Dolan v. Puget Sound Traction, Light & Power Co.

Citations

• 72 Wash. 343
• 130 P. 353
• 1913 Wash. LEXIS 1460

Syllabus

<p>Street Railroads — Franchises—Ordinances. A street railway-franchise ordinance to extend lines for two blocks, expressly declaring that nothing therein contained shall affect any franchise previously granted or authorize the city to acquire any property in the public streets heretofore constructed or located under any franchise previously granted, conflicts with a provision in a city charter providing that when any franchise is granted, the grantee shall voluntarily agree that “all the property of the grantee within the limits of the public streets” may be taken by the city at a fair valuation.'</p> <p>Street Railways — Ordinance—Franchise— Validity — Conflict With State Law. The city charter of Seattle, art. 4, § 20, making an ordinance granting a street railway franchise subject to a referendum vote of the people, and requiring any extension, or new franchise covering any substantial part of an old one, to be first submitted to a vote of the qualified electors, is void; since the legislature by Rem. & Bal. Code, § 9080, has vested in- the legislative authority of the city the power to grant street railway franchises without the restrictions imposed by the charter.</p> <p>Municipal Corporations — Charters — Powers — Statutes — Implied Repeal — Street Railways — Franchises. Laws 1911, p. 54, §§ 1-3, providing that the form of the organization and the manner and mode in which cities of the first class shall exercise powers “with respect to their own government” shall be as provided in their charters, and authorizing direct legislation “within the scope of such powers” by the initiative and referendum, does not impliedly repeal Rem. & Bal. Code, § 9080, conferring upon the mayor and council the power to grant franchises; since the power to grant franchises is a sovereign power which may be delegated by the state and is not within the act of 1911 relating to powers exercised by cities, “with respect to their own government.”</p>