188 Ind. 197 | Ind. | 1918
— On May 3, 1916, the Syracuse and Milford Railway .Company filed a petition asking for an order requiring the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railway Company to establish and maintain, in connection with the petitioner, through routes and joint rates between Syracuse, Indiana, and all points on the line of the last-named company within the State of Indiana. Thereafter the Sandusky Cement Company, a manufacturer of cement at Syracuse, filed an inter
After a hearing on the petition and intervening petition, the Public Service Commission made and entered an order classifying the Syracuse and Milford Railway Company as a common carrier possessing the right to have joint rates established with the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railway Company, and to have a fair division of rates, and the two companies named were directed to establish, publish and put into effect such joint rates within thirty days from the date of the order.
Appellee filed this action in the Marion Circuit Court asking to have said order annulled and set aside. The trial in the circuit court resulted in a finding and judg
In the case of Oregon R. & N. Co. v. Fairchild, supra, 526, the court said: “The act further provided that after the administrative body had acted, the carrier should have the right to test the lawfulness and reasonableness of the regulation in the Superior Court, where every error in rejecting or excluding evidence, or otherwise, could be corrected. On that trial the court was not bound by the finding of fact, but, like the Commission, it was obliged to weigh and consider the testimony and to give full effect to what was established by the evidence, since it acted judicially, ‘under an imperative obligation, with a sense of official responsibility for impartial and right decision, which is imputed to the discharge of official duties.'”
There is other evidence in the record which the trial court may have properly considered as bearing on the question, but without further extending this opinion the court concludes that the evidence was sufficient to justify a finding that the joint rates established by the order were not required for the benefit, accommodation and convenience of the shippers and receivers of freight, but were sought for the private benefit of the Sandusky Cement Company. The decision of the trial court is sustained by the evidence, and is not contrary to law.
Judgment affirmed.
Note. — Reported in 121 N. E. 116. Regulation of rates by-state, 62 Am. St. 289-304.