RULE X. The complainant may, within ten days after the service of the answer, object to the same as insufficient, and if the objection is sustained, the defendant may, within ten days thereafter, amend his answer. RULE XI. The complaint, answer, and demurrer must be subscribed by the party or by some attorney at law in his behalf. If the complaint is verified, the answer must be verified in the same manner, by the persons and in the form required by the Code of Civil Procedure in civil cases. RULE XII. The provisions of Sections 452, 453, 462, 463, 464, 465, 469, 470, 471, 472, 473, 475, and 476 of the Code of Civil Procedure shall be applicable to pleadings before these Commissioners. RULE XIII. If the defendant fails to appear and answer the complaint, the Commissioners shall render such decision thereon, within the relief demanded in the complaint, as the facts may warrant. RULE XIV. The secretary of the Commissioners must keep a calendar of the proceedings at issue, according to the date of service of the summons; and Sections 594, 595, and 596 of the Code of Civil Procedure shall be applicable to the proceedings to be had after said proceedings are entered on the calendar. RULE XV. Any party to such proceeding, feeling aggrieved at the decision of the Commissioners, may, within sixty days after such decision, apply to the Commissioners for a rehearing; such application shall be in writing, and shall be filed with the secretary. The application may be made upon any or all of the following grounds: 1. Irregularity in the proceedings or abuse of discretion, by which the party was prevented from having a fair rehearing; 2. Accident or surprise which ordinary prudence could not have guarded against; 3. Newly discovered evidence, material for the party making the application, which could not with reasonable diligence have been discovered and produced at the trial; 4. Insufficiency of evidence to justify the decision, or that it is against law; 5. Error of law occurring on the trial. Sections 658, 659, and 660 of the Code of Civil Procedure shall be applicable to such rehearing. RULE XVI. Sections 668, 669, and 670 of the Code of Civil Procedure shall be applicable to the entry of the decisions of these Commissioners. RULE XVII. The provisions of Part IV of the Code of Civil Procedure, relating to the general principles, kinds and degrees, production, and effect of evidence, and of the rights and duties of witnesses, shall be applicable to proceedings before these Commissioners. RULE XVIII. The word "person" in these rules includes corporations and firms; the singular, the plural; and the masculine, the feminine and neuter genders. RULE XIX. These rules may be amended at any regular meeting of the Commissioners, and amendments so made shall go into effect sixty days thereafter. RULE XX. These rules shall be in force from and after the first day of July, 1881. An Act to enable railroad companies to complete their railroads. [Approved April 1, 1878.] The People of the State of California, represented in Senate and Assembly, do enact as follows: SECTION 1. Every railroad company heretofore organized under the laws of this State, and which has completed a portion of its road prior to the passage of this Act, is hereby authorized and empowered to complete its road as described in its articles of incorporation, notwithstanding it may not have begun the construction of its road within two years after filing its original articles of incorporation, and notwithstanding it may not have completed and put in operation five miles of its road each year thereafter. SEC. 2. This Act shall take effect from and after its passage. STREET RAILROADS. MAIL CARRIERS TO RIDE FREE. An Act requiring city, city and county, or town authorities to exact and require from persons or corporations seeking permission and authority to lay railroad tracks through streets or public highways of any incorporated city, city and county, or town, a satisfactory promise and undertaking to permit and allow mail carriers in the employ of the United States Government at all times, while engaged in the actual discharge of duty, to ride on the cars of such railroad without paying fare; and to make such promise and undertaking a condition precedent to the granting of such permission and authority by such governing board. [Approved February 27, 1893.] The People of the State of California, represented in Senate and Assembly, do enact as follows: SECTION 1. In all cases hereafter, where application is made to the city, city and county, or town authorities, or to the trustees, council or other body to whom is intrusted the government of the city, city and county, or town, for permission and authority to lay railroad tracks through streets or public highways of any incorporated city, city and county, or town, such authorities, before granting such permission and authority, in addition to the terms and restrictions which they are now, by law, authorized to impose, must exact and require from the persons or corporation asking or seeking such permission and authority, a satisfactory promise and undertaking to permit and allow mail carriers in the employ of the United States Government, at all times, while engaged in the actual discharge of duty, to ride on the cars of such railroad without paying any sum of money whatever for fare or otherwise. And such governing body of city, city and county, or town authorities must make such promise and undertaking on the part of such persons or corporations a condition precedent to the granting of such permission and authority to lay railroad tracks through streets or public highways of such city, city and county, or town; provided, that all such permissions and franchises shall be subject to all other provisions of the laws of this State applicable to street railroads in general, and subject to regulations from city, city and county, and town authorities. SEC. 2. This Act shall take effect and be in full force from and after its passage. FIXING RATES OF FARE. An Act to limit and fix the rates of fares on street railroads in cities and towns of more than one hundred thousand inhabitants. [Approved January 1, 1878.] The People of the State of California, represented in Senate and Assembly, do enact as follows: SECTION 1. No street railroad in any city or town of this State, with more than one hundred thousand inhabitants, shall be allowed to charge or collect a higher rate of fare than five cents for each passenger per trip of any distance in one direction, either going or coming, along any part of the whole length of the road or its connections. SEC. 2. Every violation of the provisions of section one of this Act shall subject the owner or owners of the street railroad violating the same to a forfeiture to the person so unlawfully charged, or paying more than is therein allowed to be charged, the sum of two hundred and fifty dollars for each and every instance when such unlawful charge is made or collected, to be recovered by suit in any court of competent jurisdiction; such causes of action shall be assignable, and the action may be maintained by the assignee in his own name, and several causes of action arising out of unlawful charges or collections from different persons may be vested in the assignee and united in the same action. SEC. 3. This Act shall be in force from its passage. 315 SALE OF STREET RAILROAD AND An Act providing for the sale of street railr ing conditions for the granting of such franchises by legislative or other governing bodies, and repealing conflicting Acts. [Approved March 22, 1905.] The People of the State of California, represented in Senate and Assembly, do enact as follows: SECTION 1. Every franchise or privilege to erect or lay telegraph or telephone wires, to construct or operate street or interurban railroads upon any public street or highway, to lay gas pipes for the purpose of carrying gas for heat and power, to erect poles or wires for transmitting electric heat and power along or upon any public street or highway, or to exercise any other privilege whatever hereafter proposed to be granted by Boards of Supervisors, Boards of Trustees, or Common Councils, or other governing or legislative bodies of any county, city and county, city or town within this State, except steam railroads and except telegraph or telephone lines doing an interstate business, and renewals of franchises for piers, chutes, or wharves, shall be granted upon the conditions in this Act provided, and not otherwise. SEC. 2. An applicant for any franchise or privilege above mentioned shall file with the governing or legislative body of the county or municipality an application, and thereupon said governing body shall, in its discretion, advertise the fact of said application, together with a statement that it is proposed to grant the same, in one or more newspapers of the county, city and county, city or town wherein the said franchise or privilege is to be exercised. Said advertisement must state that bids will be received for such franchise, and that it will be awarded to the highest bidder, and the same must be published in such newspaper once a day for ten successive days, if it be a daily newspaper, and if there be no daily newspaper published in such county, city and county, city or town, then it shall be pub |