Commonwealth v. Corson

Citations

• 36 Pa. Super. 7
• 1908 Pa. Super. LEXIS 101

Syllabus

<p>Boroughs — Building laws — Illegal ordinance — Summary conviction.</p> <p>In the absence of legislative authority, a borough has no power to enact an ordinance applicable to the entire borough and undertaking to specify a uniform standard of construction for every building to which it applies, thereafter to be erected in the borough, whether the building is large or small or cheap or costly.</p> <p>An ordinance regulating the construction of buildings within a borough cannot be upheld where it is impossible to determine from the ordinance, with anything like legal certainty, just what kind of buildings are intended to be prohibited.</p> <p>Where an ordinance of a borough forbids the construction of buildings without submitting plans thereof to a borough inspector, a summary conviction for violating the terms of the ordinance cannot be sustained against mere workmen employed by the owner or contractor.</p> <p>Where a borough ordinance forbids certain classes of buildings to be erected before plans for them have been submitted to the borough inspector, a summary conviction for violation of the ordinance cannot be sustained where the record of the magistrate does not set forth the kind of houses which the defendant was building.</p> <p>In a summary conviction the record of the magistrate must show affirmatively that the defendant was convicted of having done the precise thing forbidden by the law or ordinance alleged to have been violated.</p>