WATER STOEAGK ON SWEETWATER AND SAN JACINTO RIVERS, 381 



entitled C. D. Lanhinsf, receiver of the conipanj, c. H. C. Osborne and some 200 

 others, who were irrigators of land outside of National Citj'. 



The complaint showed that the corporation, in opening its service in 1888, in 

 addition to the rates for domestic uses and the liice, established an irrigation rate of 

 $3.50 per acre per annum, and alleged that this was too low to furnish an}- net 

 revenue above the expenses of maintenance and operation, and insufficient to maintain 

 and operate the system. The corporation claimed the right to an increased i-ate of 

 $7 per acre per annum for irrigation alone, in order to pay cost of operation and 

 maintenance and pa}' the company a reasonable interest on its investment. The 

 defendants denied the right of the corporation to increase the rate from $3.50 to $7 

 per acre, on the ground that the company sold its lands to a large munber of the 

 defendants as irrigated lands, and under the representation that the rates would be 

 $3.50 per acre pvr annum; and all the defendants claimed that the corporation was 

 bound by its rate of $3.50 per acre per annum, so established in 1888 and collected 

 up to January 1, 1896, and they insisted that the claim of the coi"poration to increase 

 its rate for the pur{X)se of increasing its net revenue was in violation of their vested 

 rights. To the claim of the corporation that it had the right to increase the rate in 

 its discretion, and that the onh* recoui-se the irrigators had was a resort to the board 

 of supervisors, under the law of March 12, 1885, to fix i-ates, the defendants objected 

 that the board of supervisors was compelled In- such act to allow a rate not only for 

 maintenance and operation, but also for net revenue, at not less than 6 per cent and 

 not more than IS per cent on the Aalue of the system. The circuit court of the 

 southern district of California, before whom the cause was heard, held that the only 

 remedy of the defendants was to go to the board of supervisors; threw doubt upon 

 the validitA' of the water rights held b}- the defendants, and rendered judgment 

 against them, authorizing the coi-poration to collect the $7 rate from the time when 

 claimed by the companj-, January 1, 1896, until the board of supervisors should 

 fix rates. The syllabus of the case, as published in 76 Federal Reporter, page 

 319, is as follows: 



(1) No corporation appropriating water under and by virtue of the constitution and laws of 

 California for sale, rental or distribution has the right to exact any sum of money or other thing in 

 addition to the legally established rates as a condition upon which it will furnish to consumers water 

 so appropriated. 



(2) Since by the civil code of California a consumer whose right to demand a supply of water 

 from a company has once vested is protected from the injury of having his supply cut off, he may 

 prevent by injunction, if need be, the distributor from disposing of it to others beyond the capacity of 

 the system. 



(3) Should the rates fixed by the county board of supervisors for the sale, rental, or distribution 

 of water appropriatetl for these purposes, as provided by acts of California, March 12, 1885, be 

 unreasonable, a person aggrieved may have the rates annulled by the courts, and the question !» again 

 remitted to the board. 



(4) "Where water is appropriatetl and furnished by a public or quasi-public corporation, the water 

 being charged with a public use, the rates nuist be established in pursuance of law, and no attempt to 

 fix them by private contract with consuinere is of any validity. 



(5) Since the act of March 12, 1885, provides that, in case of failure of the board of supervisors 

 to establish rates for furnishing water as provided in the act, the rates established by the company 

 shall control, the latter is not divested of the power to fix rates by the fact that before the passage of 

 the act it contracted to furnish water at a lower rate, the persons with whom it so contracted being 

 chargeable with notice that the constitution conferred power upon the legislature to prescribe the 

 manner in which such rates should be established. 



