Railroad Commission of Texas v. Central Freight Lines, Inc.

434 S.W.2d 911, 1968 Tex. App. LEXIS 2585, 1968 WL 163762
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedNovember 27, 1968
DocketNo. 11637
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 434 S.W.2d 911 (Railroad Commission of Texas v. Central Freight Lines, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Railroad Commission of Texas v. Central Freight Lines, Inc., 434 S.W.2d 911, 1968 Tex. App. LEXIS 2585, 1968 WL 163762 (Tex. Ct. App. 1968).

Opinion

HUGHES, Justice.

This suit was brought by Central Freight Lines, Inc., Red Arrow Freight Lines, Inc. and Merchants Fast Motor Lines, Inc., ap-pellees, seeking invalidation of certain orders of the Railroad Commission of Texas granting V. C. Bilbo Common Carrier Motor Carrier authority to provide services in competition with appellees. The trial court granted appellees the relief sought. The Commission and Bilbo have appealed.

On September 30, 1964, V. C. Bilbo filed an application with the Railroad Commission seeking to amend Limited Common Carrier Certificate No. 3039 so as to authorize the transportation of additional commodities over various routes as follows:

BUILDING MATERIALS, GYPSUM (EXCEPT IN BULK), GYPSUM PRODUCTS AND MATERIALS AND SUPPLIES used in the manufacture and/or distribution thereof, over the following highways:
“United States Highways (Here follows thirty six numbers)
State Highways (Here follows one hundred and sixty one numbers), serving all intermediate points along said highways.”

On February 25, 1965 the Commission issued its Order granting such application and authorizing Bilbo to transport:

“Building Materials, limited to those that are closely related to gypsum (except in bulk), gypsum products and materials and supplies used in the manufacture and/or distribution thereof”

over the same highways listed in the application. On March 17, 1965, appellees filed exceptions to the Order, and on July 16, 1965, the Commission issued another Order sustaining the exceptions in part and amending its previous Order of Febru[913]*913ary 25, 1965, limiting the grant of authority to the following commodities:

“Gypsum (except in bulk), Gypsum products and Building materials and supplies when tendered as an integral part of the Gypsum products, from the plant or warehouse of Flintkote Company at Sweet-water and Enis; from the plant or warehouse of Bestwall Gypsum Company at Acme and Houston; and from the plant or warehouse of Celotex Corporation approximately five (5) miles west of Hamlin, Texas, over the same highways set forth in the Order of February 25th.”

Findings of fact and conclusions of law were made and filed by the trial court at the request of appellants, but additional findings and conclusions requested by ap-pellees were overruled.

Appellants’ First Point is that the trial court erred in holding that the Orders of the Commission grant Bilbo a Common Carrier Certificate over irregular routes of a type and kind not authorized by Art. 911b, Vernon’s Ann.Tex.Civ.St., and were, therefore, unauthorized by law.

Under the authority granted Bilbo, he proposes to operate on a call and demand basis on irregular schedules over any and all of the highways named in his Certificate in order to provide service from point of origin to destination.

The evidence shows that it has been the practice of the Commission for many years to grant limited Common Carrier Certificates authorizing the transportation of limited classes of commodities over regular routes, and that the Commission has construed 911b consistently to authorize the granting of Common Carrier Certificates (as opposed to specialized motor carrier certificates) over regular routes only.1

The basic position of appellants is that Art. 911b does not require the Commission to restrict the granting of Common Carrier Certificates to regular routes only, but if so, the Certificate and Orders issued Bilbo describe regular routes over which the proposed operations must be conducted.

We believe that it would be helpful to an understanding of our decision to consider, briefly, the legislative history of the regulation of motor carriers for hire over our highways.2

The first effort of the Texas Legislature at such regulation was by enacting Chapter 314, Acts Regular Session, 41st Legislature, 1929, which became effective June 13, 1929. In the 1929 Act motor carriers were classified as either Class “A” or [914]*914Class “B” carriers, and in Section 1(b) of the Act, Class “A” carriers were specifically defined as carriers engaged in transporting property for hire “ * * * over fixed routes, under regular schedules and having fixed termini * * * ” In the same section of the Act, Class “B” carriers were defined as carriers transporting property for hire having “ * * * no fixed routes, regular schedules or fixed termini * * * » Class “A” carriers were to receive “certificates of convenience and necessity,” while Class “B” carriers were to receive “permits.”

Section 10 of the 1929 Act required that an applicant for a Class “A” certificate file an application defining the routes over which operations were proposed and setting forth the applicant’s operating schedules, while Section 6 prescribed the type of application which the Class “B” motor carrier applicants were required to file. The provisions of the 1929 Act relating to public hearing required that such hearings be held with respect to applications for certificates of convenience and necessity, and since only Class “A” carriers were recipients of such certificates (as distinguished from the “permits” issued to Class “B” carriers), the Railroad Commission construed the Act to mean that no hearing or proof of public convenience and necessity was necessary in approving applications for Class “B” permits.

The 1929 Act was amended by the 42nd Legislature in 1931. See Chapter 277, Acts of Regular Session of the 42nd Legislature in 1931. The 1931 Act, which was and is codified as Art. 911b, V.T.C.S., did not define common carrier motor carriers specifically but did define a contract carrier as any motor carrier other than a common carrier. Section 3 of the Act provided that no motor carrier shall operate as a common carrier without first having obtained a “certificate of convenience and necessity” pursuant to a finding to the effect that the public convenience and necessity require such operation, and that no motor carrier shall operate as a contract carrier without first having obtained from the Commission a “permit” so to do in accordance with other provisions of the Act. Section 10 of the 1929 Act was carried forward word-for-word into Section 10 of Art. 911b which today prescribes the requisites of a common carrier application.

The “grandfather” clause of the 1931 Act appears in Section 5 of Art. 911b and provides in pertinent part as follows:

“ * * * the Commission shall, without application or hearing when this Act goes into effect, issue all motor carriers then operating lawfully under permanent certificates [f. n. 3] of public convenience and necessity heretofore issued to them, certificates in lieu of the certificates issued under the terms of the former law covering the same routes that said common carrier shall have been operating over, and no more.”

The “grandfather” clause thus provided for the issuance of common carrier motor carrier certificates only to those carriers operating over fixed regular operating routes, to wit, the so-called Class “A” carriers under the 1929 Act.

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434 S.W.2d 911, 1968 Tex. App. LEXIS 2585, 1968 WL 163762, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/railroad-commission-of-texas-v-central-freight-lines-inc-texapp-1968.