1900.] HASTINGS—POLICE POWER OF THE STATE. 525 
‘‘ All property, indeed, except the savage’s temporary cabin, his bow, 
his matchcoat and other acquisitions absolutely necessary for his sub- 
sistence, seems to me to be the creature of public convention. Hence, 
the public has the right of regulating descents and all other conveyances 
of property and even of limiting the quantity and uses of it.” 
It is not by accident or mistake that such control of the uses of 
property as is reasonable—that is, as, in the judgment of the court, 
the public need really requires—has been upheld. 
In * People vs. Squire the application of legislative authority to 
electricity and electrical lighting was upheld. Squire was commis- 
sioner of public works in the city of New York. The electrical 
lines asked a mandamus to compel his permission to excavate and 
lay wires. The mandamus was refused by the New York courts, 
and the company brought the case to the federal Supreme Court. 
In 1882 the company was incorporated for the purpose of con- 
structing and maintaining telegraph and telephone lines and elec- 
tric conductors for illumination under the sidewalks and streets of 
New York and Brooklyn, and owning the franchise for such con- 
struction and owning and disposing such real and personal prop- 
perty as was needed for the purpose. The telegraph law allowed 
such companies the use of highways provided there was no ob- 
struction. A further provision required the obtaining of license 
before laying any line in city or village streets. 
April 10, 1883, the common council of New York city gave 
the company permission to lav its lines underground through the 
city, subject to certain restrictions. On April 16 the company 
accepted the franchise and filed a map, as required, indicating the 
space and localities which it would occupy. A considerable sum 
was expended in preparations for work, but it did not get ready 
to excavate until July, 1886, when it applied for a permit to do so, 
which was refused, because in 1885 the legislature had enacted a 
law requiring the approval of a board of commissioners of electri- 
cal subways before such excavating was done, and such approval 
had not been obtained. 
The company then brought its mandamus, claiming that the act of 
1885 had no application to it under its charter and the agreement 
of 1883. The court held that the company was subject to the lat- 
ter acts, that it had no absolute right, but only a qualified one, sub- 
ject to the state laws. A requirement that the company pay the 
1 145 U, S., 880 (1892). 
