In re James

• Decision Date: 06 May 1925
• Citation: 129 A. 175
• Court: Vermont Supreme Court
• Parties: In re JAMES.

129 A. 175

In re JAMES.

Supreme Court of Vermont. Bennington.

May 6, 1925.

Appeal from Public Service Commission.

Petition to Public Service Commission by John B. James, for permission to operate motor busses, opposed by the Berkshire Street Railway and another. From order granting petitioner permission prayed for, the petitionees appeal. Appeal dismissed.

Argued before WATSON, C. J., and POWERS, TAYLOR, SLACK, and BUTLER, JJ.

R. E. Healy, of Bennington, for appellants.

James K. Batchelder, of Bennington, for appellee.

SLACK, J. This is a petition to the Public Service Commission, in effect, seeking permission to operate certain motor busses over the public highway between the villages of Bennington and North Bennington. The petition is opposed by the Berkshire Street Railway and the Vermont Company, corporations operating an electric street railroad in close proximity to the route over which petitioner desires to operate his busses. The case has been here before, and is reported in 97 Vt. 362, 123 A. 385, where the substance of the petition, and the questions then presented for review, appear. After the case was remanded, a hearing was had on the merits which resulted in an order granting the permission prayed for, from which the petitionees appealed.

The questions briefed are raised by exceptions saved by the petitionees to the holding of the Commission that it had no jurisdiction in the matter of time schedules, to the failure of the Commission to find whether the petitioner's method of operating his busses was dangerous, and to its finding that the indemnity furnished by petitioner is such as the statute requires.

The record shows the main question at issue before the Commission was whether the petitioner operated his busses in such manner as to afford safety and protection to his passengers and to the public, and no question concerning the running time or schedule upon which such busses were operated, beyond the effect such operation had on the safety and protection of petitioner's passengers and the public, was involved. As bearing upon this question, the petitionees were permitted to, and did, go into a full showing as to how the petitioner operated and ran his busses with reference to the running time of their cars, the use he made of their track, when and where he stopped and started his busses, etc.

During the progress of the hearing, it was suggested by petitionees' counsel "that it would serve a public benefit" if the Commission would rule on the subject of whether it had any power of supervision "outside the matter of safety and protection to passengers and the public," whereupon the Commission held that it had no jurisdiction of the matter of "time schedules," to which petitionees saved an exception.

But, notwithstanding this ruling, it appears that the Commission assumed jurisdiction of the matter of petitioner's schedules so far as the same was material to the question involved—namely, the safety...