Railroad Commission of Texas v. City of Austin

GREENHILL, Chief Justice.

This case concerns the powers of the Texas Railroad Commission to regulate gas utilities and how it may exercise its powers. The primary source of its jurisdiction for such purposes comes from a statute enacted in 1920 which is known as the Cox Act.1 In order to ascertain legislative in*265tent, and to put the provisions of the statute in context, the Cox Act will be discussed herein, along with the construction it has heretofore received by this Court. It will be noted at the outset that there was, and is, no statutory provision which prohibited the sale of gas reserves,…