by John Marshall Harlan

“ While the New Orleans Water Works Company was proceeding under the above legislative enactment constituting its charter, the Louisiana constitution of 1879 was adopted. By article 258 of that constitution it was provided: 'All rights, actions, prosecutions, claims and contracts, as well of individuals as of bodies corporate, and all laws in force at the time of the adoption of this constitution, and not inconsistent therewith, shall continue as if the said constitution had not been adopted. ”

“ New Orleans Waterworks; that the plaintiff is lawfully entitled to have for and during the period named in said act of incorporation all of the exclusive rights and privileges named and set forth therein; that all the said acts, resolutions, and grants sought to be made by the defendant to persons or corporations, not being possessors or owners of property not touching the banks of the Mississippi river within the parish of Orleans, are null, void, and of no effect ”

“ It further alleged that after the above adjudications the defendant continued to make and promulgate ordinances conferring upon individuals and corporations the right to lay pipes and mains through the streets and public ways of New Orleans to premises not contiguous to the rivers and waters with which said pipes and mains connected, from which the water supply is drawn and consumed within the city of New Orleans, such premises not being included in the proviso in the plaintiff's charter relating to the owners of property contiguous to said waters ”

“ If an ordinance be passed, and is invalid, the jurisdiction of the courts may then be invoked for the protection of private rights that may be violated by its enforcement. Page's Case, 34 Md. 558, 564 ”