Town of Suisun City v. Pacific Gas & Electric Co.

A rehearing was granted in this ease for the purpose of considering the case of City of Hanford v. Hanford Gas etc. Co., 169 Cal. 749 , [L. R. A. 1915E, 165, 147 Pac. 969 ], which was called to our attention for the first time in the petition for a rehearing. We find nothing in said case which, in our judgment, militates against the views expressed and the conclusion reached in our former opinion. The question as to the right of a municipality to exact from lighting and other like public service corporations the payment of certain sums for a franchise to operate its business in municipalities was not raised, considered, or discussed in the Hanford case, and it is, therefore, no authority for the position that municipalities may impose upon such corporations a charge upon gross receipts arising from the use of gas or electricity for lighting purposes. The cases cited in the original opinion filed herein seem clearly enough to hold that no charge for the use of gas or electricity for lighting purposes may, under the terms of section 19 of article XI of the constitution, as that section read when the franchise here involved was granted, be exacted from corporations furnishing the…