Abbeville progress., 1914-06-13
j. S. SUPREME COURT
UPHOLDS RATE CASE
STEP TAKEN TOWARD PLACING
RAILROADS UNDER LONE MAS
TER INSTEAD OF MANY"
DECISION IN SHREVEPORT CASE
Ruling Places Interstate Commerce
Commission Over Stste-Wll.
Have Far-Reaching
Effect, Etc.

Washington.--A long step toward
placing railroads under zone master
instead of many" was taken Monday
by the United States supreme court
in upholding the power OF the inter
state commerce commission TO strike
down state rates that discriminate
against interstate commerce. In sub
stance. the court said that the Mime
sofa and other recent state rate cases,
in which the railroads lost, might have
been decided otherwise had the roads
gone to the commission for relief in
stead of the courts.
The decision was announced by JUS
tice Hughes, Justices Pitney and Lur-
ton dissenting The case arose out of
complaint by Shreveport CLa) m"r-
chants that the Texas railroad com
mission had shut them out of all Tex
as business by compelling the rail
roads to reduce Texas State rates far
below what the interstate commerce
commission allowed the railroads run
ming from Shreveport to Texas cities
to charge. The court first decided
that congress had power TO control in
terstate charges over an interstate
carrier 10 the extent necessary to pre-
vent injurious determinations against
interstate traffic and then held that
congress had conferred this power
upon the interstate commerce com
mission.
THE fact that carriers are instru-
mcnts of intrastate commerce as well
as Of Interstate commerce" said jus
tice Hughes, does not derOgate from
the complete and paramount author
ity of congress over the latter or pre-
clude the federal power from being
exerted to prevent the intrastate Op-
erations of sIch carriers from being
made a means of injury to that which
has been confided to federal care.
Wherever the interstate and intrastate
transactions Of carriers are so related
that the government of the one in
wolves the control of the other it is
congress and not the state that is en-
titled to prescribe the final and domi-
would be denied the exercise of its
constitutional authority, and the state,
not the nation, would be supreme
within the national field"
In removing determinations against
interstate commerce. the court held,
congress was not bound to reduce the
interstate rates below what it may
deem to be an appropriate standard to
the carrier and the public.
"Otherwise," said the opinion, "it
could prevent the injury to interstate
/ commerce only by the sacrifice of its
judgment as to interstate rates"
Justice Hughes, who wrote the
courts decision in the state rate cases
of year ago, pointed out that the
present ease did not conflict with
absence of a finding by the commits
sion of unjust discrimination intra-
state rates undoubtedly were left to
be fixed by the carrier and subject to
the authority of the states.
1--WE are not unmindful of the grav-
/ ity of the question that is presented
when state and federal views con
/ flict," the opinion concluded. But it
was recognized at the beginning the ma
ton could not prosper if interstate and
/ foreign trade were governed by many
masters. and where the interests of
the freedom of interstate commerce
are involved the judgment Of congress
and of the agencies it lawfully estab-
/ fishes should rule"
Members of the interstate commerce
commission regarded this case as one
of the most important in which the
body ever had been involved.
The decision was written by Secre-
tary Lane before he left the commits
! sion to become a member of the presi-
| dents cabinet.