Honolulu Rapid Transit Land Company v. Territory of Hawaii

• Decision Date: 30 November 1908
• Docket Number: No. 412,412
• Citation: 53 L.Ed. 186,211 U.S. 282,29 S.Ct. 55
• Parties: HONOLULU RAPID TRANSIT & LAND COMPANY, Appt., v. TERRITORY OF HAWAII, by Charles R. Hemenway, Attorney General of the Territory of Hawaii
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

211 U.S. 282

29 S.Ct. 55

53 L.Ed. 186

HONOLULU RAPID TRANSIT & LAND COMPANY, Appt.,

v TERRITORY OF HAWAII, by Charles R. Hemenway, Attorney General of the Territory of Hawaii.

No. 412.

Argued and submitted November 6, 1908.

Decided November 30, 1908.

Messrs. David L. Withington, A. B. Browne, Alex. Britton, W. R. Castle, and A. Perry for appellant.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 282-284 intentionally omitted] Messrs. Charles R. Hemenway for appellee.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 284-286 intentionally omitted] Mr. Justice Moody delivered the opinion of the court:

The appellant, hereafter called the transit company, was incorporated by a law of the territory of Hawaii. Revised Laws of Hawaii, chap. 66 §§ 835 to 871.The corporation was granted the right to construct and operate a street railway for a term of thirty years in the district of Honolulu. The character of the construction was, in part, expressly prescribed by the statute, and, in some details, left to be determined by the transit company, subject to the approval of the superintendent of public works. Section 841 enacted that——

'The said association . . . shall at all time maintain a sufficient number of cars to be used upon said railway for the carriage of passengers as public convenience may require, and such other cars designed for the carriage of mails, parcels, and goods as they may deem necessary.'

It was provided that, after paying from the income certain charges, including a dividend of 8 per cent on the stock, the excess of the income should be divided equally between the territory and the stockholders, and that 'the entire plant, operation, books, and accounts . . . shall, from time to time, be subject to the inspection of the superintendent of public works.' Section 868. In certain parts of the field of operation a maximum rate of fare was established by the statute, and in certain other parts it was left to the transit company to fix, subject to the approval of the governor. It was provided by § 843, paragraph 4, that——

'The said association . . . shall make reasonable and just regulations with the consent and approval of the governor regarding the maintenance and operation of said railway on and through said streets and roads; and the said association . . . failing to make such rules and regulations, the superintendent of public works, with the approval of the governor, may make them. All rules and regulations may be changed from time to time as the public interests may demand, at the discretion of the governor.'

The railway was constructed and its operation was in progress. On certain streets of its line the transit company had been running cars at intervals of ten minutes. It proposed to discontinue this schedule and established one with somewhat longer intervals, and had applied to the superintendent of public works for permission to lay the switches necessary to put the proposed schedule into convenient operation. Thereupon the territory, on the relation of its attorney general, brought, in one of the circuit courts of the territory, a suit in equity, in which an injunction was sought to prevent the company from running the cars in question at less frequent intervals than ten minutes. In the bill it was alleged that the convenience of the public required that the ten-minute schedule should be maintained and continued. The respondent answered, issue was joined by replication, evidence was taken, and the court found as a fact that the public convenience required the maintenance of the ten-munute schedule. An injunction against the change was accordingly granted. Upon appeal to the supreme court of the territory, the judgment of the lower court was affirmed, and findings of fact made, including the finding that the public convenience required the continuance of the ten-minute schedule. The transit company then appealed here, upon the ground, which is well taken, that the amount in controversy was more than $5,000.

The dispute between the parties is whether the courts of the territory had jurisdiction in equity to issue the injunction. The transit company contends that no such jurisdiction existed, and, in the alternative, that, if there was jurisdiction in the courts over the subject, it could only be exercised by mandamus. We think it unnecessary to consider the latter proposition, and confine ourselves to a consideration of the broad question whether the court had power, by any form of proceedings, thus to regulate and control the operations of the company. The courts below based the right to issue the injunction upon § 841, correctly interpreting that section as imposing the general duty upon the transit company to operate as well as to maintain such cars as the public convenience requires. The section, however is not a specific direction to keep in force on the streets covered by the order of the court a defined schedule, with cars running at named intervals, and the right of a court to enforce by injunction or mandamus such a schedule need not be considered. But the action of the court below went much farther than this, and farther than is warranted by any decision which has been called to our attention. In the absence of a more specific and well-defined duty than that of running a sufficient number of cars to meet the public convenience, the court, in this case, inquired and determined, as matter of fact, what schedule the public convenience demanded on particular streets, and then, in substance and effect, compelled a compliance with that schedule. And this was done, though, as will be shown, the full power to regulate the management of the railway in this respect was vested by the statute in the executive authorities. In form the order of the court was a mere prohibition against a change of an existing schedule; but its substantial effect was to direct the transit company to operate its cars upon a schedule found to be required by the public convenience. The effect of the order is not changed by the fact that the schedule enforced by the order of the court is that upon which the transit company was then running its cars. The order of the court was not founded upon the consideration that the schedule was the one existing, although that was taken into account; but upon the fact that it was the one which the public convenience required. The question to be determined is whether a court, not invested with special statutory authority, nor having the property in its control...