Board of Health v. Susslin

61 So. 661, 132 La. 569, 1913 La. LEXIS 1909
CourtSupreme Court of Louisiana
DecidedDecember 16, 1913
DocketNo. 19,610
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 61 So. 661 (Board of Health v. Susslin) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Louisiana primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Board of Health v. Susslin, 61 So. 661, 132 La. 569, 1913 La. LEXIS 1909 (La. 1913).

Opinions

LAND, J.

The case is thus presented in the brief of counsel for the relator:

“The board of health of the state of Louisiana filed in the civil district court for the parish of Orleans a suit against one Adolph Susslin, the proprietor of a bakery in the Fifth district of New Orleans, alleging that Susslin’s bakery daily supplied many citizens of the city and state with bread, and that inspections which had been made by the board showed that Susslin’s establishment was operated and conducted in such an insanitary and inhygicnic manner as to constitute a menace to the public health and to be a nuisance.
“A writ of injunction was prayed for to restrain Susslin from operating his bakery until he affirmatively showed, contradictorily with the board, that the nuisance complained of was abated, and the conditions complained of were remedied. The form of the prayer was especially pitched in these terms because all that the board wanted was to have Susslin clean and sanitate his place, and, when he could show that he had done this, the board’s object would be accomplished, and, in so far as the board was concerned, he might resume his operations. The judge a quo did not grant the injunction, but instead issued an order for Susslin to show cause why the injunction should not issue. On the trial of this rule the counsel for Susslin set up by way of exception that the board had no right to stand in judgment in the case, relying on article 319 of the Constitution of 1898, reading as follows:
“ ‘The electors of the city of New Orleans, and of any political corporation which may be established within the territory now, or which may hereafter be, embraced within the corporate limits of said city, shall have the right to choose the public officers, who shall be charged with the exercise of the police power and with the administration of the affairs of said corporation in whole or in part.’
“The learned judge a quo in a lengthy written opinion sustained this contention, holding that the state board has no legal right or power to stand in judgment civilly, to exercise or enforce its police power, within the parish of Orleans. The board thereupon made the present application for writs.”

The respondent judge has sent up the record, including his written reasons for refusing to grant the preliminary injunction, and suggests that the mandamus prayed for by the relator should not be granted, because the case is appealable under article 85 of the Constitution, as his decision was based on article 319 of the Constitution, under which the respondent held that in so far as the acts of the Legislature, under which the state board of health is operating, confer on said board powers over local sanitation, they are unconstitutional.

The judgment below does not decree any law of this state to be unconstitutional, and the reasoning of the judge tends to the conclusion that the statutes on which the relator relied did not confer any police power on the board within the limits of the parish of Orleans. This was the principal ground of exception, and the unconstitutionality of the statutes was pleaded in the alternative. It therefore does not appear from the record that the cause is appealable to this court.

One of the grounds of exception reads as follows:

“Respondent further excepts on the ground that the said petition discloses no cause or right of action, and upon the face of the papers and under the law the Louisiana state board of health has no standing in court, nor any right, power, authority or control whatsoever with respect to the matters and things set up in said petition, which upon their face are matters of purely local sanitation, and are not within the province of the Louisiana state board of health.”

On the same day the defendant filed the exceptions he also filed an answer to the rule to show cause why an injunction should not be granted as prayed for by the board of health. This answer denied generally and specially the allegations as to the insanitary conditions under which defendant’s "bakery had been operated, and pleaded the pendency of seven or more affidavits in the Second city criminal court, “charging the very matters and things herein set up as the basis of an injunction,” as a bar to the relief sought by the state board of health by way of injunction.

The allegations of the petition, which must be taken for true for the purposes of the exception, show that the defendant is, in defiance of the repeated warnings of plaintiffs’ inspectors, conducting his bakery under such filthy conditions as to make its products dangerous to the public health. Under such [574]*574circumstances an injunction will lie. Board of Health v. Maginnis Cotton Mills, 46 La. Ann. 806, 15 South. 164.

[1] Under Act No. 192 of 1898, as amended and re-enacted by Act No. 150 of 1902, the supervision and control of the state board of health is exercised by the adoption of a sanitary code, containing rules and regulations in regard to health, sanitary and hygienic subjects. Section 3 of Act No. 150 of 1902 provides as follows:

“And any violations of any provision or provisions, or regulation or regulations of said Code, shall constitute a misdemeanor, and the offender shall be punished by a fine of twenty-fiVe (25) dollars, or thirty days imprisonment for each and every offense, on conviction before any court of competent jurisdiction.”

The only issue specifically raised by the exception are:

(1) That the statutes of this state do not confer on the state board any jurisdiction over the matter of local sanitation in the city of New Orleans.

(2) That if the act of 1898, as amended, can be construed as conferring any such jurisdiction (which is denied), it in that respect is repugnant to article 319 of the Constitution of 1898.

While Act 192 of 1898 established a state board of health and local boards of health, and in section 7 conferred on the latter “full power and authority to establish, control and administer all matters of strictly and purely local sanitation, not affecting other portions of the state, “nevertheless section 3 empowered the state board to adopt a Sanitary Code, and provides, among other things, that said Code “shall contain general rules in regard to such health, sanitary and hygienic subjects as cannot in the opinion of the state board of health be, efficiently and effectually regulated by the local boards.” By Act No. 98 of 1906, the state board of health was empowered to incorporate in the Sanitary Code “rules and regulations governing the manufacture, sale and inspection of foods, liquors, waters, and drugs within the state in so far as the same may affect the public health.” See, also, Act 126 of 1912. These provisions certainly give the state board jurisdiction over matters which affect the public health, and the preservation of the public health concerns the state at large. It is not objected that the subject-matter set forth in the petition is not covered by the Sanitary Code adopted by the state board of health.

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Bluebook (online)
61 So. 661, 132 La. 569, 1913 La. LEXIS 1909, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/board-of-health-v-susslin-la-1913.