§37-3-19. Duty of common carrier to provide service, equipment, and facilities; rates and charges generally; rules, regulations, and practices; other remedies not extinguished.

(a) It shall be the duty of every common carrier of passengers by motor vehicle to establish and provide safe and adequate service, equipment and facilities for the intrastate transportation of passengers in the State of Alabama; to establish, observe and enforce just and reasonable individual and joint rates, fares and charges and just and reasonable regulations and practices resulting thereto, and to the issuance, form and substance of tickets and the carrying of personal sample and excess baggage, the facilities for the transportation, and all other matters relating to or connected with the intrastate transportation of passengers in the State of Alabama; and, in case of such joint rates, fares and charges, to establish just, reasonable and equitable divisions thereof as between the carriers participating therein, which shall not unduly prefer or prejudice any such participating carriers.

(b) It shall be the duty of every common carrier of property by motor vehicle to provide safe and adequate service, equipment and facilities for the intrastate transportation of property in the State of Alabama; to establish, observe and enforce just and reasonable rates, charges and classifications and just and reasonable regulations and practices relating thereto and to the manner and method of presenting, marking, packing and delivering property for transportation, the facilities for transportation and all other matters relating to or connected with the intrastate transportation of property in the State of Alabama.

(c) Common carriers of property by motor vehicle may establish reasonable through routes and joint rates, charges and classifications with other such carriers or with common carriers by railroad or express or water; and common carriers of passengers by motor vehicle may establish joint rates and fares or charges with common carriers by railroad or water. In case of such joint rates, fares or charges, it shall be the duty of the carrier parties thereto to establish just and reasonable regulations and practices in connection therewith and just, reasonable and equitable divisions thereof as between the carriers participating therein, which shall not unduly prefer or prejudice any of said participating carriers.

(d) Any person, state board, organization or body politic may make complaint in writing to the commission that any such rate, fare, charge, classification, rules, regulation or practice in effect or proposed to be put in effect is or will be in violation of this section or of Section 37-3-20. Whenever, after hearing, upon complaint or in an investigation on its own initiative, the commission shall be of the opinion that any individual or joint rate, fare or charge demanded, charged or collected by any common carrier or carriers by motor vehicle or by any common carrier or carriers by motor vehicle in conjunction with any common carrier or carriers by railroad or express, or water for transportation intrastate commerce, or any classification, rule, regulation or practice whatsoever of such carrier or carriers affecting such rate, fare or charge or the value of the service thereunder is or will be unjust or unreasonable or unjustly discriminatory or unduly preferential or unduly prejudicial, it shall determine and prescribe the lawful rate, fare or charge or the maximum or minimum, or maxima or minima rate, fare or charge thereafter to be observed, or the lawful classification, rule, regulation or practice thereafter to be made effective, and the commission shall, whenever deemed by it to be necessary or desirable in the public interest, after hearing upon complaint or upon its own initiative without a complaint, establish joint rates, fares, charges, regulations or practices applicable to the transportation of passengers by common carrier by motor vehicle, or the maximum or minimum, or maxima or minima, to be charged and the terms and conditions under which such shall be operated.

(e) Whenever after hearing, upon complaint or upon its own initiative, the commission is of the opinion that the divisions of joint rates, fares or charges applicable to the transportation in intrastate commerce in this state of passengers or property by common carriers by motor vehicle or by such carriers in conjunction with common carriers by railroad or express or water are or will be unjust, unreasonable, inequitable or unduly preferential or prejudicial as between the carriers parties thereto (whether agreed upon by such carriers, or any of them, or otherwise established), the commission shall by order prescribe the just, reasonable and equitable division thereof to be received by the several carriers and, in cases where the joint rate, fare or charge was established pursuant to a finding or order by the commission and the divisions thereof are found by it to have been unjust, unreasonable or inequitable, or unduly preferential or prejudicial, the commission may also by order determine what would have been the just, reasonable and equitable divisions thereof to be received by the several carriers and require adjustment to be made in accordance therewith. The order of the commission may require the adjustment of divisions between carriers, in accordance with the order, from the date of filing the complaint or entry or order of investigation or such other date subsequent, as the commission finds justified, and, in case of joint rates prescribed by the commission, the order as to divisions may be made effective as a part of the original order.

(f) Whenever there shall be filed with the commission any schedule stating a new, individual or joint rate, fare, charge or classification for the transportation of passengers or property by a common carrier or carriers by motor vehicle or by any such carrier and carriers by railroad or express or water in intrastate commerce, or any rule, regulation or practice affecting such rate, fare or charge, or the value of the service thereunder, the commission is hereby authorized and empowered upon complaint of any interested party or upon its own initiative at once and, if it so orders, without answer or other formal pleading by the interested carrier or carriers, but upon reasonable notice, to enter upon a hearing concerning the lawfulness of such rate, fare or charge or such rule, regulation or practice; and, pending such hearing and the decision thereon, the commission, by filing with such schedule and delivering to the carrier or carriers affected thereby a statement in writing of its reasons for such suspension, may suspend the operation of such schedule and defer the use of such rate, fare or charge, or such rule, regulation or practice, for a period of 90 days, and, if the proceedings have not been concluded and a final order made within such period, the commission may, from time to time, extend the period of suspension by order, but not for a longer period in the aggregate than 180 days beyond the time when it would otherwise go into effect; and, after hearing, whether completed before or after the rate, fare, charge, classification, rule, regulation or practice goes into effect, the commission may make such order with reference thereto as would be proper in a proceeding instituted after it has become effective. If the proceeding has not been concluded and an order made within the period of suspension, the proposed change of rate, fare or charge, or classification, rule, regulation or practice shall go into effect at the end of such period; at any hearing involving a rate, fare, charge or classification, increased or sought to be increased, or involving a rule, regulation or practice after July 5, 1940, the burden of proof shall be upon the carrier to show that the increased rate, fare, charge or classification, or the rule, regulation or practice is just and reasonable, or the proposed increased rate, fare, charge or classification or rule or regulation or practice is just and reasonable.

(g) In the exercise of its power to prescribe just and reasonable rates for the transportation of passengers or property by common carriers by motor vehicle, the commission shall give due consideration, among other things, to the effect of rates upon the movement of traffic by such carriers to the need, in public interest, of adequate and efficient transportation service by such carriers at the lowest cost consistent with the furnishing of such service, and the need of revenues sufficient to enable such carriers, under honest, economical and efficient management to provide such service.

(h) Nothing in this section shall be held to extinguish any remedy or right of action not inconsistent herewith.

(Acts 1939, No. 669, p. 1064, §17; Code 1958, T. 48, §301(17).)