State ex rel. Board of Railroad Commissioners v. Wilmington & Weldon Railroad

Citations

• 122 N.C. 877

Syllabus

<p>Railroad Commission — Powers of General Assembly— Establishment of Courts — Allotment of Jurisdiction —Appeals to Supreme Court.</p> <p>1. The-Superior Court having been created by the Constitution, the General Assembly cannot abolish it in whole or in part.</p> <p>2. While the General Assembly 'may, under Section 12, Article IV of the Constitution, confer upon the courts established by it inferior to the Supreme Court original,jurisdiction, exclusive or concurrent with the Superior Court, of any matters heretofore cognizable in the latter Court (except appellate jurisdiction over Justices of the Peace), it cannot change the status of the Superior Court as the head of the Superior Court system.</p> <p>3. Though the Railroad Commission is a court of record, “inferior to the Supreme Court,” with the inherent power pertaining to all courts to punish for contempt, &c., it is, properly, an administrative court, and all its orders and regulations are merely the basis of judicial action in the Superior Court to enforce them or pvunish their violation, and, until there has been a judicial adjudication of the validity of its action in any particular case, there can be no appeal to the Sujireine Court, whose jurisdiction (save in the case of claims against the State), is appellate. Hence,</p> <p>4. Section 29 of the Railroad Commission Act (Chapter 320, Acts of 1891-), authorizing an appeal from the Commission direct to the Supreme Court, “ where no exception is made to the facts as found by the Commission,” is in conflict with Section 9, Article IV of the Constitution, which gives to the Supreme Court appellate jurisdiction only except of claims against the State.</p>