Philadelphia v. Jewell

Citations

• 135 Pa. 329
• 20 A. 281
• 1890 Pa. LEXIS 1185

Syllabus

<p>1. The provisions of a municipal ordinance, directing that all contracts for street paving should contain a condition that the work should be completed in two years or the contract should become void, must be considered as written into a paving contract in which the time for completing the work is left blank, but which expressly stipulates that it shall be executed in accordance with all the city ordinances relating to paving.</p> <p>2. Such a contract, made by the city of Philadelphia in 1873, under which a part, of the work was done in that year, but nothing further was done until 1879, became voidable by the city in 1875, but was revived by ordinance of December 3, 1878, ratifying and approving “all contracts for paving streets.....under which work has been done under resolution or ordinance authorizing the same: ” Philadelphia v.'Hays, 93 Pa. 72 ; Pepper v. Philadelphia, 111 Pa. 96.</p> <p>(re) The price named in the contract of 1873 was $1.50 per yard, then a legal rate, and the contractor was required by the contract to receive assessment bills against the property, in payment for the wor-k done by him thereunder. On April 21, 1877, while said contract was dormant, the councils, in pursuance of the act of March 30, 1866, P. L. 351, enacted an ordinance fixing the price for all new paving at $1.10 per yard.</p> <p>3. The revival of the contract in 1878 being an act of grace, the contractor must accept it subject to such terms as were imposed, and by reasonable implication the reviving ordinance imposed the condition that the price- of work to be done thereafter should be that fixed by the ordinance of 1877 ; at all events, the city could not then impose upon property owners a higher rate than could have been imposed by a new contract.</p> <p>4. The right of the city to order the paving of its streets, to determine the kind of pavement, the manner of its doing, the terms of the contract, etc., is independent of the property owner’s consent; but, when the latt