City of Shreveport v. Prescott

Citations

• 51 La. Ann. 1895
• 46 L.R.A. 193
• 26 So. 664
• 1899 La. LEXIS 647

Syllabus

<p>Syllabus.</p> <p>On Motion to Dismiss.</p> <p>The matter at issue being a question oí iocal assessment or charge upon the property of abutting proprietors in a municipality levied upon compulsion of law alone, to pay the cost of street Improvement, and without their knowledge or consent, is a tax in the sense of the constitutional provision, conferring appellate jurisdiction on this court.</p> <p>There can be no difference, or distinction in principle, between a forced contribution for levee purposes, and a forced contribution for street improvement.</p> <p>While it has ever been held with practical unanimity in numerous decisions of this court, that the portion of the cost of the paving and improvement of streets and banquettes in cities and towns, which are under the law chargeable to abutting property owners, is not a tax in the sense of the jurisdictional article of the Constitution, yet, the reason for so holding evidently is, that under the provisions of the different city charters, such assessments were based, primarily, upon petitions signed by the abutting property-owners, and, consequently, not predicated upon the flat of the legislature — notwithstanding same are levied upon the theory of local benefits conferred upon the property of said abutting proprietors.</p> <p>The feature which distinguishes local assessments for public State purposes from those for city street improvement, is, in all laws, except the one under consideration, the assent of the property owner.</p> <p>This court affirms the proposition announced in State ex rel. Brill vs. Judges, 46th Ann., 1292, to the effect that, “the use of the words ‘all cases’ and of “ the words ‘any fa®, impost or toll whatever1, clearly indicates, on the part “ of the framers of the Constitution, an emphasized intention to give to the “ terms tax, toll and impost, the widest meaning to which they are suscept- “ ibie, and to allow every citizen to have submitted to the test of legality “ and constitutionali