Pennsylvania Hospital v. City of Philadelphia

Citations

• 254 Pa. 392
• 98 A. 1077
• 1916 Pa. LEXIS 740

Syllabus

<p>Constitutional law — Obligation of contracts — Impairment—Eminent domain — Opening city street.</p> <p>1. The constitutional inhibition upon any State law impairing the obligation of contracts is not a limitation upon the power of eminent domain. The obligation of a contract is not impaired when property rights acquired from the State by contract are appropriated to a public use and compensation made therefor.</p> <p>2. There enters into every contract, whether between the state and an individual or between individuals only, the unwritten condition that it is subordinate to the right of appropriation- to a public use.</p> <p>3. Where, the Act of April 11, 1854, P. L. 385, provided that no streets should be opened through the property belonging to a certain hospital -without its consent, and thereafter the city within whose limits the hospital was located commenced to open a street through the hospital’s property, a bill in equity alleging that the act constituted a contract between the State and the hospital which would be impaired by the opening of a street without plaintiff’s consent, and praying for an injunction to restrain the city from proceeding with the improvement, was properly dismissed.</p>