Citizens Electric Illuminating Co. v. Lackawanna & Wyoming Valley Railroad

Citations

• 255 Pa. 176
• 99 A. 465
• 1916 Pa. LEXIS 544

Syllabus

<p>Corporations — Railroads—Furnishing of electric power — Acts of February 19, 18J¡.9, P. L. 79, and March 19, 1908, P. L. 8k- — Ultra vires — Electric companies — Territorial rights — Bill in equity — Injunction.</p> <p>1. A corporation has no natural rights, such as an individual or partnership, and if a power is claimed for it, the words giving the power, or from which it is necessarily implied, must be found in the charter or the power does not exist. Where the provision of the charter is doubtful the power does not exist.</p> <p>2. An implied power is such as is necessary to enable the corporation to carry out a power expressly granted it so as to effect -the purpose for which .the corporation was created.</p> <p>3. A railroad company, is not given the right either by the Act of February 19, 1849, P. L. 79, or the Act of March 19, 1903, P. L. 34, to supply an independent coal company with electric current from its plant sufficient for the latter’s mining operations, and will be enjoined from so doing at the-instance of an electric company possessing the exclusive privilege, as against other electric companies, of furnishing electricity in the township in which the coal company operates.</p> <p>8 tatutes — C onstruciion- — Intention.</p> <p>4. Every statute is to be construed with reference to the object intended to be accomplished by it even to the extent of restraining the meaning of general terms where found necessary in order to interpret clearly the spirit and reason of the statute.</p> <p>5. A thing which is within the letter of a statute is not within the statute unless it be within the intention of its makers.</p>