Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 273, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 November 1914 — CAN NOT BUILD A KANKAKEE LEVEE [ARTICLE]

CAN NOT BUILD A KANKAKEE LEVEE

Supreme Court Rules Adversely to Brown Dike and in Favor of Jasper County Farms. The supreme court of Indiana has just handed dbwn a decision reverting the lake county superior count* in the Brown Kankakee levee dase. John Brown and others petitioned for the of a dike on the north Side of the. Kankakee river and The Northern Indiana Land Co., which ownka large acreage in northern Jasper by its. attorneys, A. Halleck, of Rensselaer, and Schuyler C. Hubbe! of South Bend, opposed the building of the levee on ithe ground that its construction to prevent the overflow of the low lan dis on the nortif side of (the river would result in that vast Volume of water being dumped over the lands on the south ride of the river. Attorney (Halleck presented a remonstiance signed by land owners on the south side of the river when the Case was pending in Lake county but th court there ruled that the land owners who. signed the .petdtipn could not remOnfetnate inlasmuejj as they had not been named in the action for the levee. The ciase was then carried to the (supreme court and the Lake (Superior court wlas reversed. The atbistradt of the decision is as follow's: Northern Indiana Land 00. vs. Brown et aL Lake S. C. Reversed. Spencer, J. (1) Petition by appel2ms for levee on north bank of Kankakee river in Lake county, submitted to viewers, report favorable, tihe only land mentioned ais affected being in Lake county. Ajppellee filed petition to intervene, showing it owned land for fifteen miles along south Hank of river, which had shallow bed 'and* in rimes of flbod spread over the land on the north of river, and if levee is conSttirutoted-it will greatly damage appellant's lands by verflbw. Blight to intervene ws denied, levee was ordered conforuJdted. .The court erred in refusing appellant right to intervene and reversed with order to .allow appellant 'to intervene and be made ,a partly. (2) An owner bias no right for his greater convenience and benefit to build anything iwbidh, in times of ordinary flood, will throw the wa-. ter on thegroundfe of another proprietor, so as to overflow and injure them. And this 'rule hold's good as .against a public enterprise to. reefuire that the person .who claim's Ms lands will be 'injuriously affected shall be given a hearing to determine if 'he is damaged, and if so tb What extent. (3) The fact that appellant was not named in the peritipn flor the levee or in the ra port of Viewers, did nipt deprive it oif a hearing to determine whether it was damaged by levee.