Court Opinion

ID: 9834437
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 23:35:26.297332+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:44:15.352454
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
In the first paragraph of our opinion herein, we said; “In this case, however, we regard the Railroad Commission as occupying the place ordinarily occupied by a trial court. The duty devolved upon it primarily to ascertain the facts. The suit before the district court, upon appellees’ answer, was in the nature of an appeal from the findings of the commission.” This language may admit of a construction that we did not intend. We did not mean to say that we were called upon to review the evidence adduced before the commission. We have no knowledge as to what such evidence was. The only testimony in the record is that given in the district court upon the trial of this case, and upon such trial it would not have been permissible to prove what was testified to before the Railroad Commission, except by way of impeaching a witness. What we meant by the language above quoted is that, inasmuch as the statute makes the orders of the commission binding, unless the party complaining of the same shall prove by clear and satisfactory evidence that they are unreasonable and unjust to him, an. appellate court must indulge in favor of such orders all the presumptions that are given by law to the judgment of a trial court. That is to say, it must be presumed that an order so made was justified .by the facts in the case, until the contrary is clearly and satisfactorily shown by the testimony adduced in the district court in a suit to set aside such order.
We have carefully re-examined the record in this case, and have concluded that we yvere in error in holding that the evidence justified us in finding that the orders of the Railroad Commission of Texas were not unjust and unreasonable to appellees the Cotton Belt and the T. & B. V. in so far as said orders required each of said roads to pay one-third of the value . of the ground upon which the union depot was ordered to be constructed, and one-third of the cost of erecting and maintaining said depot. There is evidence in the record from which it might be inferred that said orders were, in this respect, unjust and unreasonable as to said appellees; but the case does not seem to have been as fully developed on these points by either party as it should have been. We think this case ought to be remanded, in order that these issues of fact should be again submitted to and specifically passed upon by the trial court. See Miller v. Hobdy, 159 S. W. 96, recently decided by this court on motion for rehearing.
We adhere in all other respects to our opinion herein, but, for the reason above stated, we reverse and remand this cause to be tried in accordance with said opinion, and with this additional opinion on motion for rehearing. Accordingly the motion for rehearing is granted, and this cause is reversed and remanded.