Court Opinion

ID: 9830054
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 19:50:46.08584+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:11.838747
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
Reference of a San Antonio daily newspaper to some decision by some nisi prius court in Memphis, Term., is cited as an authority to the effect that the state or a municipality cannot require a bond to protect its citizens from damages incurred at the-hands of á common carrier. This cannot be recognized by any appellate court as authority. The decision, if in fact it was made, of the Tennessee trial court, is in the face of a de-cisión of the Supreme Court of the state of Washington, in which it was held:
“Now the act in question does two things of importance as legislative functions, viz.: (1) It recognizes a new sort of common carrier; and (2) it enacts a system of regulation of such common earners. It is true that it does not limit the speed of such passenger ears, nor the number to be permitted on given streets, nor the capacity of the car, nor the routes, nor rules of the road. It does; however, regulate them to the extent of requiring them to obtain permits from the secretary of state to operate, and to furnish a surety bond in a specified amount to the approval of the licensing officer, with specified conditions therein and provides for civil actions to recover against the carrier and the bond for any injury occasioned by the negligence or unlawful act of such carrier.” State v. Howell (Wash.) 147 Pac. 1159.
That language was held in regard to an act of the Legislature, providing that any person, firm, or corporation desiring to engage in the business of carrying or transporting passengers for hire in any motor propelled vehicle over and along any public street, road, or highway, in any city of the first class, should obtain a license and give an indemnity bond. The Washington court held the act constitutional saying:
“The reasonable regulation of common carriers by legislation has always been recognized as a proper exercise of the police power touching the safety and welfare of the public. No citation of authorities is deemed necessary to sustain the above statement in these terms. Whatever, therefore, may be the general effectiveness of this law as to regulating such common carriers, it certainly can be said with conviction that it is an attempt at such regulation. For instance, it may have the effect of limiting the number of such carriers upon the streets by the restraints put upon them; and it may conduce to the safety of passengers carried by such vehicles and others upon the streets by the restraints placed upon them. At all events, the body of the act certainly bears all the semblance of an attempted exercise of police power, and of coming within the excepted provisions of the seventh amendment to the Constitution.”
The city of San. Antonio is given exclusive control of the streets, and if the Legislature has the power to require a bond for the protection of the citizen against the negligence of common carriers along a street, the municipality to whom its powers have been delegated would have the same authority. “The power possessed by the state to attach as a condition to the grant of a franchise to a quasi public corporation the performance of duties beneficial to the public may be exercised by the municipality under a delegated power to grant to such a corporation the use of its streets.” Dill. Mun. Corp. § 1229.
 The state has assumed and exercised the right to forfeit titles to public lands by the stroke of a pen upon the part of the land commissioner, has authorized and enforced the right to forfeit liquor licenses by the comptroller, and these acts are held to be done in due course of law. How then can it be claimed that section 9 of the ordinance which provides for a forfeiture in case of certain infráctions of the ordinance be held to be in contravention of the-fourteenth or any *11other amendment to the Constitution of the United States? The Supreme Court of Texas has held that a title to land was forfeited by the comptroller writing the words “Land forfeited” upon certain papers in his office. Brightman v. Comanche Co., 94 Tex. 599, 63 S. W. 857; Hoefer v. Robison, 104 Tex. 159, 135 S. W. 371. Can it be that the right to operate an automobile for hire in San Antonio is more sacred than the right of a family to a homestead? Has the owner of such automobile not had a day in court when he is given notice to appear before the city council to answer to charges as to violation of the conditions of his license, and is given the right to introduce witnesses and be heard in his defense? There is no merit in the contention. If the man whose license is forfeited is dissatisfied, there are ways by which he can carry the matter into the courts of the state. Appellant has no right or authority whatever to conduct his business on the streets of San Antonio and, in order to obtain permission to do so, must comply with the conditions prescribed by the municipality. Appellant desired to use the streets for private purposes of gain, and the city has the absolute right to prohibit the use of the streets for his private business, and in case it gave permission for such use had the right to compel the payment of á license fee.
While protesting that the ordinance was passed not to regulate, but to destroy, the new cheap transportation for the benefit of “intrenched interests,” appellant loses sight of the fact that when he.took up the occupation of a common carrier he became subject to the rules governing common carriers, and cannot contend that the same regulation should be applied to him that is applied to the individual riding in his private carriage or wagon or automobile on the street. There is nothing in the ordinance or in the record justifying the wholesale charge that the ordinance was passed in the interest of a certain corporation, and was intended to destroy rather than regulate the motor car services on the streets.
In the case of Hoefling v. City of San Antonio, 85 Tex. 228, 20 S. W. 85, 16 L. R. A. 608, the business being taxed was one that appellant had the right to engage in, at the place in which he desired to prosecute it, but in this appellant seeks to engage in a business on the streets which he has no right to engage in, and which could be absolutely prohibited by the city. The occupation of a common carrier on the streets of a city is not one like that of a grocer or druggist that can be engaged in at the will and pleasure of any one with the necessary means, and the occupation tax for which could not exceed one-half that levied by the state, but the “jitney” occupation is one that cannot be exercised except by the authority and under the conditions prescribed by the city.
There is no strength or force in the contention that the city of San Antonio is not* empowered to grant a franchise unless at the same time it grants a right of way, or, in other words, that a franchise cannot be granted except to a railway company. In section 101 of the charter of the city, of San Antonio it is provided:
“Franchises for the use of the streets and public places of the city may be granted by the affirmative vote of four commissioners, but no franchise or privilege for the use of any of the public streets or other public places of the city shall ever be granted for any but a strictly public purpose, and any grant of a franchise or privilege hereafter made for the use of any of the public streets or other public places within said city, where from the nature of the case the use thereof would be private, or only colorably public, or chiefly for private purposes, shall be absolutely void.”
That provision of the charter is broad enough to cover any franchise granted by the city, the only limitation being that it must be made in the interest of the public. That section is the one giving the authority to the city to grant franchises or privileges, and such authority is not confined to granting franchises only to individuals and corporations that are granted a designated right of way. Sections 103 and 104 speak of rights of way merely in connection with extentions of existing charters.
The contention of appellant as to the license fee being an occupation tax was anticipated and fully disposed of by the Legislature in section, 99 of the city charter, in which authority is given to charge license and inspection fees, and provides that “such fees shall not be construed as occupation taxes.”
The motion is overruled.