SECTION 1. No private corporation shall be created except by general laws.
SEC. 2. General laws shall be enacted providing for the creation of private corporations, and shall therein provide fully for the adequate protection of the public and of the individual stockholders.
SEC. 3. The right to authorize and regulate freights, tolls, wharfage or fares levied and collected or proposed to be levied and collected by individuals, companies or corporations, for the use of highways, landings, wharves, bridges and ferries, devoted to public use, has never been and shall never be relinquished or abandoned by the State, but shall always be under legislative control and depend upon legislative authority.
SEC. 4. The first Legislature assembled after the adoption of this Constitution shall provide a mode of procedure by the attorney general and district or county attorneys, in the name and behalf of the State, to prevent and punish the demanding and receiving or collection of any and all charges, as freight, wharfage, fares, or tolls, for the use of property devoted by the public, unless the same shall have been specially authorized by law.
SEC. 5. All laws granting the right to demand and collect freights, fares, tolls or wharfage shall at all times be subject to amendment, modification or repeal by the Legislature.
SEC. 6. No corporation shall issue stock or bonds except for money paid, labor done or property actually received, and all fictitious increase of stock or indebtedness shall be void.
SEC. 7. Nothing in this article shall be construed to divest or affect rights guaranteed by any existing grant or statute, of this State, or of the Republic of Texas.
(Transcription, errors in original preserved)
Article XII, Sections 1-7; Article XIII, Sections 1-4
