Shreveport Suburban Ry. Co. v. Hollingsworth
Shreveport Suburban Ry. Co. v. Hollingsworth
Opinion of the Court
Plaintiff claims exemption from taxation under the Constitution as amended by Act 16, p. 19, of the year 1904, exempting for the period of 10 years from the date of its completion any railroad or part of railroad that shall have been constructed and completed subsequent to January 1, 1905, and prior to January 1, 1909.
The “purchase, construction, maintenance and operation of street railway iines in the city of Shreveport, its suburbs and surrounding territory, a street railway for the transportation of passengers, express and freight.”
The road’s length was 1,800 feet in the city and 6,000 feet in the country. Some time after the railroad had been completed, the city enlarged its limits and included the whole of the road within its boundaries. In the year 1911 the assessor assessed the whole of the road. The plaintiff asks that the railroad be decreed exempt from assessment and taxation under the amendment before cited.
The defendant filed an exception of no .cause of action which was referred to the merits to stand as an answer to plaintiff’s demand. There was judgment for defendant, and the plaintiff appealed.
We have stated above the question for decision and the facts.
Only for the purpose of illustrating if a corporation were to state in its charter that the object of incorporation was to construct a transcontinental road, and it were, instead, to construct a railroad operating exclusively within the limits of a city, exemption would be out of all question.
Private railroads built by' individuals or corporations solely for their own use. and benefit are not exempt from taxation, and, following similar lines of reasoning, passenger railroads having the privilege of operating within the limits of a city do not fall in the class of quasi public corporations, however public is its passenger service within the boundaries of the city in which it is operated. It is a local company. So important a road as it may be cannot be considered in the same light as a railroad consisting of one or more lines of rails engaged in the transportation of passengers and freight to and from different points in the state.
In the latter case a railroad has the appearance at least of materially aiding and assisting in developing different sections of the country.
That position has no application to that part of the road which was originally constructed within the city limits.
For reasons stated, the judgment is affirmed.
Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.