Aaron v. Broiles

Citations

• 64 Tex. 316

Syllabus

<p>1. Cities and towns — City ordinance.— The right of a city council, acting under legislative authority, to enact and enforce an ordinance providing for the removal from the city limits of persons afflicted with contagious diseases, is not to be questioned. If the continuance of such persons in the city is incompatible with the safety of the inhabitants, the city authorities can remove them, but in doing so, the city, and those to whom she intrusts this duty, are bound to make every reasonable provision for the safety of the diseased persons.</p> <p>3. Negligence — Exemplary damages — R. S., arts. 2899 and 2901,— Thestatutes provide that actual damages for injuries causing death .may be recovered when death was caused by the wrongful act, negligence, unskilfulness or default of another, and that when it is caused by the wilful act or omission or gross negligence of the defendant, exemplary damages also can be recovered. If city authorities cause the removal of a person afflicted with a contagious disease, and in doing so fail to exercise the care and precaution the circumstances demand, and dealth results, they are responsible, even though acting under a city ordinance.</p> <p>3. Judicial act. — There is nothing judicial in the act of removing diseased persons from the city limits, and the question is, whether there was a wrong done in the manner of effecting the removal.</p> <p>4. Damages — Charge oe court.— Where the evidence tended to show that inferior tents and poor accommodations were provided by the board of health for small-pox patients, removed from the city limits, and there was no evidence to show that they constituted the city pest-house, it was error to charge the jury that it was the duty of the city to provide pest-houses and all comforts for patients so removed, and that the members of the board of health and those who removed the persons werenot liable for injuries suffered by patients after they had been placed in the tents.</p>