City of Erie v. Brady

Citations

• 127 Pa. 169
• 17 A. 885
• 1889 Pa. LEXIS 1097

Syllabus

<p>i • A municipal ordinance providing for the paving and curbing of a city street, enacted subsequently to the aet of May 1, 1876, P. L. 94, is null and void, if before its passage the councils have not caused an estimate to be made of the total cost of such improvement, maps, etc., thereof, and had the same attached to the ordinance, as required by said act.</p> <p>2. When such an estimate has not been previously made and attached to the ordinance at its passage, the detect is not cured by the provisions of § 2, act of May 17, 1887, P. L. 118, that “ all taxes heretofore levied in any cities of the third, fourth and fifth classes, .... and all assessments, made in pursuance of the ordinances of such cities, are hereby made valid.”</p> <p>3. When it appeared that in fact the provisions of the act of 1876 were formally complied with by the city engineer, but that the estimate made was not such as the defendant considered sufficient, the proper method to state the defence was to set out a copy of the estimate with an averment of the defects in it.*</p> <p>4. If, however, the defendant assumed the responsibility of being sworn to matters which were admittedly conclusions of law, but which were stated in unqualified language as positive averments of fact, such a course cannot be too strongly reprobated: per Mr. Justice Mitchell.</p>