Langenau Mfg. Co. v. City of Cleveland

159 Ohio St. (N.S.) 525
CourtOhio Supreme Court
DecidedMay 27, 1953
DocketNo. 33469
StatusPublished

This text of 159 Ohio St. (N.S.) 525 (Langenau Mfg. Co. v. City of Cleveland) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Ohio Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Langenau Mfg. Co. v. City of Cleveland, 159 Ohio St. (N.S.) 525 (Ohio 1953).

Opinion

Hart, J.

Langenau claims that, since the city of Cleveland takes the position that it has the power under Section 3677, General Code, to take only real estate and has no obligation to pay for anything else, even though as a direct result of the appropriation it will take personal property, Langenau is entitled to enjoin the appropriation to protect its constitutional rights in its personal property which will not be taken but will be destroyed.

A court of equity will intervene to prevent the enforcement of claimed rights in a court of law, where it is shown that there are situations, or relations existing between the parties, which would render the enforcement of a single lawful claim unjust or inequitable. 21 Ohio Jurisprudence, 1208, Section 138.

A number of cases are cited by Langenau which it claims support this proposition.

Equity will enjoin a municipality from appropriating property of a railroad company for the purpose of extending a public street across the property where it appears that the extension of the street will unnecessarily interfere with a reasonable use of the tracks of [529]*529the railroad. P., C., C. & St. L. Ry. Co. v. City of Greenville, 69 Ohio St., 487, 69 N. E., 976.

In the case of Pontiac Improvement Co. v. Board of Commissioners of the Cleveland Metropolitan Park District, 104 Ohio St., 447, 135 N. E., 635, 23 A. L. R., 866, the Board of Commissioners of the Cleveland Metropolitan Park District sought to appropriate outright a certain acreage of land and to acquire certain easements in the remainder, including the right to drastically regulate the owner’s use thereof. An injunction Avas granted.

In the case of Sargent v. City of Cincinnati, 110 Ohio St., 444, 144 N. E., 132, the court enjoined the city of Cincinnati from appropriating for Avaterworks purposes the fee in property Avhich Avas already used by the city for the same purpose under a perpetual lease at a rental Avhich the city regarded as excessive in view of the then present value of the land.

In the case of Emery v. City of Toledo, 121 Ohio St., 257, 167 N. E., 889, an injunction was sought to restrain the city from taking possession of property sought to be appropriated for street and railroad grade separation purposes, on the grounds that the city was seeking to appropriate more property than Avas necessary, that the city did not intend to use all the property for a public purpose, and that the legislation upon which the appropriation proceeding was predicated was insufficient and inadequate. In that case, however, an injunction was refused on the facts.

It will be noted that in the Greenville case the jurisdiction of the court of equity was invoked to test the right of interference with the rights of a public utility having a right of eminent domain and engaged in operating a transportation system thereon; that in the Pontiac Improvement. Company case, under the guise of an appropriation, restrictions were sought to be placed on the use of land not taken; that in the [530]*530Sargent case the city of Cincinnati sought to relieve itself of an unfavorable lease, the value of the property having declined, which lease, however, afforded it full use of the premises; and that in the Toledo case the question related to the appropriation purposes and was resolved against the property owner.

In none of the cases above referred to was there involved the proper determination of the true value of the property proposed to be appropriated. That issue is exclusively within the jurisdiction of the court in the appropriation proceeding, and such court has the unquestioned authority to determine the value of the property sought to be taken to the full extent of the constitutional rights of its owner therein. Sargent v. City of Cincinnati, supra. It must be remembered that under Section 19, Article I of the Ohio Constitution, “private property shall ever be held inviolate but subservient to the public welfare.”

On this subject, in 29 Corpus Juris Secundum, 1044, Section 175, it is stated:

“Where land is condemned for public uses, the value of buildings or other improvements and fixtures on the land must be considered in determining the owner’s compensation, to the extent that they enhance the value of the land to which they are affixed, the appropriator being required either to take the land with the improvements he finds thereon or to reject it in toto.”

. And, again in 30 Corpus Juris Secundum, 188, Section 446, it is stated:

“In estimating the value of the property taken or injured, as the measure of damages every element which affects or causes a depreciation in the value of the property may be considered. Consideration may be given to the uses to which the property might be applied before and after the taking or injury, or to which it was devoted by the owner at the time of the taking, as having a special value to him * *

[531]*531It is the duty of the court in the appropriation proceeding to afford Langenau the right to fully show the extent and character of the real estate proposed to be taken and its maximum value for any purpose for which its use is available, including the use which is now made of it. In re Appropriation by Supt. of Public Works, 155 Ohio St., 454, 99 N. E. (2d), 313, paragraph three of the syllabus.

As a further ground for injunctive relief, Langenau claims that the appropriation case involves a condemnation for a nonpublic use in violation of the statutes, the city charter and the Fourteenth Amendment, since, under the contract between the railroad and the transit system, two of the tracks already being used by Nickel Plate will be used by the transit system, and Nickel Plate will relocate its tracks on the premises of Langenau. It relies on the case of City of Cincinnati v. Vester, 281 U. S., 439, 74 L. Ed., 950, 50 S. Ct., 360, wherein the court, in considering the provisions of Section 3679, General Code, requiring the city council as a preliminary to the appropriation of property to specify definitely the purpose of the appropriation, said that “the importance of the definition of purpose would be even greater in the case of taking property not directly to be occupied by a proposed public improvement. ’ ’

Granting that the purpose of the appropriation must be a municipal one and for a public purpose, the question is whether the city may appropriate the property which it will later exchange with a public utility transportation company for the purpose of the necessary readjusting and relocating of the tracks of each. The acquisition of this property by one of the parties for exchange with the other, having like powers and rights of eminent domain, in the adjustment of their tracks results not only in a public benefit but a public use as well. In this respect, the situation differs from that in the Vester case, where the appropriation of excess of [532]*532land was for the purpose of selling the excess at a profit and using the proceeds to pay for a street improvement.

There is in Ohio a dearth of judicial authority on this specific problem, but there are cases in other jurisdictions which approach the situation here and presented identical or similar legal issues for solution.

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Related

Brown v. United States
263 U.S. 78 (Supreme Court, 1923)
Dohany v. Rogers
281 U.S. 362 (Supreme Court, 1930)
Cincinnati v. Vester
281 U.S. 439 (Supreme Court, 1930)
Sowers v. Schaeffer
99 N.E.2d 313 (Ohio Supreme Court, 1951)
Pitznogle v. Western Maryland Railroad
87 A. 917 (Court of Appeals of Maryland, 1913)
Fitzsimons & Galvin, Inc. v. Rogers
220 N.W. 881 (Michigan Supreme Court, 1928)
Emery v. City of Toledo
167 N.E. 889 (Ohio Supreme Court, 1929)
Sargent v. City of Cincinnati
144 N.E. 132 (Ohio Supreme Court, 1924)
Darwin v. Town of Cookeville
97 S.W.2d 838 (Tennessee Supreme Court, 1936)
Town of Cookeville v. Farley
102 S.W.2d 56 (Tennessee Supreme Court, 1937)
Weyel v. Lower Colorado River Authority
121 S.W.2d 1032 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1938)
Meisel Press Manufacturing Co. v. City of Boston
172 N.E. 356 (Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, 1930)
Smouse v. Kansas City Southern Railway Co.
282 P. 183 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1929)

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Bluebook (online)
159 Ohio St. (N.S.) 525, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/langenau-mfg-co-v-city-of-cleveland-ohio-1953.