Union Pacific Railroad Company v. Hall Et Al‪.‬

This is a proceeding instituted under the act of Congress of March 3, 1873 (17 Stat. 509, sect. 4), which confers upon the proper Circuit Court of the United States jurisdiction to hear and determine all cases of mandamus to compel the Union Pacific Railroad Company to operate its road as required by law. The alternative writ, as amended, commanded the railroad company to operate the whole of their road from Council Bluffs westward (including that portion thereof between Council Bluffs and Omaha, and constructed over and across their bridge spanning the Missouri River) as one continuous line for all purposes of communication, travel, and transportation; and especially commanded them to start from Council Bluffs their regular through freight and passenger trains westward bound, and to run their eastern-bound trains of both descriptions through and over said bridge to Council Bluffs under one uniform time-schedule with the remainder of their road, and to desist and refrain wholly from operating said last-mentioned portion of said road as an independent and separate line, and from causing freight or passengers bound westward or eastward to be transferred at Omaha, or to show cause why they did not obey the writ. To the alternative mandamus the railroad company put in a return, which was met by an answer filed by the relators; and the case was heard by the Circuit Court on the facts stated in the writ, the return, and the answer (the averments of the answer not being controverted), and a peremptory mandamus was ordered. It is of this final judgment that the plaintiffs in error now complain.