THE OKLAHOMA LAW JOURNAL VOL. 8. EDITED AND PUBLISHED MONTHLY BY D. H. FERNANDES, GUTHRIE, OKLAHOMA. REGULATION OF CORPORATIONS-FUNDAMENTAL VIEWS OF THE COURTS RELATIVE THERETO. The manner in which an existing Franchise to operate a railroad may be exercised, is a matter of regulation and generally within the absolute control of the legislature. Third Ave. Ry Co. 24 N. E. 951. The legistature may compel a railroad to exercise its functions and direct its management in such a manner as in the legislative judgment it will best subserve the public interest. People vs. N. Y. Lake Erie & W. R. R. Co., 104 N. Y. 58. The legislature having created a railroad corporation, may regulate the mode in which it may transact its bus iness, the price it may charge for the transportation of freight and passengers, the speed at which it may run its trains, and the way it may cross or run upon the highways. People ex rel. Kimball vs Boston & A. R. Co., 70 N. Y. 569. Because, as said in People vs. N. Y. C. & H. R. R., 28 Hun. 543: "The duties, functions and property of railroad corporations are held in trust by the corporation for the public, and the sovereign power regulates such corporation as its trustee." While courts will arrest an arbitrary or plainly unreasonable exercise of police power, where there has been an attempt thereby to lay a burden upon a subject in the use or enjoyment of his property, yet, notwithstanding this, the courts recognize that, as respects the police power, there is a broad authority within the field of legislative discretion, wherein, as respects what is good and expedient, the law-making power is absolutely the master of its own discretion. So that railroads must submit to regulations in the proper exercise of the police power of a state even though they involve some expense and inconvenience. Pittsburgh, etc. Co. vs. Hartford City, 82 N. E. Rep. 787. A requirement that a company or individual comply with reasonable police regulations without compensation for the compliance, is the legitimate exercise of the police power and not in violation of the constitutional inhibition against the impairment of the obligation of contracts. N. P. R. R. Co. vs. Duluth, 208 U. S. 583, affirming 98 Minn. 429. In U. S. vs. Standard Oil Company, 155 Fed. 305, the Supreme Court of the United States, said: "It being settled that Congress has authority to require that railroad rates shall be uniform, it necessarily follows that to preserve uniformity Congress may prohibit the doing of any act or thing whatever by any person or corporation calculated to impair uniformity, and may enforce such prohibitions by such penal provisions as it deems proper and requisite." The State has the inherent power of regulating and controlling public service corporations operating within its borders and of prescribing the facilities and conveniences which shall be furnished by them. Winchester etc. R. Co. vs. Commonwealth, 106 Va. 264. The Illinois statute requiring every railroad company incorporated or doing business in the state to make re ports to the Warehouse Commission, applies to every railroad company doing business in the state, whether it is a domestic or foreign corporation, and whether it is engaged in intra-state or inter-state commerce; and that this compulsion to report to the Commission is a valid exercise of State's police power, and is not repugnant to the commerce clause of the Federal Constitution. People ex rel. Stead vs. Chicago etc., R. Co. 7 Amer. & Eng. Ann. Cases 1. POINTS IN OIL AND GAS QUESTIONS. The lessee under an oil and gas lease has no right to compulsory partition of the oil and gas in place, considered separately from the land, or the land itself. 2. A lease of land to enter and prospect for oil and gas is a grant of a privilege to enter and prospect, but does not give the title to the oil or gas until such products are found. 3. The right to go upon the land and occupy it for the purpose of prospecting, if of unlimited duration, is a freehold interest, but being vested for a speific purpose, it becomes extinct when the purpose is accomplished or the work abandoned. 122 Amer. St. Reports, 144. A gas company will be held liable for all damages resulting from negligence in failure to properly maintain its pipes in repair; and the measure of its diligence will be estimated upon the principle that where one is dealing with a dangerous element must use that care commensurate with the danger. Marshall Window Glass Co. vs. Cameron The owner of a premises upon which a gas explosion occurs is not liable for injuries sustained by a licensee. Eckels vs. Maher, 137 Ill. App. 45. Under a lease providing that in case the lessee shall become satisfied that wells which have been put in operation are not paying, he may, upon surrender of the lease and removal of the machinery, be released from further obligations, although the lessee cannot arbitrarily say that a profitable gas or oil well is not paying and thus satisfy the conditions of the lease; nor can the lessee avoid the lease while there is a profitable well, though several be unprofitable. Dickey vs. Coffeyville etc. Co.. 69 Kan. 106. Natural gas is not subject to absolute ownership in its natural state and cannot be reserved. Louisville Gas Co. vs. Ky Heating Co. 77 S. W. 368. The laying of pipe lines by a gas company without the consent of the land owner or lawful appropriation is a taking within the constitutional inhibition against the taking or damaging of private property for a public use before payment of compensation therefor. Lovett vs. West Virg. Cent. Gas Co., 65 S. E. 195. In an action for injuries to a building by explosion of gas negligently permitted to escape between the walls floors and studdings, evidence of the effect of the explosion on another building in the neighborhood was inadmissible. Linford vs. San Erancisco Gas & Electric Company, 103 Pac. 320. A party in actual and peaceable possession of a mining claim in an Indian Reservation after the Indian right has been extinguished, may by proper proceedings hold his mining rights in the reservation, although Indian lands are not subject to be patented as mineral land for mining claims as other lands. 3 Dak. 189, 14 N. W. 426. SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES. Important Points Recently Decided Relative to Appeal or Review from a State Court. 1. The Federal question must be properly and seasonably set up in the State Court in order to give this Court jurisdiction to review under $709, Rev. Statutes. 2. Where the State statutes provides that an appeal from an order refusing to remove a cause to the federal court must be taken within two years, and no appeal is taken, and the highest court of the State decides that an appeal from the judgment in the case taken more than two years after entry of the order refusing to remove does not bring up that order for review, the Federal question has not been properly preserved, and this court has no jurisdiction. 3. A Federal constitutional objection may be waived so far as having the right of review of a judgment in the state court is concerned where the question is not made in the state court by proper procedure. Harding vs. Illinois, 196 U. S. 78, Adv. Sheets No. 2. p. 191. of Vol. 214. 1. Mandamus is not a proper substitute for a writ of error. Where the bankruptcy court in adjudicating a corporation a bankrupt is called upon to decide, a question of fact, or of mixed law and fact, that adjudication cannot be reviewed by proceedings in mandamus. )In re Politz, 206 U. S. 323; Re Winn, 213 U. S. 458.) 2. Where the evidence sustaining an application for an adjudication in bankruptcy is not disclosed this court will not assume that it was not sufficient. 3. Mandamus to the bankruptcy court to dismiss proceedings in bankruptcy against a corporation because the petition failed to show that the principal business of |