People ex rel. Busching v. Ericsson

263 Ill. 368
CourtIllinois Supreme Court
DecidedApril 23, 1914
StatusPublished
Cited by40 cases

This text of 263 Ill. 368 (People ex rel. Busching v. Ericsson) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Illinois Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People ex rel. Busching v. Ericsson, 263 Ill. 368 (Ill. 1914).

Opinion

Mr. ChiEE Justice Cooke

delivered the opinion of the court:

The relator, Henry Buschirig, applied to the building commissioner of the city of Chicago for a permit authorizing him to erect a public garage at 871-877 Chestnut place, between Chestnut street and Delaware place, in the city of Chicago. As he had not complied with an ordinance of the city of Chicago regulating the location of garages the building commissioner refused to issue the permit. Busching then filed a petition for a writ of mandamus in the circuit court of Cook county against the city of Chicago, the building commissioner and the city plan examiner to require them to issue the permit. On a hearing before the court the writ was denied and the petition dismissed. This appeal has been perfected from that judgment, the trial court having certified that the validity of an ordinance was involved.

The only question presented for our determination is the validity of the following ordinance:

“It shall be unlawful for any person, firm or corporation to locate, build, construct or maintain any garage within two hundred feet of any building used as and for a hospital, church or public or parochial school, or the grounds thereof, and it shall be unlawful for any person, firm or corporation to locate, build, construct or maintain any garage in the city in any block in which two-thirds of the buildings on both sides of the street are used exclusively for residence purposes, or within one hundred feet of any such street in any such block, without securing the written consent of a majority of the property owners, according to frontage, on both sides of the street, as provided by the ordinances of the city of Chicago.”

Another section of the code of the city of Chicago defines the word “garage” to mean any building where automobiles, auto cars or any similar self-propelled vehicles are let for hire or are kept ready for use upon the payment of fees for such services.

The invalidity of the ordinance is urged upon two grounds: (i) That the city has no power to legislate upon this subject and thus'deprive its citizens of'their rights under the State and Federal constitutions; and (2) that if it be held that the city has the power to legislate upon this subject the ordinance is void for unreasonableness.

The city is given express authority by the statute to legislate upon this subject. Clause 82 of section 1 of article 5 of the Cities and Villages act is as follows: The city council shall have the power “to direct the location and regulate the use and construction of breweries, distilleries, livery, boarding or sale stables, blacksmith shops, foundries, machine shops, garages, laundries, and bathing beaches, within the limits of the city or village.” If the ordinance is invalid it must be for the reason that this clause of the Cities and Villages act is invalid in so far as it authorizes the municipality to direct the location and regulate the use and construction of garages.

• It is conceded that a garage is not a nuisance per se, and it is contended on the part of appellant that it was incumbent upon appellees to prove that this particular garage would, in fact, become a nuisance before the building commissioner would be justified in refusing to- issue a permit to construct the building. We have often been called upon to determine when our legislative bodies are authorized to interfere with the business of the citizen by virtue of the p'olice power vested in the State and its municipalities. In City of Chicago v. Netcher, 183 Ill. 104, we thus announced the rule as to when such interference or regulation was authorized in cases such as the one under consideration: “In order to sustain legislative interference with the business of the citizen by virtue of the police power it is necessary that the act should have some reasonable relation to the subjects included in such power. If it is claimed that the "statute or ordinance is referable to the police power the court must be able to see that it tends, in some degree, toward the prevention of offenses or the preservation of the public health, morals, safety or welfare. It must be apparent that some such end is the one actually intended, and that there is some connection between the provisions of the law and such purpose. If it is manifest that the statute or ordinance has no such object, but, under the guise of a police regulation, is an invasion of the property rights of the individual, it is the duty of the court to declare it void.” In the recent case of People v. City of Chicago, 261 Ill. 16, we thus announced the same rule: “Even if the municipality is clothed with the whole police power of the State, it would still not have the power to deprive a citizen of valuable property rights under the guise of prohibiting or regulating some business or occupation that has no tendency whatever to injure the public health or public morals or interfere with the general welfare. An act of the legislature which deprives the citizen of his liberty or property rights cannot be sustained under the police power unless the public health, comfort, safety or welfare demands such enactment; (Ruhstrat v. People, 185 Ill. 133; Bailey v. People, 190 id. 28; Bessette v. People, 193 id. 334;) and there must be some logical connection between the object to be accomplished by such legislation and the means prescribed to accomplish that end. The owner of property has the constitutional right to make any use of it he desires, so long as he does not endanger or threaten the safety, health and comfort or general welfare of the public. This right cannot be wholly-taken away or limited by the State except in so- far as it may become necessary for individual rights to yield to the higher and greater law of the best interest of the public.” Many other cases have announced this rule in substantially the same language, but it will not be necessary to refer to each of them.

Testing the statute here involved by these rules it becomes necessary to determine whether it has for its object the preservation of the public health, morals, comfort, safety or welfare, or' whether, under the guise of police regulation, it is an invasion of the property rights of the individual. 0If it is not such an invasion, then individual rights must yield to the higher rights of the public.

Conceding, as the parties do, that the business of conducting a public garage does not constitute a nuisance per se, it is a matter of common knowledge that the automobile propelled by the use of gasoline is a large and sometimes noisy machine, which frequently, when in operation, emits an offensive odor. Automobiles go in and out of public garages at all hours of the day and night, producing noises which must necessarily interfere with the comfort and welfare of those in the immediate vicinity. In "the starting of these machines and in the testing and repair of their engines a considerable noise is unavoidable. Gasoline and oil are used in places of this kind, and it is necessary to keep a considerable quantity of gasoline constantly on hand, whichJs transferred to the tanks of automobiles propelled by this means. In making this transfer a portion of it necessarily becomes vapor, thus creating a menace both because of the odor of the fumes and their inflammable character. The power of the legislature to regulate such a business is in no way dependent upon the question whether it is á nuisance per se.

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Bluebook (online)
263 Ill. 368, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-ex-rel-busching-v-ericsson-ill-1914.