State v. Railroad Com'n of Washington

• Decision Date: 06 April 1909
• Citation: 52 Wash. 440,100 P. 987
• Parties: STATE ex rel. NORTHERN PAC. RY. CO. v. RAILROAD COMMISSION OF WASHINGTON et al.
• Court: Washington Supreme Court

100 P. 987

52 Wash. 440

STATE ex rel. NORTHERN PAC. RY. CO. v. RAILROAD COMMISSION OF WASHINGTON et al.

Supreme Court of Washington

April 6, 1909

Appeal from Superior Court, Thurston County; O. V. Linn, Judge.

Writ of review by the State of Washington, on the relation of the Northern Pacific Railway Company, to review an order of the Railroad Commission of Washington. From an order annulling its order, the commission and its members, individually appeal. Affirmed.

John D Atkinson, J. B. Alexander, L. B. Knickerbocker, and E. C Macdonald, for appellants.

B. S Grosscup and Geo. T. Reid, for respondent.

MOUNT J.

This appeal is taken by the Railroad Commission from an order of the superior court of Thurston county, adjudging an order of the Railroad Commission, establishing a terminal rate on hay, oats, barley, and mill feed from points on the line of the Northern Pacific Railway Company to Bellingham, Aberdeen, Hoquiam, and South Bend, null and void. In May, 1907, a complaint was filed by the Railroad Commission against respondent and other railway companies, charging that certain rates were unreasonable and excessive. A citation was issued and served upon all the companies named in the complaint. All appeared and answered. Evidence was taken by the commission on many questions, and final findings of facts were made, and an order followed fixing certain joint rates on wheat and potatoes from certain zones to certain points in the state, and ordering certain track concessions, and fixing the rate on hay, oats, barley, and mill feed shipped over the line of the Northern Pacific Railway Company from eastern Washington points to points on Gray's Harbor, South Bend, Bellingham, and other branch lines in western Washington, the same as the rate charged to Kalama. The Northern Pacific Railway Company thereupon obtained a writ of review from the superior court Thurston county to review this finding and order of the Railroad Commission relating to the rate on hay, oats, barley, and mill feed. The record was certified to the superior court, and, upon a hearing, that court found that the order of the Railroad Commission, fixing the rate on hay, oats, barley, and mill feed, was void. This appeal is prosecuted by the Railroad Commission from that part of the order.

We find nothing in the complaint of the Railroad Commission which can justify the order of the commission on the commodities named. The only place where hay, oats, barley, and mill feed are mentioned in the complaint is in paragraph 24 thereof, and it is there stated that a joint rate exists on hay, oats barley, and mill feed from eastern Washington to Seattle and Tacoma, for a continuous haul from points contiguous and equidistant from Seattle and Tacoma; that wheat bears the same classification as those commodities, and that the exclusion of wheat from such joint rate is unreasonable. Paragraph 25 of the complaint reads as follows: 'That the towns of Aberdeen and Hoquiam, in Chehalis county, on Gray's Harbor are flourishing towns, being distant from each other five miles, more or less, and have a joint population exceeding 20,000 people, and are growing and increasing in population with great rapidity. That there are good shipping facilities at such points and large shipping interests, and...