New York Court of Appeals, 1947

Western New York & Pennsylvania Railway Co. v. City of Buffalo

New York Court of Appeals · Decided January 9, 1947 · <italic>Per Curiam.</italic>

71 N.E.2d 108; 296 N.Y. 93; 1947 N.Y. LEXIS 963 (North Eastern Reporter, Second Series)

Cases that cite this one

9 later published cases cite this decision.

Juba v. General Builders Supply Corp. (N.Y. 1959)
Garal Wholesalers, Ltd. v. Miller Brewing Co. (New York Supreme Court 2002)
Huskission v. Sentry Insurance (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 1986)
Saporita v. Delco Corp. (New York Supreme Court 1980)
Kinney v. Kinney (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 1975)
In re the City of Lackwanna (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 1974)
In re the Accounting of Karnbach (New York Surrogate's Court 1955)
Meyer v. Zimmer (Rochester City Court 1950)
Braunstein v. Swartz (Appellate Terms of the Supreme Court of New York 1947)

This list shows which later cases cite this one. It does not say how they treated it, and no review of that has been done. Not a substitute for Shepard’s or KeyCite — verify before relying.

Opinion of the Court

Per Curiam.

The validity of the agreements whereby appellant City of Buffalo undertook to bear the expense of repairing the structures here involved can not be questioned. (Matter of Ward v. Erie R. R. Co., 215 N. Y. 629.) In the light of the settled principle that a statute will not — in the absence of an unequivocal expression of such legislative intent — be given retrospective effect so as to interfere with antecedent rights (Hastings v. Byllesby & Co. [Granbery], 293 N. Y. 413, 419; see, also, Shielcrawt v. Moffett, 294 N. Y. 180, 189; Jacobus v. Colgate, 217 N. Y. 235, 240), the 1937 amendment .(L. 1937, ch. 889) can not be construed as affecting plaintiffs’ rights — and defendant’s correlative duty — which had accrued many years before. In short, we decide that the Legislature did not disclose an intent that the statute should apply to contracts' previously made. We consider no other question.

The judgment should be affirmed, with costs.

Loughban, Ch. J., Lewis, Conway, Desmond, Thacheb, Dye and Fuld, JJ., concur.

Judgment affirmed.

Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.