Opinion of the Court. public. This, as has been often observed, is a government of law, and not a government of men, and it must never be forgotten that under such a government, with its constitutional limitations and guarantees, the forms of law and the machinery of government, with all their reach and power, must in their actual workings stop on the hither side of the unnecessary and uncompensated taking or destruction of any private property, legally acquired and legally held. . If the State were to seek to acquire the title to these roads, under its power of eminent domain, is there any doubt that constitutional provisions would require the payment to the corporation of just compensation, that compensation being the value of the property as it stood in the markets of the world, and not as prescribed by an act of the legislature? Is it any less a departure from the obligations of justice to seek to take not the title but the use for the public benefit at less than its market value? . . . It is unnecessary to decide, and we do not wish to be understood as laying down, as an absolute rule, that in every case a failure to produce some profit to those who have invested their money in the building of a road is conclusive that the tariff is unjust and unreasonable. And yet justice demands that every one should receive some compensation for the use of his money or property, if it be possible without prejudice to the rights of others.” The cases to which we have referred related to the power of the legislature over rates to be collected by railroad corporations. But the principles announced in them are equally applicable, in like circumstances, to corporations engaged under legislative authority in maintaining turnpike roads for the use of which tolls are exacted. Turnpike roads established by a corporation, under authority of law, are public highways, and the right to exact tolls from those using them comes from the State creating the corporation. California v. Central Pacific Railroad, 127 U. S. 1, 40. And the exercise of that right may be controlled by legislative authority to the same extent that similar rights, connected with the construction and management of railroads by corporations, may be controlled. A statute which, by its necessary operation, com Opinion of the Court. pels a turnpike company, when charging only such tolls as are just to the public, to submit to such further reduction of rates as will prevent it from keeping its road in proper repair and from earning any dividends whatever for stockholders, is as obnoxious to the Constitution of the United States as would be a similar statute relating to the business of a railroad corporation having authority, under its charter, to collect and receive tolls for passengers and freight. It is suggested by counsel for the plaintiffs that neither the original nor the amended answer sufficiently disclosed the facts upon which the company rested its contention as to the invalidity of the act of 1890, and that, upon the showing made by the company, the court, under the established rule forbidding the annulment of a legislative enactment not clearly and palpably unconstitutional, was not obliged to hold that act to be repugnant to the Constitution of the United States. We do not concur in this view. The answer disclosed what had been the average annual receipts of the company under the act of 1865 for a number of years immediately preceding the passage of the act of 1890, and what during that period had been the average annual expenses; alleged that the receipts for the several preceding years had not admitted of dividends. greater than four per centum on the par value of the company's stock; that the act of 1890 reduced the tolls 50 per cent below those allowed by the act of 1865; and that such reduction would so diminish the income of the company that it could not maintain its road, meet its ordinary expenses and earn any dividends whatever for stockholders. These allegations were sufficiently full as to the facts necessary to be pleaded, and fairly raised for judicial determination the question assuming the facts stated to be true-whether the act of 1890 was in derogation of the company's constitutional rights. It made a prima facie case of the invalidity of that statute. When a party specially sets up and claims a right or privilege under the Constitution or laws of the United States, the question of the sufficiency of allegations to present that issue is not concluded by the view expressed by the state court. In Mitchell v. Clark, 110 U. S. 633, 645, this court Opinion of the Court. said: "The question whether a plea sets up a sufficient defence, when the defence relied on arises under an act of Congress, does present, and that necessarily, a question of Federal law; for the question is and must be, does the plea state facts which under the act of Congress constitute a good defence." This principle was approved in Boyd v. Thayer, 143 U. S. 135, 180. We decide, however, nothing more on this hearing than that upon the facts alleged the demurrer to the answer should have been overruled; and upon the completion of the pleadings-unless the plaintiffs elected to stand by their demurrer — the parties should be allowed to make their proofs touching the issues involved. It is proper to say that if the answer had not alleged, in substance, that the tolls prescribed by the act of 1890 were wholly inadequate for keeping the road in proper repair and for earning dividends, we could not say that the act was unconstitutional merely because the company (as was alleged and as the demurrer admitted) could not earn more than four per cent on its capital stock. It cannot be said that a corporation is entitled, as of right, and without reference to the interests of the public, to realize a given per cent upon its capital stock. When the question arises whether the legis lature has exceeded its constitutional power in prescribing rates to be charged by a corporation controlling a public highway, stockholders are not the only persons whose rights or interests are to be considered. The rights of the public are not to be ignored. It is alleged here that the rates prescribed are unreasonable and unjust to the company and its stockholders. But that involves an inquiry as to what is reasonable and just for the public. If the establishing of new lines of transportation should cause a diminution in the number of those who need to use a turnpike road, and, consequently, a diminution in the tolls collected, that is not, in itself, a sufficient reason why the corporation, operating the road, should be allowed to maintain rates that would be unjust to those who must or do use its property. The public cannot properly be subjected to unreasonable rates in order simply that stockholders may earn dividends. The legislature Opinion of the Court. has the authority, in every case, where its power has not been restrained by contract, to proceed upon the ground that the public may not rightfully be required to submit to unreasonable exactions for the use of a public highway established and maintained under legislative authority. If a corporation cannot maintain such a highway and earn dividends for stockholders, it is a misfortune for it and them which the Constitution does not require to be remedied by imposing unjust burdens upon the public. So that the right of the public to use the defendant's turnpike upon payment of such tolls as in view of the nature and value of the service rendered by the company are reasonable, is an element in the general inquiry whether the rates established by law are unjust and unreasonable. That inquiry also involves other considerations, such, for instance, as the reasonable cost of maintaining the road in good condition for public use, and the amount that may have been really and necessarily invested in the enterprise. In short, each case must depend upon its special facts; and when a court, without assuming itself to prescribe rates, is required to determine whether the rates prescribed by the legislature for a corporation controlling a public highway are, as an entirety, so unjust as to destroy the value of its property for all the purposes for which it was acquired, its duty is to take into consideration the interests both of the public and of the owner of the property, together with all other circumstances that are fairly to be considered in determining whether the legislature has, under the guise of regulating rates, exceeded its constitutional authority, and practically deprived the owner of property without due process of law. What those other circumstances may be, it is not necessary now to decide. That can be best done after the parties have made their proofs. It is further insisted by the company that the rates prescribed for it by the act of 1890 are much less than those imposed by the General Statutes of Kentucky upon other turnpike companies of the State; consequently, that that act denies to it the equal protection of the laws. The proposition of the defendant is, that the constitutional provision referred Opinion of the Court. to requires all turnpike companies in the State to be placed by the legislature, when exercising its general power over the subject of rates to be charged upon highways of that character, upon substantially the same footing. Upon this point the Court of Appeals of Kentucky said: "A turnpike road leading into and connected with a populous city like that of the city of Covington could afford to charge less toll by reason of the immense travel upon it than turnpikes in thinly settled portions of the county or State, and hence under former constitutions the legislature has seen proper to regulate the tolls as the turnpike road may happen to be located." The circumstances of each turnpike company must determine the rates of toll to be properly allowed for its use. Justice to the public and to stockholders may require, in respect of one road, rates different from those prescribed for other roads. Rates on one road may be reasonable and just to all concerned, while the same rates would be exorbitant on another road. The utmost that any corporation, operating a public highway, can rightfully demand at the hands of the legislature when exerting its general powers is that it receive what, under all the circumstances, is such compensation for the use of its property as will be just both to it and to the public. If the rates prescribed for the defendant in this case were manifestly much lower-taking them as a whole than the legislature has, by general law, prescribed for other corporations whose circumstances and location are not unlike those of the defendant, a different question would be presented. At any rate, no case of that kind is properly presented by the pleadings, and there is no ground for holding that the act of 1890 denies to the defendant the equal protection of the laws. For the reasons we have given, The judgment of the court below is reversed, and the cause is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion. |