It is within the power of the court to make the writ peremptory in the first instance ; and where the parties have been heard, and there is no controversy in regard to facts, I can see no objection to that course,' although the practice, except in very clear or very urgent cases, is hardly to be commended. (Topping, on Mandamus, 407; Crary’s Prac., 286;
Regina
v.
Fox,
2 Ad. & Ellis N. S., 246;
Ex parte Goodell,
*387
Throop,
Judgment reversed, and judgment for defendants.