Musick v. Railroad Com'n of Texas

POWERS, Justice.

The Texas Railroad Commission denied Mary Ann Campbell Musick’s application for a permit to drill and complete a well in the Panhandle West Field, a natural-gas field in Moore County. She sued in district court for judicial review of the Commission’s decision, joined by W.V. Harlow, Jr. and Strick Watkins who were entitled to a royalty in production from the proposed well. The district court declined to reverse the Commission’s decision, a judgment we will affirm.1

THE CONTROVERSY

Harlow and Watkins discovered in 1980 a vacancy tract comprising 8.064 acres. The tract is some…