Washington & Baltimore Turnpike Co. v. The State of Maryland

IN 1812 the State of Maryland incorporated a company to build a turnpike road between Baltimore and Washington. The company by its charter had power to take tolls and was bound to erect bridges and keep them and the road in good repair. In regard to its privileges generally, there was nothing special about it.

In 1831 the same State granted a charter to a railroad company to make a railroad between the same cities, the line of which ran near to and parallel with the track of the turnpike.

The turnpike company not having kept its road and bridges in repair, while it yet demanded tolls, the legislature of the State in 1860 directed their attorney-general to issue a scire facias against it, to forfeit its charter; which writ was issued accordingly.

It was set up as a defence to the ''sci. fa. that the State had, in disregard of the Constitution of the United States, passed laws 'impairing the obligation of contracts,' in that with the grant of a charter to the turnpike company in force, it had incorporated a company to make a railroad right alongside of it, which second road had every year been transporting great numbers of persons and large amounts of property that but for it would have been carried on the turnpike, and had now by statute directed the sci. fa.;'' that the turnpike company being by the charter to the railroad corporation deprived of much of the income which but for this they would have received, it had become 'impracticable for them, with all the income that they received from such persons and property as pass upon the turnpike road, to maintain and keep it in any better order and repair than it was kept in.'

The turnpike company further set up that the railroad had been made not only under the authority of the State but to a considerable extent with the State's own money; the State, in addition, managing it largely, and getting from it one-fifth of the whole amount received for the transportation of passengers.

The Court of Appeals of Maryland, where the case finally got, considered the defence insufficient, and gave judgment of ouster of the franchise. The charter of the turnpike company was thus annulled. The case was now here on error.

Messrs. Dobbin and Robinson, for the turnpike company, plaintiffs in error, contended that the charter of 1812 made a contract, persons having parted with their property on the faith of it; that under this charter the turnpike company had a right to take and enjoy the tolls and other privileges and immunities granted by it, and for which the original cost of constructing the road and the obligation, by continuing outlays to keep it in order, was a consideration. That the State, by authorizing a rival road, had violated that contract; and by diverting and carrying away the tolls from the turnpike company-as owing to the new road being a railroad and having greater facilities for carrying passengers and freight it did-it had, itself, disabled the turnpike company from keeping its road in repair. That the State having thus prevented the turnpike company from performing its duty, and still furthering a prevention-being itself a gainer moreover by what it did and was still doing-it could not take advantage of the resulting incapacity of the turnpike company to keep its road in order.

The case was argued with profound reference to the books; and the learned counsel cited very numerous authorities, beginning with the Year Books, Keilwey, Sir Francis Moore, Bulstrode, Godbolt, and other early reporters, and coming down to the latest of the modern, to show a universal concurrence of the courts on the subject; and that it was an ancient, settled, and most just rule of law and morals, that a covenantor was discharged from his obligation when the party for whose benefit it is made has performed an act by which such covenantor is incapacitated to observe his contract; and that where forfeiture was the penalty provided for breach, the other party was not permitted to take advantage of it.

Messrs. Randall and Poe, contra, citing among other cases, Charles River Bridge v. Warren Bridge; Richmond Railroad Co. v. Louisa Railroad Co.; Washington and Baltimore Turnpike Company v. Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Co.

Mr. Justice NELSON delivered the opinion of the court.