65 Fla. 404 | Fla. | 1913
The city of Gainesville obtained an injunction restraining the Gas and Electric Company “from closing down or discontinuing its public service business” of furnishing electricity to the city and its inhabitants. A demurrer to the bill of complaint was interposed. This appeal is from an order “that the injunction be and the same is dissolved, with the right of the complainant to amend the bill in ten days from this date or the bill may be dismissed without prejudice to such other action as the complainant may be advised is proper.” The question to be determined is whether there was error in' dissolving the injunction.
The bill of complaint alleges in effect that the municipality has all the usual powers of cities in this State, and is authorized “to provide for the lighting of the streets of said city and to provide for the lighting of the said city by gas and other illuminating material and to do and perform all such other acts as shall seem necessary and best adapted to the improvement and general interest of said city, or as shall be necessary for the health, convenience and safety of its citizens;” that a charter was granted by the State to the defendant as a corporation, authorizing the corporation to exist for 99 years and, among other things, to engage in the business of manufacturing, generating, and selling electric current for lighting and
That there is also located in said City the University of the State of Florida, a State Institution of learning, which now consists of two dormitories with the aggregate of one hundred and fifty-six (156) bedrooms, four academic buildings completed and in use, two others that will shortly be completed and ready for use, at which University there will be in the coming scholastic year, beginning with the month of September, an attendance of from three hundred and fifty to four hundred students from about forty-four counties of this State; that in some of the academic buildings electricity is a necessity for the operation of machinery and appliances used in the course of study pursued therein, and in all thereof it is the sole and only means of illumination; that the said Gainesville Gas and Electric Power Company has been supplying said University of Florida with electricity for illumination and power purposes since the location and construction thereof within said city and that all the buildings thereon have been constructed soley for the use of electricity for the illumination thereof, and that the said Gainesville Gas and Electric Power Company has been receiving from said University between two hundred and two hundred and fifty dollars per month in payment for the electric current it has furnished therefor;” that said company is the only “person, firm or corporation in the said City of Gainesville engaged in the manufacture, generation and sale of electricity, that it has acquired and holds a valuable easement from said city in the permission granted it to use and in the use of the streets of said city wherein it has erected its poles and placed its wires for the purpose of conveying and by means of which it conveys its electric current and that
The policy of the law is to require by mandatory process the performance by public utility corporations of
A corporation engaged in furnished electricity to a municipality or its inhabitants and using public streets or exercising other franchises or privileges in doing so, is thereby performing services of a public nature, within the meaning of the constitution and laws of this State, and such a corporation is subject to lawful governmental regulations to enforce its duties to the public it undertakes to serve. Such a corporation is manifestly a public service or public utility corporation, and is subject to the rules of law applicable to corporations or companies engaged in performing or rendering service of a public nature. See 1 Wyman Pub. Ser. Cor., Sec. 113.
As the gas and electric company had received and accepted from the State a corporate charter authorizing it to engage in the business of manufacturing, generating and selling electric current for lighting and power purposes to the municipality and its inhabitants, and had by and with the permission of the city constructed its plant, using the streets of the city of its poles and wire by means of which the public service of furnishing electric current to the city and its inhabitants for lighting and power purposes was performed, for which the company was entitled under the constitution and laws of this State to receive a reasonable compensation in return for service rendered, the company assumed the duty imposed by implication of law to render a reasonable adequate service during the time its rights and duty may lawfully continue, and such duty may be enforced where no adequate excuse for non-performance is appropriately shown. See Gas-Light Co. v. Zanesville, 47 Ohio St. 35, 23 N. E. Rep. 60. An express contract is not essential
The defense undertaken to be shown when the injunction was dissolved is in substance that the ordinances passed by the city regulating the company’s service and compensation are in effect confiscatory and unduly arbitrary and burdensome to the company. This is not a sufficient reason for a discontinuance of the public service. While it is the duty of the company to observe all laAvful municipal regulation, the company has a right to receive a reasonable compensation for the public service it renders to the city and its inhabitants and to the equal protection of the laws in every department of the government. If the regulations imposed by the city are in law and in fact illegal for any reason, the company has its complete and adequate remedy by appropriate proceedings ; but the company being engaged in rendering a public service must continue to do so in a reasonably adequate manner until relieved of its duty by due process of law. Illegal municipal regulations are not binding; but persons and corporations cannot be permitted to arbitrarily assume to remedy an alleged wrong by refusing to' render a public service voluntarily undertaken. The service to the public must be performed, and the law will upon proper proceedings enforce the right to reasonable compensation for service rendered. An ordinary action at law would not afford an adequate remedy to the public. Under the liberal rules of procedure recognized in this State the company may by cross-bill or other appropriate steps secure a determination and enforcement of
The municipality is a proper party in proceedings to require the public service company to continue the performance of its public service in a reasonably adequate manner for the benefit of the city and its inhabitants. Since it clearly appears that the company is actually enjoying its franchises and has undertaken to render public service, it is not essential that the particular terms and limitations under which the service is being rendered, should be alleged in proceedings to enforce a continuance of the public service actually engaged in, there being nothing to indicate that the rights of the company had expired or had been lawfully surrendered or forfeited, but inferences of a continuing right and duty being fairly deducible from the proceedings.
While the public service must be performed in a reasonably adequate manner, \mlawful regulations as to rates should not be enforced. The court may on a proper showing enjoin illegal regulations of the rates to be charged, the duty of the company being to render the service undertaken, and its right being to charge a reasonable compensation for service rendered.
The decree dissolving the injunction is reversed and the cause is remanded with directions to retain the bill of complaint for the purposes of appropriate injunction orders, with leave to the defendant company by cross-bill or other procedure to test the validity of the municipal regulations of which it complains.