Pine Bluff daily graphic. (Pine Bluff, Ark.) 1893-1942, 1913-07-08
CANNOT EXTEND
Dam FRANCHISE
Supreme Court Rules Com
mission Can Only Grant
Water Power Charters.
DAVIDSON Is DOOMED
Valentine Must Serve II Years for
Murder-Lonohe Road Dis
trict Net Valid.

Little Rock, July There being
! one more week of the session of the
cation begins, the members of that
! tribunal did q regular clcanng-up
/ business Monday, rendering many inn
portant decisions, among them being
one which limits the powers of the
Arkansas Railroad Commission.
The railroad commission extended
| the franchise of the Garland Power
! and Dam Company four years, under
recent act Of the legislature which
transferred from the state board of
railroad incorporation the right to
deal with charters of this character to
the railroad commission.
The attorney general sued in the
Pulaski Circuit Court for a writ OF
certiorari to quash the order of the
commission, declaring that body had
| exceeded its rights. The petition was
dismissed in this court and an appeal
taken
The acts of 1905 give the board of
railroad incorporation the right to
grant franchises to power companies,
and the acts of 1913 amended these
by transferring this authority to the
railroad commission and. in addition,
giving that body the right to pass
upon changes of plans and locations
which We're filed with it by the COM
panies. The supreme court holds that
the question of limiting the time for
franchise or the extending of it is
not mentioned in the act, hence the
commission cannot claim such auth
GRITTY. The act merely gives the COM
mission the right to grant charter and
name the maximum rates which are to
be charged.
The supreme court denied a re-
hearing of Odus Davidson, convicted
of brutally numbering Ella Barham
near Harrison, who sought to escape
punishment by setting up the plea that
his conviction was illegal because he
was not present when the verdict was
rendered. He had been taken away
to prevent a lynching. The court also
refused to postpone further reconsid-
GRAFTON until after the summer vaca-
ton.
A local case passed upon was that OF
]. B. Grant VS.. Chris Ledwidge, Pu-
laski chancery which was affirmed
Grant claimed that he purchased $685.
600 worth of stock in the English
Grant Lumber Company from Chris
Ledwidge and e. Y. Grant, agreeing to
pay $4,000 therefore, paying $4,000 in
cash and giving his note for $4,000
He alleged that an agreement existed
by which he would turn the stock
back at the end of the year for $4,000.
The company was placed in the hands
of receiver a short time after, and
Grant disposed of his stock back to
the others for $4,000, receiving their
note for the same. The receiver then
sued him on his $4,000 note given in
part payment for the stock, and re-,
ceived judgment for $1.66747. The
lower court dismissed the claim of
| Grant, and the supreme court sus-
| tanned it.
c. j. Valentine, who was convicted
| in the Jackson circuit court for MUIR
dering Vernon Neeley left February,
receiving sentence of 81 years in the
penitentiary, will have to serve his
term, the court affirming his case.
| Alex Glass, convicted of burglary
in Sebastian county, and sentenced to
serve three years, was unable to get
his case reversed. The court also af-
| firmed the verdict in Turner VS.. State,
from Hampstead circuit. Turner is
alleged to have stolen some hats from
a case on the platform of the depot at
Hope. He admitted his guilt on the
representation that he would be
prosecuted for petit larceny. The
prosecuting attorney discovered that
the value of the hats made the crime
grand larceny, and declined to enter
tain the confession of Turner he then
being convicted for the higher crime.
| The Home Insurance Company VS..
J. B. Wilson and T. S. Grayson, Col
umbia Circuit Court, reversed and re-