Public Service Commission.
PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION.
Action of the public service commission as to fares was held, upon a bill in
equity by the receiver of the Bay State Street Railway Company, to annul
the action, to have been warranted. Donham v. Public Service Commission-
ers, 309.
In the case above described it was pointed out that the decision was confined
to the facts disclosed by the record, and that it was not necessary to con-
sider whether circumstances might arise where the public service commission
would be warranted, or whether under present circumstances they might
be warranted, in establishing rates likely to yield a revenue less than the
rates proposed by the receiver or less than a fair interest on the capital
honestly and prudently invested. Ibid.
In the case above described it also was held that the city of Fall River was
not a proper party to the suit, the public interests being entrusted to the
Attorney General. Ibid.
Under St. 1913, c. 784, the public service commission has authority to make
an order, relating to the transportation of passengers on the city lines of
a street railway corporation, requiring the issuing of not less than five
tickets or tokens for thirty-five cents as the sole means by which the public
can avail themselves of the seven-cent fare established by such order and
requiring a ten cent fare when paid in cash. Such a regulation is not un-
reasonable and is lawful. Fall River v. Public Service Commissioners, 329.
The provision contained in U. S. Rev. Sts. § 3587, in regard to minor coins
being legal tender, has no relevancy to the regulation above described. Ibid.
The provisions contained in art. 1, §§ 8, 10 of the Constitution of the United
States giving Congress exclusive power to coin money and regulate the value
thereof and forbidding the States to make anything but gold and silver
coin a tender in payment of debts, have no relevancy to the regulation
above described in regard to the sale of tickets or tokens receivable for fare
on street railway lines. Ibid.
The public service commissioners cannot maintain a bill in equity under
St. 1913, c. 784, § 28, against a telephone corporation to enforce by a man-
datory injunction an order of the public service commission relating to
toll telephone rates within this Commonwealth, while the telephones and
property of the corporation are in the possession and control of the United
States under a proclamation of the President and a bulletin of the Post-
master General made by authority of the war power granted by the resolu
tion of Congress of July 16, 1918. Public Service Commissioners v. New
England Telephone & Telegraph Co. 465.
On a petition under St. 1906, c. 463, Part I, §§ 25, 26, for the appointment of
a special commission to determine which party shall carry into effect
a decision of the county commissioners that an alteration, which does not
involve the abolition of a crossing at grade, shall be made in the crossing
of a railroad over a public way in a city by rebuilding the bridge over the
railroad, and which party shall pay the charges and expenses of making
such alteration, it was held that the special commission had authority to
determine that the cost of the relocation of a stairway for passengers lead-
ing from the elevated platform of the railroad station to the street level
below should be paid for wholly by the city. Directors of Boston & Maine
Railroad, petitioners, 171.
In an action against a railroad corporation for damage done to a harp of the
plaintiff checked as baggage on a train of the defendant on which the
plaintiff was a passenger, it was held that a certain provision of the tariff
by which the plaintiff was bound did not, and could not, exonerate the
defendant from liability for damage to the harp through negligence of the
defendant's employee. Perkins v. New York, New Haven, & Hartford
Railroad, 336.
It further was held that on the evidence the plaintiff was entitled to go to
the jury on the question of the defendant's negligence, which could have
been found to be gross negligence. Ibid.
In the case above described it also was held that the plaintiff was bound by
her valuation of $25 and her agreement that the defendant's liability should
be limited to this amount. Ibid.
In the same case it also was said that in the phrase "likely to be damaged by
ordinary handling," contained in the provision above quoted from the
defendant's tariff schedule, the words "ordinary handling" meant nothing
more than the ordinary wear necessarily incidental to the transportation
of such articles where reasonable care is used by the carrier. Ibid.
Provisions of bills of lading of carloads of oranges shipped by an orange com-
pany in California to a consignee in Boston, agent of the company to re-
ceive the oranges and sell them at auction, relating to payment of charges
by the consignee, were held not to have been waived by a delivery of suc-
cessive carloads of the oranges by a clerk of the last of the connecting
carriers to the consignee, without collecting the freight charges, nor was
such delivery a breach of any duty that the railroad corporation owed to
the orange company as the consignor. Boston & Maine Railroad v. National
Orange Co. 351.
St. 1906, c. 463, entitled an act relative to railroad corporations and street
railway companies, does not repeal either expressly or by implication the
special statute, St. 1905, c. 422, providing for a new union passenger station
in Worcester, and therefore a petition for a writ of mandamus addressed
to the public service commissioners, commanding them to file their award
to determine the rent to be paid for use of the Union Station in Worcester
with the Supreme Judicial Court for revision under St. 1906, c. 463, Part
II, § 140, must be dismissed. Boston & Albany Railroad v. Public Service
Commissioners, 358.
See also NEGLIGENCE, Railroad.
An insurance company has a right at any time to terminate its agency rela-
tions with a broker; and if, upon a receiver being appointed of the estate
of a broker, an insurance company, whose agent he is, itself makes a de-
mand upon a policy-holder, whose policy had been solicited and procured
by the broker, for a premium due from him, such act is a termination of the
agency. Ide v. Aetna Ins. Co. 523.
After such termination of the agency, the broker has no right to demand or
to sue for and collect the premium from his customer, and therefore the
receiver has no right to do so in his stead. Ide v. Aetna Ins. Co. 523.
In a suit in equity brought by a receiver of the estate of the broker, appointed
under the circumstances above described, to enjoin a suit by the insurance
company against the customer and to enforce payment of the premium to
the plaintiff, it was said that it could not be contended successfully that
the broker was entitled to a lien upon the premium which he had not col-
lected. Ibid.
But, the insurance company agreeing that the amount of the broker's com-
mission might be paid to the receiver, a decree was ordered that the amount
of the broker's commission be paid to the plaintiff and the balance of the
premium to be paid to the insurance company. Ibid.
In the above described suit, no question as to the liability of the policy-
holder being raised, although he was a party to the suit, and he having been
enjoined from making any payment pending a final decree in the suit, it
was held that he should not be required to pay any interest. Ibid.
Findings of fact by a judge who heard a suit in equity by a religious society
and by nine persons alleged to have been elected the trustees of the society
against other persons who were the trustees of the society before the alleged
election, where evidence was reported by a commissioner, to the effect that
the prayers of the bill should be granted, were held to have been warranted
and a decree was ordered enjoining the defendants from interfering with
the individual plaintiffs in the performance of their duties as the trustees of
the society. First African Methodist Episcopal Society v. Worthy, 331.
In an action of replevin for certain machines that had been delivered by the
plaintiff to the defendant under a contract of conditional sale, the title to
the machines to remain in the plaintiff who had a right to retake them on
the defendant's failure to pay notes given for a part of the purchase price,
a plea in abatement setting up the defence of the pendency of a suit in
equity against the plaintiff to enjoin the enforcement of the contract of
conditional sale on the alleged ground that the plaintiff had broken an
agreement therein and that, in order to deprive the defendant of a remedy
against him, the plaintiff had transferred the notes and the contract of
conditional sale to a certain trust company, must fail because, among other
reasons, the fact that the plaintiff brought the action of replevin showed
that he had not transferred his rights to a trust company. Orieg v. Turner,
174.
In an action by a father for expenses incurred in consequence of personal
injuries sustained by his minor son by reason of the defendant's negligence
and for loss of the earnings of his minor son by reason of such injuries, a
judgment in favor of the plaintiff's minor son in a former action brought by
Res Judicata (continued).
the son against the defendant to recover for such injuries is not conclusive,
nor apparently is it admissible in evidence, because the plaintiff was not a
party nor a privy to such former judgment and must prove every essential
allegation of his declaration as if his son's action had not been brought or
was pending for trial. McGreevey v. Boston Elevated Railway, 347.
In the case above described it was pointed out that, although the two rights of
action sprang from the same wrong, the father's right of action for expenses
incurred for his son's cure and for the loss of his son's earnings was wholly
independent of the son's right of action for his injuries. Ibid.
REVERE BEACH RESERVATION.
The boulevard of the Revere Beach Reservation was constructed on land'
taken for park purposes by the metropolitan park commission under St.
1893, c. 407, St. 1894, c. 483, and St. 1895, cc. 305, 450, and, although it
was in the form of a boulevard and was spoken of as such, it never became
a public way, and these statutes did not impose any liability on the metro-
politan park commissioners for a defect in or want of repair of such boule-
vard. Gero v. Metropolitan Park Commissioners, 389.
In the case in which the decision above stated was made it was pointed out
that in taking the land for the boulevard of the Revere Beach Reservation
and in constructing that boulevard the metropolitan park commission did
not act under St. 1894, c. 288. Ibid.
Rule 31 of the Superior Court. Sherry v. Littlefield, 220.
The word "sale" means the transfer of property from one person to another
for a consideration of value. It "implies ordinarily the passing from seller
to buyer of the general and absolute title to property as distinguished from
a special interest, a bailment, a license, a lease, a pawn or other limited
right falling short of complete ownership." By RUGG, C. J. Arnold v.
North American Chemical Co. 196.
On the evidence at the trial of an action for goods sold and delivered, where
the defendant contended that the goods were sold and delivered to another
person to whom the defendant before the delivery of the goods had sold
his business, and who thereupon had filed a certificate under St. 1907,
c. 539, that he was conducting the business under a name similar to that
formerly used by the defendant, it was held that the judge rightly refused
to order a verdict for the defendant and that the case was one for the jury.
Seamless Rubber Co. v. Reed, 454.
In an action of replevin for certain machines that had been delivered by the
plaintiff to the defendant under a contract of conditional sale, the title to
the machines to remain in the plaintiff who had a right to retake them on
the defendant's failure to pay notes given for a part of the purchase price,
a plea in abatement setting up the defence of the pendency of a suit in
equity against the plaintiff to enjoin the enforcement of the contract of
conditional sale on the alleged ground that the plaintiff had broken an
agreement therein and that, in order to deprive the defendant of a remedy
against him, the plaintiff had transferred the notes and the contract of
conditional sale to a certain trust company, must fail because, among other
reasons, the fact that the plaintiff brought the action of replevin showed
that he had not transferred his rights to a trust company. Orieg v. Turner,
Where under a contract of conditional sale of a chattel the price, which is a
round sum, is payable in instalments, the first in cash and the others rep-
resented by seven promissory notes, and the title is not to pass until the
last note is paid, if the buyer defaults on the cash payment by failing to
make good a check which he has given for it and also fails to pay the first
four notes as they fall due, and thereupon the seller brings an action of
replevin for the chattel, he has elected to disaffirm the sale and he then or
thereafter cannot maintain an action of contract on the check and the
overdue notes. Russell v. Martin, 379.
Upon the evidence at the trial of an action by a commercial banker against
a merchant upon an account annexed containing several items for goods
sold to the defendant by a manufacturer who, upon making each sale,
assigned his claim for the purchase price to the plaintiff, where the defendant
filed a claim in set-off for the purchase price of certain goods which, before
the sale of the goods which formed the basis of the plaintiff's claim, he had
purchased of the manufacturer, had paid the plaintiff for, and, in accordance
with an agreement made with the manufacturer at the time of sale, had
returned to the manufacturer, it was held that it could not be said that any
duty rested upon the defendant to state to the plaintiff the existence of his
claim against the manufacturer, and therefore that silence of the defendant
did not work an estoppel. E. V. Harman & Co. v. William Filene's Sons
Co. 52.
Action by the administratrix of the estate of the mate of a steam trawler
against the owner of the vessel for causing his death by alleged negligence
in failing to provide a railing or guard upon the steps which, it was held,
could not be maintained because there was no evidence of the defendant's
negligence, the defendant having been under no duty to the intestate to
change the obvious conditions of the vessel where the intestate was to
perform his work from what they were when he first was employed. Ford v.
Trident Fisheries Co. 400.
Further evidence as to the way in which the boat which was lowered to pick
up the intestate was lashed to the deck and the fact that there was only one
oar in the boat were held not to show that such negligence contributed to
the death of the intestate. Ibid.
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