Sanitary District v. Alderman

113 Ill. App. 23, 1903 Ill. App. LEXIS 681
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedMarch 14, 1904
DocketGen. No. 4,268
StatusPublished

This text of 113 Ill. App. 23 (Sanitary District v. Alderman) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Sanitary District v. Alderman, 113 Ill. App. 23, 1903 Ill. App. LEXIS 681 (Ill. Ct. App. 1904).

Opinion

Mr. Justice Farmer

delivered the opinion of the court.

Defendant in error sued plaintiff in error in the Circuit Court of Will county in an action on the case to recover damages for injury to grass, hay and pasture on land described in the declaration, alleged to have been sustained on account of the construction and maintenance of an embankment, which it is claimed obstructed the natural flow of water, and caused it to flow and stand upon plaintiff’s land. The land thus claimed to have been overflowed is in the southwest quarter of section twenty-six (26), township thirty-seven (37) north of range ten (10) east of the third principal meridian, in Will county. The Des Plaines river ran through this tract of land from the northeast in a southwest direction. Goose lake is a shallow body of water, covering a part of said southwest quarter of section twenty-six and a portion of section thirty-five. It also lies in a northeast and southwest direction, and the river passes through it a little west of the middle. Des Plaines river is a shallow winding stream, having low banks, and in times of heavy rains quickly overflow's and covers the entire valley.

Defendant constructed its drainage canal or channel a short distance to the southeast of the Des Plaines river, following the general direction of the river. In order that the work of constructing the drainage channel might not be interfered with by the overflow from the river, defendant changed and straightened its channel from the head of Goose lake northeast to Riverside, a distance of about nineteen miles, where it connected with the original channel of the river. From the point where this new channel or “ river diversion ” connected with the old channel at the head of Goose lake, defendant cleaned out and straightened the channel southwest and constructed an embankment alougand near the bank and between the river and-the line of the drainage canal, to prevent the water from the river flowing in and upon the canal while the work of its construction was in progress. As the chief engineer of defendant testified, “ All this was done to enable us to prosecute the work of the new channel in the dry.” This embankment extended through Goose lake and through sections twenty-six, thirty-five and thirty-four to the Romeo road, on the township line, and was about six or seven feet high, and wide enough at the top to drive a team on.

The proof fairly show's that prior to the construction of the embankment, the overflow from the river would spread to the southeast and much of the water pass off that way, and that the embankment prevented this and caused the water to flow to the northwest on plaintiff’s land in increased quantities, and remain there for a longer period of time. In our opinion the proof warranted the finding that plaintiff had sustained damages to the use and occupation of his land, resulting from the construction and maintenance of the embankment. The lands injured, comprising between seventy and eighty acres, w'ere used by plaintiff for hay and pasture. The proof was that during the years 1897, 1898, 1899 and 1900 the land was overflowed so often, and the water stood on it so much of the time, that plaintiff had but little use of it. His cattle at times had access to it, but the water so injured the grass that it was not fit for pasturage and they would eat very little of it. Plaintiff testified, and it was not contradicted, that the fair cash value of the flooded land for each of these years was three dollars per acre. The year 1901 was an unusually dry one, and plaintiff cut quite a good deal of hay, but of poor quality, from the land. He testified that the injury for that year was one dollar per acre. This testimony was objected to by defendant as not being the proper measure of damages, and it is now insisted the court erred in admitting it. The testimony showed that for the first four years above mentioned, theplaintiff practically had no use or benefit of the land, and the last year, while he cut a crop of hay from it, it was injured to the extent of one dollar per acre. That the court adopted the correct measure of damages, we think, is settled by Chicago v. Huenerbein, 85 Ill. 594, and Kankakee and Seneca R. R. Co. v. Horan, 17 App. 650. Even if defendant’s theory as to the proper measure of damages had been adopted, the .verdict so far as the amount is concerned could hardly have been more favorable to it, for the verdict was for but five hundred dollars, while the proof tended to establish damages to the extent of twice that amount.

Objection is made to the ruling of the court in permitting plaintiff to prove up an attorney’s fee and taxing the same as costs against the defendant. Two reasons are assigned why it is claimed this was error : first, that the notice given defendant by plaintiff in pursuance of the act creating the Sanitary .District, that he claimed damages to his land and of his intention to sue to recover them if the matter was not settled, was insufficient in that it did not properly describe the land; second, that the notice was not pleaded in the declaration nor any claim for attorney’s fees made therein. The notice described the land as “ The real estate owned and possessed by him (plaintiff) in section twenty-six (26), township thirty-seven (37) north, range ten (10) east of the third principal meridian, in the county of Will, and State of Illinois, overflowed and otherwise damaged to the amount of five thousand dollars ($5,000) by reason of the construction, enlargement and use of the drainage channel, ditches, drains, outlets, and other improvements made by the said Sanitary District of Chicago.”

The declaration counted on damages to the southwest quarter of section twenty-six and proof showed damages to about seventy or eighty acres of plaintiff’s land in said southwest quarter of the section mentioned, lying northwest of the obstruction complained of. It is argued the notice should have described the land actually injured, and no more, so that defendant “ could examine into the same, and, if possible, adjust the matter.” We do not think that objection well taken. The land was sufficiently described to enable the defendant to examine into and adjust the matter if it had desired to do so. It is not claimed that it even made any inquiry or effort to ascertain what, if any, of plaintiff’s lands were damaged, or that it had any desire or disposition to settle or adjust the matter. The failure to describe the exact amount and boundaries of the lands damaged, in the notice and declaration, gave the plaintiff no advantage, and prejudiced none of defendant’s rights. As to the second objection, the act under which defendant Avas organized makes it liable to the plaintiff for reasonable attorney’s fees, to be taxed as costs, in all cases where a recovery is had against it for damages for overflowing lands, provided the notice required by statute of plaintiff’s claim is served before suit brought. As the attorney’s fees are to be taxed as costs in case of recovery, we can see no reason why giving the notice should be averred and attorney’s fees counted on in the declaration. Besides, proof of the notice was not objected to on the trial, on account of the state of the pleadings, but on the ground that it Avas incompetentand particularly for the reason that it does not describe the property involved in this suit.”

The case of P. D. & E. Ry. Co. v. Duggan, 109 Ill. 537, was a suit instituted before a justice of the peace, for the value of stock killed by defendant’s cars.

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Related

City of Chicago v. Huenerbein
85 Ill. 594 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1877)
Peoria, Decatur & Evansville Railway Co. v. Duggan
109 Ill. 537 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1884)
Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railway Co. v. Smith
111 Ill. 363 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1884)
Ohio & Mississippi Railway Co. v. Wachter
15 N.E. 279 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1888)
Chicago North Shore Street Railway Co. v. Payne
61 N.E. 467 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1901)
Sanitary District v. Ray
64 N.E. 1048 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1902)
Sanitary District v. Ray
85 Ill. App. 115 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1899)

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Bluebook (online)
113 Ill. App. 23, 1903 Ill. App. LEXIS 681, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/sanitary-district-v-alderman-illappct-1904.