State ex rel. Public Service Commission v. Johnson Circuit Court

• Decision Date: 20 May 1953
• Docket Number: No. 29023,29023
• Citation: 112 N.E.2d 429,232 Ind. 501
• Parties: . Supreme Court of Indiana
• Court: Indiana Supreme Court

Page 429

112 N.E.2d 429

232 Ind. 501

STATE ex rel. PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION et al. v. JOHNSON CIRCUIT COURT et al.

No. 29023.

Supreme Court of Indiana.

May 20, 1953.

Edwin K. Steers, Atty. Gen., J. D. Wright, Deputy, for appellant.

Oral C. Barnett, Judge Johnson Circuit Court, pro se.

Bell & Bell, Indianapolis, and Miller, Pogue & Lybrook, Franklin, for respondents.

EMMERT, Chief Justice.

This is an original action for a writ of prohibition. We issued a temporary writ prohibiting the Johnson Circuit Court, and the regular judge thereof, from exercising further jurisdiction in Cause No. 16266, entitled Joseph Schaller, and Associated Freight Lines, Inc., Plaintiffs vs. Public Service Commission of Indiana, et al. The petition here for the writ, and the return of respondents thereto, put in issue the validity of a judgment of said trial court entered upon a special finding of facts and conclusions of law. The history of the controversy between the Commission and Joseph Schaller and the Associated Freight Lines, Inc., is essential to this decision.

On March 30, 1949, Joseph Schaller was a holder of a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity No. 1314-A, 1, for the operation of a trucking line as a common carrier in intrastate commerce. On that date Schaller contracted to sell his Certificate to Associated Freight Lines, Inc., and to consummate the sale they filed a joint petition for approval of the sale with the Public Service Commission of Indiana as required by § 47-1219, Burns' 1952 Replacement. However, for unexplained reasons not appearing of record in this original action, there was no hearing had upon the joint petition until more than two years thereafter. On April 19, 1951, a hearing was had, and on July 5, 1951, the application was dismissed. ¹

In the meantime, on the 30th day of December, 1950, on the complaint of Joseph Schaller and Associated Freight Lines, Inc., the Superior Court of Marion County, Room No. 4, had entered the following judgment:

'It Is Therefore, Considered And Adjudged by the Court, that the Defendants [the Commission and the Commissioners] be, and they are, hereby perpetually enjoined from attempting to carry out and enforce the order of July 13, 1950, in cause No. 1314-A, 1, modifying, amending, or otherwise disturbing Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity, No. 1314-A, 1, or the order of the Public Service Commission dated December 23, 1938, under which said Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity, No. 1314-A, 1, was issued.

'It Is Further Considered And Adjudged by the Court that the order of July 13, 1950, in Cause No. 1314--A, 1, be, and the same is hereby set aside, and declared null and void.' ²

It is our construction of this judgment that it only enjoined the order of the Commission of July 13, 1950, in Cause No. 1314-A, 1, whatever that order might have been.

On August 16, 1951, Joseph Schaller and the Associated Freight Lines, Inc., as plaintiffs filed their complaint against the Commission and its official members in Cause No. 85,331 in the Superior Court of Marion County, Room 1, whereby pursuant to § 47-1249, Burns' 1952 Replacement, they sought to review the order of the Commission entered July 5, 1951, dismissing the plaintiffs' joint petition for approval of the sale of the Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity. The venue of this cause was changed to the Johnson Circuit Court where a trial was had, and the court made and filed a special finding of facts and conclusions of law. The judgment of the Johnson Circuit Court is as follows:

'It Is Therefore Ordered, Considered, Adjudged And Decreed by the Court that the order of the defendant Public Service Commission of Indiana and its then Commissioners dated July 5, 1951 dismissing the application of Joseph Schaller and Associated Freight Lines Inc., for approval of a sale and transfer of Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity No. 1314-A, 1, from the former to the latter in respect to rights of property and the right of transfer of such rights of property created by said Certificate be, and the same is, hereby vacated and set aside and the said defendant, Public Service Commission of Indiana, acting by and through its commissioners and co-defendants, be, and it and they are hereby directed to reinstate of record by order duly made, said petition to transfer said Certificate so wrongfully heretofore dismissed.

It Is Further Considered, Ordered, Adjudged And Decreed by the Court that the joint application of Joseph Schaller and Associated Freight Lines, Inc., for approval of the sale and transfer of Certificate No. 1314-A, 1, be reinstated in the records of said Commission and that the defendants and each of them be, and they are hereby ordered and directed to issue forthwith an order approving said sale and transfer of said Certificate No. 1314-A, 1, from Joseph Schaller to Associated Freight Lines, Inc.'

On February 13, 1953, the Public Service Commission of Indiana filed a motion to modify the judgment, which is yet pending, and unruled upon by said court.

On February 13, 1953, Joseph Schaller and Associated Freight Lines, Inc. in the Johnson Circuit Court filed a verified petition for a rule to show cause against the Commission and its official members requiring them to show cause why they should not be punished for contempt of court for failure to comply with the judgment of said court.

We are of the opinion that that part of the judgment of the Johnson Circuit Court which mandated the Commission and the commissioners to enter an order approving the sale and transfer of the Certificate from Joseph Schaller to the Associated Freight Lines, Inc., was in excess of the jurisdiction of the Johnson Circuit Court, and for that reason was void.

Under § 1 of Article 3 and § 1 of Article 4 of the Constitution of Indiana, the Johnson Circuit Court is not a legislative or administrative agency of the State, and it has no authority to usurp or exercise the functions of the Commission.

In In re Northwestern Indiana Tel. Co., 1930, 201 Ind. 667, 171 N.E. 65, 71, the Northwestern Indiana Telephone Company sought to sell its capital stock and assets to the Winona Telephone Company and the Crown Point Telephone Company. The Commission denied a petition to approve the sale. The petitioners filed an action in the Lake Circuit Court to review the action by the Commission, and the trial court found the action of the Commission 'was 'unreasonable and unlawful and not sustained by sufficient evidence,'' upon which finding the court entered a judgment ordering the Public Service Commission to approve the sale on the terms set forth in the petition before it. This court, in an opinion by Judge Myers, after a careful examination of the constitutional issues involved, held that the Legislature could not vest the courts with legislative or administrative powers over the Commission, and that that part of the order which substituted the discretion of the court for that of the Commission 'was without the power of the court'.

A similar issue was presented in Federal Power Com. v. Pacific Power & L. Co., 1939, 307 U.S. 156, 160, 59 S.Ct. 766, 768, 83 L.Ed. 1180, 1183. The Inland Power & Light Company and the Pacific Power & Light Company filed a joint application with the Federal Power Commission for approval of a sale of the assets, including licenses, of Inland to Pacific, which application, after hearing, was denied by the Commission. The Supreme Court of the United States, in an opinion by Mr. Justice Frankfurther, held that judicial action by the federal courts could not 'supplant the discretionary authority of a commission', and that the court itself could not 'approve or disapprove the transfer', but that the 'court has power to pass...