Case ID: us-ct-cl_63/html/0171-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Campbell, Chief Justice,", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

WESTERN RAILWAY OF ALABAMA v. THE UNITED STATES
    [No. C-1035.
    Decided February 14, 1927]
    
      On the Proofs
    
    
      Railroad rates; shipments into Gamp Sheridan, Ala. — On shipments for the Government into Camp Sheridan, Ala., during the year 1917, the plaintiff, as final carrier, having been paid Montgomery rates on bills presented at the higher Camp Sheridan rates, is entitled to recover the difference.
    
      Same; shipment originating at Fort Benjamin, Harrison, Ind. — The plaintiff, as last carrier, presented to the Government a bill for freight charges on a shipment originating at Fort Benjamin Harrison, Ind., erroneously stated at rates applying from Indianapolis, which were lower, and was paid the amount therein claimed. Having been thus underpaid the plaintiff may recover on the basis of the correct rates.
    
      The Reporter's statement of the case:
    
      Mr. F. Garter Pope for the plaintiff.
    
      Messrs. Perry W. Howard and Louis R. Mehlinger, with whom was Mr. Assistant Attorney General Herman J. Galloway, for the defendant.
    The court made special findings of fact, as follows:
    I. The plaintiff is a corporation and a common carrier of freight and passengers.
    II. During the year 1917 the plaintiff, as the last carrier, handled a great number of movements of freight for the War Department into Camp Sheridan, which had been established in or about July, 1917, at Vandiver Park, near Montgomery, Alabama.
    III. For the services so rendered the plaintiff submitted its bills to the defendant at published tariff rates to Camp Sheridan, which were higher than the rates applying to Montgomery. The defendant paid some of them at the lower Montgomery rates, and others in full, deducting thereafter from other accounts of plaintiff or from accounts of the United States Railroad Administration the difference between the Montgomery and the Camp Sheridan rates. The deductions so made from accounts of the Railroad Administration were afterwards, in final settlement, paid by the plaintiff to the Railroad Administration.
    The total of the aforesaid deductions from plaintiff’s bills and the reimbursement by it to the Railroad Administration is $2,670.34.
    IY. Another of plaintiff’s bills, so rendered at full tariff rates to Camp Sheridan, was paid by defendant’s disbursing officer as rendered. Thereafter the plaintiff, without protest, upon request of the accounting officer, reimbursed the defendant thereon $15.46, representing the difference between the Camp Sheridan and the Montgomery rates.
    Y. In October, 1917, the plaintiff, as last carrier, delivered a shipment of a number of cars of military impedimenta to defendant at Camp Sheridan which had originated at Fort Benjamin Harrison, Indiana. Its bill therefor was paid by the disbursing officer in the sum of $1,703.20 as presented. The rates used in the said bill were erroneous, being the rates from Indianapolis and not from Fort Benjamin Harrison. The correct freight charges from Fort Benjamin Harrison to Camp Sheridan, less proper land-grant deductions, on said shipment, were $2,231.02, a difference of $527.82, which plaintiff has not been paid.
    The court decided that plaintiff was entitled to recover the three items mentioned in Finding III, Finding IY, and Finding V, being a total of $3,213.62.
   Campbell, Chief Justice,

delivered the opinion of the court:

One of the items claimed in the petition grows out of the fact that the rates applied by the accounting officers were to Montgomery and not to Camp Sheridan, and the plaintiff is entitled to judgment for this item. See Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company case, 59 C. Cls. 886; Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company case, C-136, decided November 8,1926, 62 C. Cls. 786.

(2) Another of the items grows out of the shipments originating at Fort Benjamin Harrison, Indiana, and delivered at Camp Sheridan. The bill as rendered stated the rates to be from Indianapolis and not from Fort Benjamin Harrison. The stipulation is that the correct freight charges from Fort Benjamin Harrison to Camp Sheridan, less proper land-grant deductions, are the same as claimed, and therefore plaintiff is entitled to recover on this item. There is no question involved here of the so-called Chaloner & Washburn Tariff No. 2, which is given no consideration in this case.

(3) Another small item was rendered at full tariff rates to Camp Sheridan, and the plaintiff is entitled to recover thereunder.

Plaintiff is entitled to a judgment for the three items shown in the conclusion. And it is so ordered.

Moss, Judge; Geaham, Judge; Hay, Judge; and Booth, Judge, concur.