Georgia Power Co. v. Georgia Public Service Commission, No. 18687
| Court | Supreme Court of Georgia |
| Writing for the Court | HAWKINS |
| Citation | 85 S.E.2d 14,211 Ga. 223 |
| Docket Number | No. 18687 |
| Decision Date | 08 November 1954 |
| Parties | , 8 P.U.R.3d 163 GEORGIA POWER COMPANY v. GEORGIA PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION et al. |
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v.
GEORGIA PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION et al.
Rehearing Denied Dec. 2, 1954.
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Syllabus by the Court.
1. The Georgia Public Service Commission has only such powers as the legislature has expressly, or by fair implication, conferred upon it, and there is no statute conferring upon it the power to require an electric public utility, against its will, to buy or merge with a separate and distinct neighboring electric public utility, or to sell power to such other public utility where it has never undertaken as such public utility to provide such service. 'Public regulation must not supplant private management.'
2. Injunction is an available remedy to restrain the Georgia Public Service Commission from acts or threatened acts which are beyond the scope of its jurisdiction and authority.
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3. The petition stated a cause of action, and the trial court erred in sustaining the general demurrer thereto.
On December 16, 1953, the Georgia Public Service Commission, hereinafter referred to as the Commission, issued a rule nisi directed to both Georgia Power Company (hereinafter referred to as the Power Company), and Georgia Power and Light Company (hereinafter referred to as the Light Company), which, after reciting the previous proceedings before the Commission with respect to rates of the Light Company, and the Commission's opinion that it would be in the public interest if the areas presently served respectively by the two companies were integrated into a single operation, called upon them to show cause at a time stated: (1) why the Commission should not prescribe a rate schedule for the sale of electric energy by the Power Company to the Light Company (the Light Company now obtaining its power from its parent corporation, Florida Power Corporation) in sufficient volume to meet the entire power requirements of the Light Company, and why said rate [211 Ga. 224] should not be as low as the rate at which the Power Company sells electric energy to municipalities or REA Co-ops, or at what level said rate would be reasonable; and (2) why the Light Company should not be required to purchase its entire electric power requirements or a substantial portion thereof from the Power Company at the rate prescribed by the Commission; and (3) why the Commission should not file a petition with the Securities and Exchange Commission, seeking an order from that agency which would provide for the divestment of the Light Company from the Florida Power Corporation and for the sale of said property at a fair price, either to the Power Company or as a separate and independent operating entity, whichever may finally be shown to be in the best interest of the people of the area served; and (4) why, in the event the Light Company be unwilling to purchase its power requirements from the Power Company at a reasonable rate, and in the event it be unwilling to sell its plant and equipment to the Power Company or others at a fair price, and in the event Florida Power Corporation is unwilling to sell its investment in the Light Company to the Power Company or others at a fair price, the Commission should not prescribe reduced rates for electric service rendered by the Light Company to substantially the level charged by the Power Company for the same classes of service.
Upon the service of this rule nisi upon it, the Power Company filed its petition in Fulton Superior Court seeking by injunction to restrain the Commission from requiring it to respond to the rule nisi, upon the ground that the Commission was without jurisdiction to require it to do what was contemplated by the rule nisi, and therefore it could not force the Power Company to participate in a hearing to be devoted to such matter. The petition alleges: that the Power Company is an electric public utility, engaged in the generation, transmission, and sale of electric energy at retail and wholesale within large portions of the State of Georgia, as shown on a map attached to the petition as Exhibit 'A'; that the Light Company, a subsidiary of Florida Power Corporation, is a neighboring public utility company engaged in the transmission and sale of electric energy in an area in South Georgia which is indicated on the map attached as Exhibit 'A'; that the two companies are separate and non-[211 Ga. 225] associated electric utilities, each responsible for service within the particular area it has undertaken to serve, and that the Commission has no power, authority, or jurisdiction to force the Power Company to provide the power requirements of the Light Company, or to force or in any way coerce the Power Company to acquire or to negotiate for the acquisition of property or to merge with the Light Company, and that the rule nisi is void and of no effect because: (1) the Power Company has never undertaken the obligation as a public utility to provide the power requirements of the Light Company or other comparable independent electric utilities; (2) the Commission has no authority to force the Power
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Company to render public-utility service outside of its territory or its commitments as a public utility; (3) the Commission has never before undertaken to regulate and control the purchase and sale of power by neighboring public-utility systems or to establish any rates applicable to such transactions, and the Power Company's action in this respect constitutes...To continue reading
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