Conger v. Pierce County

Citations

• 116 Wash. 27
• 198 P. 377
• 18 A.L.R. 393
• 1921 Wash. LEXIS 789

Syllabus

<p>Navigable Waters (30-3)—Riparian Rights—Injuries Caused by Structures—Erosion. Laws 1913, p. 156, authorizing contiguous counties to cooperate in the improvement, confinement and protection of rivers and their banks, tributaries and outlets, the waters of which work damage by inundation or otherwise, has for its object the protection of adjoining lands from overflow, and does not contemplate the improvement of the stream for navigable purposes.</p> <p>Waters and Water Courses (35, 72)—Diversion—Plowage— Action for Injuries. Where adjoining counties, under express legislative authority, improve a navigable stream for the purpose of preventing it from overflowing its banks and doing damage to public property, they are liable to a, landowner, under Const., art. 1, § 16, prohibiting the damaging of private property for public use without compensation, if, because of such improvements and the manner in which they are made, his property is eroded and washed away.</p> <p>Constitutional Law (43, 51)—Police Power—Nature and Scope —Deprivation oe Property. The police power of the state, while permitting the regulation of private property even to its destruction, under the necessity of the public health, peace or welfare, does not extend to the taking of private property for public use without compensation to the owner.</p> <p>Waters and Water Courses (44)—Damages (9)—Direct or Consequential—In General. The erosion and washing away of a property owner’s land on the banks of a stream, due to deflecting the current of the stream by improvements in the channel made by defendants, cannot be said to be an indirect or consequential damage, where it appears that defendants through their engineer had knowledge that such an injury would probably result from the improvement.</p> <p>Holcomb, J., dissents.</p>