(DOWNLOAD) "Texas Oil & Gas Corp. v. Phillips Petroleum Co." by United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit " Book PDF Kindle ePub Free
eBook details
- Title: Texas Oil & Gas Corp. v. Phillips Petroleum Co.
- Author : United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
- Release Date : January 24, 1969
- Genre: Law,Books,Professional & Technical,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 65 KB
Description
In this federal question suit, wholly between private parties, the appellants, oil and gas lessees of federal lands in Oklahoma, collaterally attack well spacing and forced pooling orders of the Oklahoma Corporation Commission insofar as they undertake to space and pool their federal leases. The effect of the spacing order is to establish a 640 acre spacing unit for the drilling and production of gas and gas condensates from a common source of supply. The spacing unit includes the federal oil and gas leases in question, along with privately owned and leased lands, a part of which is owned by the appellee Phillips Petroleum Company. The forced pooling order had the effect of pooling the spaced unit for the drilling of a permitted well by the lessee Phillips, the cost to be borne proportionately by the lessees in the unit. Any lessee electing not to participate in the permitted well was to be paid a lease bonus determined by the Oklahoma Corporation Commission to be $40.00 per acre. The assignors of the appellants elected not to participate and the title to their leases was transferred by operation of law to Phillips upon the payment of the prescribed lease bonus. The appellants here succeeded to the rights of their predecessor after the election and transfer of title. They do not seek a review of the orders of the Corporation Commission nor of the administrative orders of the Bureau of Land Management which approved the transfer; rather, they collaterally attack only that portion of the Oklahoma Corporation's well spacing and pooling orders which purport to space the federal leases within the unit and to transfer the title of their leases to Phillips Petroleum Company upon their election not to participate in the drilling of the permitted well. They deny that either the Secretary of the Interior or any of his subordinates are necessary or proper parties to the litigation and say that the judgment sought will merely determine the rights of the parties to the suit. They agree that state law governs matters which concern only individuals but insist that the spacing order directly affects the interest of the United States and that as federal lessees they have standing to assert the federal interest, and that the federal court is empowered to grant the relief sought.