99 F. 162 | U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Eastern North Carolina | 1900
These cases having been heard together, an opinion was filed directing that injunctions issue as prayed for in the several bills. 97 Fed. 513. Before the expiration of the term within which the opinion was filed, and therefore while the cases were within the control of this court, a petition for rehearing was filed by the defendants. After due notice to all parties, this petition was heard, and full argument had thereon. The petition seeks to reopen the cases, because, as is alleged, the supreme court of North Carolina has rendered a decree construing the acts of the legislature of North Carolina, and reaching a different conclusion from that of this court.
The legislature of North 'Carolina, in 1891, passed an act to provide for the general supervision of railroads, steamboat or canal companies, express and telegraph companies, doing business in the state of North Carolina, being chapter 320 of that year, and popularly known as the “Railroad Commission Act.” This act constituted a railroad commission, consisting of three members, elected
“The commissioners electee! from time to time under the authority of an act to provide for the general supervision of railroads, steamboat or canal companies, express and telegraph companies, doing business in Hie slate of North Carolina, shall constitute a board of appraisers and assessors, for railroad, telegraph, canal and steamboat companies.”
This same provision is repeated year by year in the machinery act of each year, from 1891 to 1899, inclusive. At the session of 1899, two acts were ratified on 6th March, 1899. The one of these declared “that chapter 320, Public Laws of 1891, and all acts amendatory thereof and supplementary thereto, be and the same are hereby repealed.” The other of these was an act to establish the North Carolina corporation commission. This act provided for the election, by the general assembly passing it, of three commissioners, who shall have general supervision of railroads, steainboat, navigation, and canal companies, express, telegraph, and telephone companies, building and loan associations, banks, and sleeping-car companies. Those then elected held for a term ending January 1, 1901. Thenceforward the commissioners were to he elected by the people at the general election, the first election to be in 1900, one of them for a term of two years, another for a term of four years, and another for a term of six years. At all subsequent elections the term of the person elected shall be six years. The duties of this board are minutely specified, — very similar to those of the railroad commissioners with respect to the railroad, steamboat, or canal companies and express and telegraph companies, — and adds to these supervision over telephone companies, building and loan associations, sleeping-car companies, and banks. A separate, distinct provision in the act is “to perform all the duties and exercise all the powers imposed or conferred by chapter 320, Public Laws of 1891, and the acts amendatory thereto.” Neither this act, — which, by the way, was made of force the day after the repeal of the railroad commission act, — nor, as has been seen, this last-named act itself, say anything whatever about the assessment and taxation of railroad property. The cor
Unaided by any decision on this point of the court of last resort in North 'Carolina, the conclusion was reached that it had no such power. This power of assessment was intrusted to the commissioners elected under chapter 320, Laws 1891, and for this purpose they were constituted a board of appraisers. The machinery act of each succeeding year had done this, including that of the year 1899. The legislature of 1899 repealed that act in toto, so far as language and intent could do so. The conclusion then seemed inevitable that the act was in fact repealed. Besides this, one day after that act was said to be repealed the legislature put in force the corporation commission act, by which they declared their purpose to establish the North Carolina corporation commission, by electing then and there three commissioners, to whom was given a different term from that of the railroad commissioners, whose successors would hold for a term differing wholly from the railroad commissioners, who, after one election by the legislature, would thereafter be elected by the people, whose vacancies were filled, not by the governor, but by the board of internal improvements, and who received a different salary, and took a different oath of office: With this light, the conclusion was reached that the act providing for railroad commissioners was repealed; that other officers had been elected, differing in tenure and in other important respects from them; and that, as was stated at bar, two of the former railroad commissioners, having* accepted .election under the new act, and having taken the oath of office thereunder, necessarily vacated their formér office, and there remained but one person who could claim to be a railroad commissioner. So, as he could not act as a board himself, and in fact did not act with any one, and as the corporation commission was not empowered to make the assessment, the conclusion was reached that the supposed assessment was void, and action under it was enjoined.
But, while the case was before this court, there was pending in the courts of North Carolina an action of the state ex relatione Abbott, the railroad commissioner who was not elected on the corporation commission, against Beddingfield, who, never having been a railroad commissioner, was elected on the corporation commission. Abbott claimed that he had property in his office, of which he could not be deprived, except by the abolition of the office, and that, so long as the duties of the office were continued, a mere change of the name of the office did not abolish it or extinguish his right to it; that the corporation commission was but the railroad commission under another name; and that its'passage in no way affected his' right to his office, and that Beddingfield was an intruder therein. The cause was heard in the court of last resort in North Carolina. That court awarded the office to Abbott, and excluded Beddingfield. Construing the acts quoted above, the court held that the railroad commission act was not repealed in fact; that the corporation commission was the same commission, to all intents ánd purposes, except the name; that, when the legislature passed it, they defeated
The question now is, what effect should the judgment of the supreme court of North Carolina have upon the action of this court? Ought it to lead to a reconsideration of its opiniqn, and the recall of ils action thereon?
We are bound to presume that, when a question arose in the state' court, it was thoroughly considered by that tribunal, and that the decision rendered embodied its deliberate judgment. Cross v. Allen, 141 U. S. 539, 12 Sup. Ct. 67, 35 L. Ed. 843. It is the practice of the supreme court of the United States, whose practice controls all federal courts, to adopt the interpretation given by the highest tribunals of the several states to their respective acts of legislation, where such interpretation does not conflict with the paramount authority of the constitution of the United States, binding on their own courts, or with the fundamenial principles of justice and common right. Murray v. Gibson, 15 How. 421, 14 L. Ed. 755. There are exceptions to this rule: When the meaning of a state statute has not become established (Burgess v. Seligman, 107 U. S. 20, 2 Sup. Ct. 10, 27 L. Ed. 359; Carroll Co. v. Smith, 111 U. S. 556, 4 Sup. Ct. 539, 28 L. Ed. 517); when the decision is in conflict with previous decisions of this court; and when the rights which it affects here were acquired before the decision of the state court was made (Carroll Co. v. Smith, supra). In these cases the federal courts' exercise their independent judgment. Subject, however, to these excepiions, by comity or by the suggestion of public policy, federal courts adopt the decision of state courts as to the construction and validity of their local laws. In these cases the supreme court will change its decision when the highest tribunal of a state has given a different interpretation. In Morley v. Railway Co., 146 U. S. 162, 13 Sup. Ct. 54, 36 L. Ed. 925, these propositions were affirmed. The rule of construction adopted by the highest court of the state, in construing its own constitution and one of its own statutes, in a case not involving any question re-examinable in this court, under section 25 of the judiciary act, must be regarded as conclusive in this court. Provident Inst. v. Massachusetts, 6 Wall. 611, 18 L. Ed. 907. “The construction given to a statute of a state by the highest judicial tribunal of such state is regarded as a part of the statute, and is as binding upon the courts of the United States as the text.” Leffingwell v. Warren, 2 Black,
In the argument of the case in this court, four grounds were taken against the constitutionality of the action of the corporation commission: (1) It was denied that it had any power to levy the assessment complained of. (2) It was alleged that the method adopted for assessing the value of railroad property differs so materially from that provided for assessing other property in the state of North Carolina as to deny the complainants the equal protection of the law. (3) That there has been in the state of North Carolina a systematic and intentional undervaluation of real and personal property, other than railroad property, with the design to discriminate against railroads, and to cast upon them an undue share of the burdens of taxation, for the purpose of relieving other property of its. just proportion of state taxation. (4) That, there being this systematic and intentional undervaluation of real and personal property other than railroad property, the yiroperty of complainants lias been valued higher than that of individuals.
The first ground has been passed upon, and, in deference to the decisions of the supreme court of North Carolina, is not sustained.
The three other grounds present federal questions, dependent upon issues both of fact and of law. An examination of the affidavits filed leads to no satisfactory conclusion or to an inclination of opinion. They will be referred.
It was stated at the hearing that appeals in three of the cases have been taken to the circuit, court of appeals, arid have been perfected. These are therefore out of the reach of this court. Ensminger v. Powers, 108 U. S. 302, 303, 2 Sup. Ct. 643, 27 L. Ed. 732.
It is ordered, adjudged, and decreed that each of the cases in the margin, except: the three in which appeals have been taken and.