Idaho Power & Light Co. v. Blomquist

Decision Date27 June 1914
PartiesIDAHO POWER & LIGHT COMPANY, a Corporation, Plaintiff, v. J. A. BLOMQUIST, A. P. RAMSTEDT and D. W. STANDROD, as the Public Utilities Commission of the State of Idaho, Defendants, and THE BEAVER RIVER POWER COMPANY, a Corporation, Plaintiff, v. J. A. BLOMQUIST, A. P. RAMSTEDT and D. W. STANDROD, as the Public Utilities Commission of the State of Idaho, Defendants
CourtIdaho Supreme Court

PUBLIC UTILITIES ACT - PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION - CONSTITUTIONAL LAW - STATUTORY CONSTRUCTION - LEGISLATIVE POWER-DELEGATION OF-CITY ORDINANCE-CONTRACTS AND VESTED RIGHTS-ORDERS OF COMMISSION-REVIEW OF BY COURTS-CERTIORARI.

1. The act known as the "Public Utilities Act" was passed at the twelfth session of the Idaho legislature, which session was adjourned on the 8th day of March, 1913, and said act was approved by the governor on March 13, 1913, and went into effect sixty days after the adjournment of said session of the legislature, to wit, on the 8th day of May, 1913. (Sess. Laws 1913, p. 247.) Said act provided for the organization of a public utilities commission and defined its powers and duties, and also the rights, remedies, powers and duties of public utilities, their officers, agents and employees, and the rights and remedies of patrons of public utilities.

2. Under the provisions of sec. 10 of art. 4 of the constitution, every bill passed by the legislature becomes a law upon the approval and signing of the same by the governor.

3. All property devoted to public use is held subject to the power of the state to regulate or control its use in order to secure the general safety, health and public welfare of the people, and when a corporation is clothed with rights, powers and franchises to serve the public, it becomes in law subject to governmental regulation and control.

4. The legislature has plenary power in all matters of legislation except as limited by the constitution.

5. There is nothing in the constitution that prohibits the legislature from enacting laws to regulate and control public utility corporations.

6. The police power of the state is sufficiently broad and comprehensive to enable the legislature to regulate by law public utili- ties in order to promote the health, comfort, safety and welfare of the people, and thus regulate the manner in which public utility corporations shall construct their systems and carry on their business within the state.

7. Under the state's police power, the legislature has authority to authorize said utility commission to determine whether a duplication of an electrical plant is required in a town or city for the convenience and necessity of the inhabitants.

8. Under the provisions of said act, the commission has power absolutely to fix the rates, and it is unlawful for the utility to charge more or less than the rates so fixed.

9. Formerly competition was supposed to be the proper means of protecting the public and promoting the general welfare in respect to service of public utility corporations, but experience has demonstrated that public convenience and public needs do not require the construction and maintenance of numerous instrumentalities in the same locality, but rather, the construction and maintenance only of those necessary to meet the public necessities, when such utilities are properly regulated by law.

10. Said public utilities act provides that competition between public utility corporations of the classes specified shall be allowed only where public convenience and necessity demand or require it.

11 Sec. 18, art. 11, of the state constitution prohibits combinations for the purpose of fixing prices or regulating production, and requires the legislature to pass appropriate laws to enforce the provisions of that section, and said public utilities act is justified by the provisions of said section, since its ultimate effect will be to prevent unreasonable rates and combinations by public utilities.

12. Unregulated competition is the tool of unregulated monopoly.

13. Under the provisions of said act, unregulated competition is not needed to protect the public against unreasonable rates or unsatisfactory service; and there can now be no justification for unregulated competition or a duplication of utility plants under the pretense of preventing monopoly.

14. Experience and history clearly show that public utility corporations cannot be safely intrusted to properly serve the public until they are regulated and placed under public control.

15. The legislature has ample power to give the public utilities commission authority to refuse to give a certificate of convenience and necessity to a public utility where it seeks to duplicate a plant or system that is amply sufficient to serve properly the inhabitants of a community.

16. The legislature may not delegate its purely legislative power to a commission, but having laid down by law the general rules of action under which a commission may proceed, it may require of that commission the application of such rules to particular situations and conditions and authorize an investigation of facts by the commission with a view to making orders in a particular matter within the rules laid down by such law.

17. Power to regulate public utilities presupposes an intelligent regulation and necessarily carries with it the power to employ the means necessary and proper for such intelligent regulation.

18. Under the law the standard by which rates, services, etc must be fixed clearly contemplates reasonable rates services, etc., which is a legislative matter and cannot be delegated; but the authority to determine what is a reasonable rate is purely administrative and can be delegated and was delegated to the commission in our public utilities act, and the several acts authorized to be performed by the commission may be reviewed by this court on a writ of certiorari or review, as provided by sec. 63a of said act and under the provisions of that section all orders made by the commission may be reviewed by this court, and this court has the authority to determine whether such orders are unlawful.

19. The contract right given to a public utility corporation by ordinance of a city does not come within the contract clause of the constitution of the United States, in that it can in no manner be affected by the police power of the state, and when a corporation acquires a franchise for the purpose of carrying on a corporate business within a city, it is accepted subject to the police power.

20. It is provided by sec. 48a of said act that no electrical corporation shall "henceforth" begin the construction of an electrical plant, etc., without having first obtained a certificate of convenience and necessity from the commission; and a public utility corporation cannot slip in between the passage and approval of such act and its going into effect and procure an ordinance that would deprive the state of its right to regulate it in its operations under the police power of the state, especially where such corporation had not begun actual construction work and was not prosecuting such work in good faith and uninterruptedly and with reasonable diligence in proportion to the magnitude of the undertaking, as provided by sec. 48b of said act; for under the facts of this case the plaintiffs had not begun actual construction work on their system in either of said cities.

21. The last proviso of sec. 48a provides that power companies may, without such certificate, increase the capacity of existing plants or develop new generating plants and market the product thereof. That proviso must not be so construed as to nullify the clear object and purpose of said act. If construed to give such corporations the power to establish new plants and lines and enter into new fields for the sale of their products, then the main object and purpose of said act would be nullified and defeated; and if that proviso be construed in that way, it must be held as nugatory and be disregarded.

22. It was not the intention of the legislature under the provisions of sec. 48b to permit such corporations to extend their lines into territory already occupied by a similar utility corporation, without first securing a certificate of convenience and necessity from said commission.

23. Held, that the power of regulation as provided by said act is not required to be specifically conferred by the provisions of the state constitution, and that there is no inhibition in the constitution upon the legislature prohibiting the enactment of such law.

Original proceeding in this court for a writ of review to determine the validity of the order of the public utilities commission, requiring the plaintiffs to refrain from constructing their proposed plants in either the city of Twin Falls or Pocatello, on the ground that such companies have not obtained a certificate of public convenience and necessity requiring such service. The order and action of the commission affirmed.

Affirmed Costs awarded in favor of the defendants.

Hawley, Puckett & Hawley and H. R. Waldo, for Plaintiffs.

The provision requiring a written acceptance of a city franchise is merely one of the conditions subsequent which may be waived and the acceptance may be evidenced by acts. (4 McQuillin on Mun. Corp., sec. 1650; Postal Tel. Cable Co. v. Newport, 25 Ky. Law Rep. 635, 76 S.W. 159; City of Allegheny v. People's Natural Gas etc. Co., 172 Pa. 632, 33 A. 704, 705; City Railway Co. v. Citizens' Street R. R. Co., 166 U.S. 557, 17 S.Ct. 653, 41 L.Ed. 1114; Lincoln & Kennebee Bank v. Richardson, 1 Greenl. (Me.) 79, 10 Am. Dec. 34; Illinois River R. Co. v. Zimmer, 20 Ill. 654.)

And it has ever been held that an acceptance will be presumed from the fact that the...

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