Diamond Taxi Co. v. Gilliam
| Decision Date | 12 November 1926 |
| Citation | 287 S.W. 981,216 Ky. 521 |
| Parties | DIAMOND TAXI CO. v. GILLIAM, CIRCUIT JUDGE. |
| Court | Kentucky Court of Appeals |
Petition by the Diamond Taxi Company for writ of mandamus to be directed to John H. Gilliam, Circuit Judge. Petition dismissed.
Guy H Herdman and Rodes & Harlin, all of Bowling Green, for appellant.
Thomas Thomas & Logan, of Bowling Green, for appellee.
By this original proceeding in this court, the petitioner seeks a writ of mandamus commanding the respondent, who is the circuit judge of the Warren circuit court, to decide a certain action pending in his court, wherein this petitioner is plaintiff and the Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company and the Brown & Yellow Taxicab & Transfer Company are defendants.
From the petition and answer, as amended, we find that on December 2, 1925, the Brown & Yellow Taxicab & Transfer Company formerly a Kentucky corporation, but then a Tennessee corporation, which we shall hereafter call the Yellow Cab Company, brought suit in the United States District Court for the Western District of Kentucky against the Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company, hereafter called the railroad, and the Black & White Taxicab Company, to enjoin the Black & White Taxicab Company from interfering with the Yellow Cab Company's alleged exclusive right to solicit on the platforms of the railroad's station at Bowling Green passengers and the carriage of baggage, and to occupy with its taxicabs and trucks certain portions of the railroad's premises at that point under a contract theretofore entered into between it and the railroad giving it such exclusive privileges, and to enjoin the railroad from permitting other taxicab companies to so solicit passengers and baggage and to impede the Yellow Cab Company's occupancy of the railroad's premises. The jurisdiction of the federal court was based on diversity of citizenship.
On December 10th, following, the petitioner herein brought suit in the Warren circuit court against the railroad and the Yellow Cab Company, to enjoin the railroad from forbidding the petitioner and its agents to solicit on the platforms of the railroad's station at Bowling Green passengers and baggage. A temporary injunction in this case being denied by the Warren circuit court, a motion was made before Judge Clay, of this court, to grant the temporary injunction thus refused; but the federal court having in the meantime granted a temporary injunction in the suit pending before it (no opinion filed), Judge Clay, all of the judges of this court concurring with him, overruled this motion, but without prejudice to a trial on the merits.
Thereafter the pleadings in the case pending in the Warren circuit court were duly made up and the case prepared for final submission. On June 30, 1926, the federal District Court made its temporary injunction permanent. The defendants in that action at once appealed the case to the United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, and at the time this petition was filed in this court it had there been argued and submitted. By the amended answer we are informed that, since the submission of this proceeding, the United States Circuit Court of Appeals has affirmed the District Court, but its mandate has not as yet issued. See Black & White Taxicab, etc., Co. v. Brown & Yellow Taxicab, etc., Co., 15 F.2d 509.
During the February, 1926, term of the Warren circuit court, the petitioner unsuccessfully moved for a final submission of its action pending in that court. The respondent assigned as his reason for declining then to pass upon the case that he was awaiting the final decision of the federal District Court in the action therein pending. Again, at the October, 1926, term of the Warren circuit court, the petitioner sought a final submission of its cause, and, the court again declining to decide it, the petitioner brought this proceeding to compel him to do so.
The respondent in his original answer filed herein stated that he had declined to decide this case at this time, because he was awaiting the outcome of the case pending before the United States Circuit Court of Appeals. By his amended answer,...
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