Ogden v. City of Philadelphia
Ogden v. City of Philadelphia
Opinion of the Court
Opinion,
In the absence of any opinion by the court below, we are left to gather the grounds of the nonsuit from the facts and the arguments of counsel.
No point is made that the action should have been brought originally in the Common Pleas. The city, instead of raising the question of jurisdiction in the Quarter Sessions, appealed to the Common Pleas, and there filed of record an agreement that the appeal should be considered at issue and tried without pleadings, and the agreement here waives any question of jurisdiction of the court in which damages were sought to be recovered. The parties, therefore, being in the proper court on a proceeding de novo, this court will not be astute to inquire how they got there: Wilson v. Scranton City, 141 Pa. 621. And the point is noticed merely to avoid any apparent conflict betwmen this and the other cases in which it is hel(l that the Quarter Sessions has no jurisdiction.
Judgment reversed, and procedendo awarded.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- R. T. OGDEN v. CITY OF PHILADELPHIA M. H. Ellis v. City of Philadelphia
- Cited By
- 16 cases
- Status
- Published
- Syllabus
- 1. No right of action is given by law to landowners for the mere establishment upon the official plans of the city of Philadelphia of a grade for a street which had no established grade prior to February 2, 1854; the right of action given by §8, article XVI. of the constitution, being clearly for the actual establishment of a new grade upon the land. 2. Wherefore, the first established grade for a street having been fixed upon the city plan in 1871, but nothing having been done upon the ground until 1887, when the physical change of grade was effected, the statute of limitations did not commence to run against a landowner’s right of action to recover damages for the change, until the actual cutting of the ground in 1887. 3. While the remedy to recover compensation for such a change of grade is by action in the Court of Common Pleas, and the Court of Quarter Sessions lias no jurisdiction to assess damages therefor, yet a proceeding for such assessment, commenced in the latter court and brought into the former by appeal of the city, the city waiving any question of jurisdiction, sustained in this instance.