Watkins

This is an appeal by O. Ray Watkins (hereinafter appellant), publisher of the Carson Bulletin, from a judgment of the superior court vacating a prior judgment adjudicating the Bulletin a newspaper of general circulation in and for the City of Carson.

In September 1976, appellant filed a verified petition pursuant to Government Code 1 section 6026, seeking a “judgment and Decree ascertaining and establishing the newspaper as a newspaper of general circulation as defined in said Section 6008, in and for the City of Carson . . . .” In October, the petition was granted following an uncontested ex parte proceeding. The judgment recited that the court found: “[TJhat The Carson Bulletin is a newspaper published for the dissemination of local and telegraphic news and intelligence of a general character, which has a bona fide subscription list of paying subscribers and has been ‘established’ and ‘published,’ as such terms are defined in said Section 6008 of the Government Code, at regular weekly intervals in the City of Carson ... for at least three years preceding the date of the filing of this petition. . . .”

The petition alleged that the newspaper “has a substantial…