Leis v. Cleveland Railway Co.

Citations

• 101 Ohio St. (N.S.) 162

Syllabus

<p>Municipal corporations — Home rule — Local police regulations— Section 3, Article XVIII, Constitution, 1912 — \General laws\ construed — Common-law rules inapplicable, when — Ordinance regulating street cars — ■Prescribing care by motormen — Constitutional law — •Construction favoring validity of ordinances.</p> <p>1. Rights of property cannot be taken away or interfered with without due process of law. But there is no property or vested right in any of the rules of the common law, as guides of conduct, and they may be added to or repealed by legislative authority.</p> <p>2. In Section 3, Article XVIII of the Constitution, which empowers municipalities to adopt and enforce within their limits such local police, sanitary and other similar regulations as are not in conflict with general laws, the words “general laws” refer to laws passed by the legislature which are of general application throughout the state.</p> <p>3. When a municipality in the exercise of its constitutional authority has adopted local police regulations to promote the public health and safety, every intendment is to be made in favor of the lawfulness of such regulations, and courts will not interfere except in clear cases of violation of the authority granted.</p> <p>4. An ordinance which requires a motorman or other person having charge of a street car to exercise all possible care and vigilance on approaching any other car that has stopped for the purpose of receiving or letting off passengers, or which requires that any car approaching another car which has been stopped for any purpose, or approaching a curve, shall do so with the greatest care and be under complete control of the person operating the same, is a reasonable and valid ordinance.</p>