286 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



tion in equity is most effective, not only because it prevents threatened 

 injury instead of operating upon harm which has been fully wrought, 

 but in equity the defendant is required to terminate the nuisance under 

 pain of punishment for contempt of the court's order. Frequently, 

 however, at this point the controversy between the parties is hardly 

 more than begun, for the form of injunction may be so indefinite as 

 merely to prohibit causing material discomfort to the plaintiff or in- 

 juring his health, things which the defendant usually disavows doing 

 from the beginning. The court struggles not to frame its injunction 

 in such a way as to absolutely destroy the defendant's business, seeking 

 rather some device by which the business may be continued without the 

 accompanying nuisance, often a difficult and sometimes impossible task. 

 The defendant may therefore succeed in having the injunction in so 

 weak a form that it is ineffective, or he may after a period of com- 

 pliance slowly resume the wrong doing, thus compelling the plaintiff to 

 prove his case anew in contempt proceedings. While the private indi- 

 vidual is thus seeking an injunction, the municipal body affected as to 

 its property interest or as to its health, may as a matter of common 

 law likewise procure an injunction. 



Where the nuisance affects the right of the public, it is ordinarily 

 punishable as a crime, and in some states abatement may be had by an 

 order in the criminal proceedings. 



Such is the law of nuisances relating to the public health. Laws 

 do not execute themselves. A vigorous administration of statutory 

 laws, adequate appropriations for the ascertainment and proof of the 

 facts, enlightenment of the public mind as to the dangers from polluted 

 streams and poisonous air, and a civic earnestness which not only will 

 make easy the enforcement of law by public authorities, but will impel 

 private individuals at some cost to themselves to set in operation the 

 machinery of the common law, are all necessary. Many death-dealing 

 nuisances await the attack of those who would protect public health. 



