109 F. 32 | U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Washington | 1901
The complainant, a citizen of the state of Pennsylvania, by his amended bill of complaint avers that he is the owner of certain city lots situated in the city of Tacoma, fronting upon Gr street, and extending to an alley 40 feet wide, designed for use as a means of ingress and egress to and from the rear end of said lots, which are near the middle of a block bounded on the northerly side by a street called “South Eighth Street.” Said lots are improved, having three dwelling houses thereon; and before the
In a series of decisions recently rendered, the supreme court of the United States has corrected a common misunderstanding of the decision of that court in the case of Village of Norwood v. Baker, 172 U. S. 269-303, 19 Sup. Ct. 187, 43 L. Ed. 443. French v. Paving Co.; 21 Sup. Ct. 625, 45 L. Ed. —; City of Detroit v. Parker, 21 Sup. Ct. 624, 45 L. Ed. —; Webster v. City of Fargo, 21 Sup. Ct. 623, 45 L. Ed. —; Town of Tonawanda v. Lyon, 21 Sup. Ct. 609, 45 L. Ed. —; Farrell v. Commissioners, 21 Sup. Ct. 609, 45 L. Ed. —; Lombard v. Same, 21 Sup. Ct. 507, 45 L. Ed. —; and Wight v. Davidson, 21 Sup. Ct. 616, 45 L. Ed. —. In these several decisions the supreme "court recognizes the fact that the per front foot plan may he a perfectly fair method of apportioning the burden of paying for street improvements, and that in cases in which it appears that assessments levied according to that plan are not in excess of the benefits to the property assessed, and are equal and fair, so that there is no ground for complaining of actual injustice, the assessments are not necessarily in violation of the constitution of the United States merely because made according to the per front foot plan; and it is shown that no such inflexible rule was announced or intended by the court in its
“This court lias said that the statute meant assessment by benefits, and that practically makes the statute rgean it, and the construction of the statute placed upon it by this court will be followed by the supreme court of the United States.”
The determinations of courts and of specially authorized tribunals are, in general, conclusive and binding upon the parties to the. pro-' ceedings in which they are made, but this general rule has its limitations. Courts are not competent to eliminate physical conditions, nor to change the necessary effect of actual conditions admitted to exist, by judgments or decrees declaring the effect to be other than what it really is. When a living man appears, and his identity is admitted, the protection to which the laws of the land entitle him cannot be denied because a eourt has decided that he had previously died. Scott v. McNeal, 154 U. S. 34-51, 14 Sup. Ct. 1108, 38 L. Ed.
Demurrer overruled.