Weyauwega Telephone Co. v. Public Service Commission

111 N.W.2d 559, 14 Wis. 2d 536, 41 P.U.R.3d 479, 1961 Wisc. LEXIS 306
CourtWisconsin Supreme Court
DecidedOctober 31, 1961
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 111 N.W.2d 559 (Weyauwega Telephone Co. v. Public Service Commission) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Wisconsin Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Weyauwega Telephone Co. v. Public Service Commission, 111 N.W.2d 559, 14 Wis. 2d 536, 41 P.U.R.3d 479, 1961 Wisc. LEXIS 306 (Wis. 1961).

Opinions

Currie, J.

As we view it, four questions are presented on this appeal:

(1) Does Wis. Tel. Co. have an indeterminate permit to provide telephone service in the town of Royalton which imposes upon it a correlative duty to extend service anywhere in the town that the PSC may properly find to be required by public convenience and necessity?

(2) What is the effect of the exchange-area map, filed by Wis. Tel. Co. pursuant to the PSC order authorizing the filing of such maps, upon Wis. Tel. Co.’s undertaking?

(3) If question (1) is answered in the negative, has there been any undertaking by Wis. Tel. Co. to extend service throughout the unincorporated community?

(4) Is there substantial evidence in view of the entire record to support the PSC finding that public convenience and necessity requires Wis. Tel. Co. to extend service as provided in the commission’s order?

Existence and Extent of Indeterminate Permit.

It is a fundamental principle of public utility law that a public utility is required to serve only within the scope of its undertaking, or profession of service. Milwaukee v. Public Service Comm. (1954), 268 Wis. 116, 120, 66 N. W. (2d) 716; 1 Wyman, Public Service Corporations, p. 219, sec. 250.

A public utility may make a profession of service in several ways. One is by the acceptance of a franchise which gives it the right to serve in a certain specified area. 43 Am. [542]*542Jur., Public Utilities and Services, pp. 586, 587, sec. 22, and pp. 601, 602, sec. 47; 1 Wyman, Public Service Corporations, p. 179, sec. 212. In Wisconsin, public-utility franchises have been converted into indeterminate permits. Sec. 196.01 (5), Stats. This court recognized in Northern States Power Co. v. Public Service Comm. (1944), 246 Wis. 215, 224, 16 N. W. (2d) 790, that an obligation to extend service may arise by acceptance of and operation under an indeterminate permit.

The crucial question is whether Wis. Tel. Co. did accept and operate under a franchise in the nature of an indeterminate permit applying to the town of Royalton. If it did, we are satisfied that under the foregoing authorities it could be compelled to extend telephone service anywhere in the town that the PSC might order under a proper finding of public convenience and necessity.

Respondents Wis. Tel. Co. and Weyauwega espouse entirely different theories on the question of whether Wis. Tel. Co. operates under an indeterminate permit in the town of Royalton. Wis. Tel. Co. takes the position that it is impossible for a telephone utility to acquire an indeterminate permit within the limits of a town. On the other hand, Weyauwega concedes that Wis. Tel. Co. is operating in the town under an indeterminate permit, but contends that the area to which such permit extends is confined to that in which it has made a profession of service as evidenced by its exchange-area map filed with the PSC.

The PSC grounds its contention, that Wis. Tel. Co. has accepted and is operating in Royalton under a town-wide indeterminate permit, upon sec. 182.017, Stats.,1 and the [543]*543holding of this court in Kenosha v. Kenosha Home Telephone Co. (1912), 149 Wis. 338, 135 N. W. 848. Subs. (1) and (7) of sec. 182.017 were formerly part of sec. 180.17, which was sec. 1778 prior to the renumbering under the decimal system. Sec. 1778, first enacted in 1851, contained substantially the same language as present sub. (1) of sec. 182.017. The provision of present sub. (7) was not added by the legislature until 1905. The particular holding in the Kenosha Case, relied upon by the PSC, was thus stated by the court (p. 340):

“The first question presented by the appeal is, Was the ordinance of March, 1903, purporting to grant to the Citizens Telephone & Telegraph Company the right to operate a general telephone system in the city of Kenosha, valid as a franchise? This court has repeatedly answered the question in the negative. The only franchise needed by a telephone company to enable it to conduct its business anywhere within the state is the franchise conferred upon it by virtue of sec. 1778, Stats., when it is incorporated pursuant thereto. [Citing cases.]” (Emphasis supplied.)

The Wisconsin Public Utility Law was originally enacted as ch. 499, Laws of 1907. Sec. 1797m-1 (5) of this act provided for the transformation of certain public-utility franchises into indeterminate permits. Present sec. 196.01 [544]*544(5), Stats., is the successor to this statute.2 As originally enacted, sec. 1797m-1 (5) did not apply to telephone utilities. This was because express statutory language limited it to “grants, directly or indirectly, from the state ... to own, operate, manage, or control any plant or equipment . . . within this state for the production, transmission, delivery, or furnishing of heat, light, water, or power, . . .” Thus, telephone utilities were not expressly included. In 1929, by means of a Revisor’s bill this statute was amended to read “any public utility,’’ in which form it was substantially the same as present sec. 196.01 (5).

In 1930 the attorney general ruled that under the holding of the Kenosha Case any utility company organized under sec. 180.17 (now sec. 182.017), Stats., acquires an indeterminate permit upon entering a town for the purpose of rendering utility service, if no other utility already is operating in the town under an indeterminate permit. See 19 Op. Atty. Gen. 378. This is essentially the present contention of the PSC, except it also maintains that, if a second telephone utility obtains a certificate of convenience and necessity to operate in the town, such second telephone utility also operates in the town under an indeterminate permit.

However, this opinion of the attorney general and the present contention of the PSC were rejected by this court in South Shore Utility Co. v. Railroad Comm. (1932), 207 Wis. 95, 240 N. W. 784. There the railroad commis[545]*545sion had determined that the first electric utility to enter a town and render service thereby obtained an indeterminate permit which continued after the part of the town in which it served was incorporated as a village. The railroad commission ordered that a second electric utility, which had obtained a franchise from the village, cease and desist from rendering service in the village. The statute under which the first utility sought relief was sec. 196.50 (1). A history pf sec. 196.50, stating its wording at different periods, is set forth in an appendix at the end of this opinion. At the time the South Shore Case arose, this statute read in part as follows:

“No license, permit, or franchise shall be granted to own, operate, manage, or control any plant or equipment for the conveyance of telephone messages, or for the production, transmission, delivery, or furnishing of heat, light, water, or power in any municipality, where there is in operation under an indeterminate permit a public utility engaged in similar service, without first securing from the commission a declaration, after a public hearing of all parties interested, that public convenience and necessity require such second public utility.” (Italics supplied.)

Because of this statutory language, the outcome of the South Shore Case

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Weyauwega Telephone Co. v. Public Service Commission
111 N.W.2d 559 (Wisconsin Supreme Court, 1961)

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Bluebook (online)
111 N.W.2d 559, 14 Wis. 2d 536, 41 P.U.R.3d 479, 1961 Wisc. LEXIS 306, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/weyauwega-telephone-co-v-public-service-commission-wis-1961.