Court Opinion

ID: 9605723
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 02:41:10.706674+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:02:29.941106
License: Public Domain

Ingram, Justice,
dissenting.
This case is here on appeal from the judgment of the trial court holding the complaint states a claim upon which relief can be granted. I would affirm that judgment as I agree that there should be an evidentiary hearing in the trial court to determine whether the present rate order is "other than just and reasonable” as specified in the Georgia Constitution (Code Ann. § 2-2401).
It seems to me that if our Constitution protects the utility company from the confiscation of its property caused by an unreasonably low rate, it also protects a consumer from a confiscation of its property caused by an unreasonably high rate.
There is always a legal presumption that any rate order is reasonable, but whether it is or is not depends upon all the relevant facts and circumstances developed in a particular case. I agree the courts have no jurisdiction or expertise in the area of rate making and therefore should interfere only in plain and palpably clear cases of obviously unreasonable orders of the commission. But even in this narrow area of constitutional review, the final determination will depend on the evidence in each case and cannot be resolved as a matter of law. We have held the courts are available to determine whether a particular order is unreasonably low. See Georgia Power Co. v. Georgia Pub. Serv. Commission, 231 Ga. 339 (201 SE2d 423). If we presume to make this kind of judgment on a constitutional basis, we ought to be able, without additional difficulty, to decide whether a particular order is unreasonably high. To undertake the one and decline the other is, to my mind, a denial of equal protection of the law. Simple justice demands equality before the law. To rule the court is open to relieve the utility company from an unjust and unreasonable order but not the consumer mocks the constitutional protections which we cherish and herald as available to all who are aggrieved.
Suppose the evidence shows that the plaintiffs have *573a valuable property right in a business that cannot operate without electricity and that the only place they can purchase electricity is from the defendant at a rate which is so unreasonably high and unjust that, in practical terms, it is confiscatory. In my opinion, this would interfere with the constitutional rights of the consumer and these rights can be protected in the courts in a case where the consumer has exhausted all available administrative remedies by appearing before the commission.
In summary, I conclude that if a rate order is subject to judicial review for being unreasonably low, it is subject to judicial review for being unreasonably high, and I would apply City of Atlanta v. Atlanta Gas Light Co., 149 Ga. 405 (100 SE 439), as the trial court did in this case.