Source: http://www.chanrobles.com/usa/us_supremecourt/215/481/case.php
Timestamp: 2019-07-19 10:35:08
Document Index: 372219350

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 15', '§ 15', '§ 15', '§ 23', '§ 15', '§ 23', '§ 23']

BALTIMORE & OHIO R. CO. V. PITCAIRN COAL CO., 215 U. S. 481 (1910) - US SUPREME COURT DECISIONS ON-LINE
US Supreme Court Decisions On-Line> Volume 215 > BALTIMORE & OHIO R. CO. V. PITCAIRN COAL CO., 215 U. S. 481 (1910)
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Under the court review provisions of § 15 of the Act to Regulate Commerce as amended in 106, the courts are limited to the question of power of the Commission to make the order, and cannot consider the wisdom or expediency of the order itself. Interstate Commerce Commission v. Illinois Central Railroad, ante, p. 215 U. S. 452. chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
165 F.1d 3 reversed.
To decide the merits of this cause will require us to determine the legality of the regulations of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Company by which that company distributed cars to coal mines along the line of its road in case of car shortage. As an incident to this general question, we would further be required to consider the relations, irrespective of its mere attributes and duties as a common carrier, of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad with various coal mines along the line of its road, and the relation with or control over some, if not all, of these coal mines by other mines or mine operators, and, in chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Company, a corporation existing under the laws of Maryland, owned and operated a railroad or railroads in the States of Maryland, West Virginia, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and other states, and, as a common carrier, was engaged in interstate commerce between such states. The main line of said road west of Cumberland, Maryland, passes through a bituminous coal field, which is worked by many coal operators, the product of whose mines depends for its movement to market in interstate commerce on the facilities for such movement which the Baltimore & Ohio affords. For the purpose of this case, the coal mines referred to may be treated as situated in what is described as the Monongah District of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad. chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
2. New mines are allotted an arbitrary number of cars daily or weekly for development. In cases where the inspection shows a marked increase in the capacity of certain mines, and it is not practicable to change the percentage of the whole district, proper arbitraries are applied pending a general revision. chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
With the system just referred to in force on the nineteenth of January, 1907, the Pitcairn Coal Company, a West Virginia corporation owning a coal mine on the line of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad in West Virginia, filed its petition in mandamus in the United States Circuit Court for the District of chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Maryland. The defendants were the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Company, the Fairmont Coal Company, the Clarksburg Fuel Company, the Pittsburgh & Fairmont Fuel Company, and the Southern Coal & Transportation Company, these four coal companies operating coal mines located in West Virginia on the Monogah Division of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad. Along with these there were also made defendants two other corporations, the Consolidation Coal Company, located on the Cumberland & Pennsylvania Railroad in Maryland, and the Somerset Coal Company, located on the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad in Pennsylvania. All of these coal companies were charged to be substantially one in interest, and were generally described as the Fairmont Companies. In addition, thirty-one other coal companies, alleged to be independent companies, operating coal mines on the line of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, were also made defendants. Rearranging somewhat the order of the averments as contained in the bill, the prayer for relief was substantially based upon the following grounds: the Pitcairn Coal Company, it was averred, was entitled to an equal distribution of the coal cars of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad in times of shortage in order to move its output of coal in interstate commerce; that the railroad company had refused, after demand, to give it the share of cars to which it was entitled, and that its not doing so had been seriously prejudicial to the business of the company, had curtailed its production, and interfered with the moving of the coal produced in interstate commerce, and that the conduct of the railroad in the premises had amounted to the giving of an undue preference to the Fairmont Coal Company and its affiliated companies, to the prejudice of the Pitcairn Company and all other independent companies. The method pursued by the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad for rating mines by the consideration of both capacity and previous shipments was alleged, and it was charged that, on the basis of capacity of the mine as rated by that system, the Pitcairn Company was entitled to seven-tenths percent chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
of the cars for distribution in the Monongah Division. General averments were, however, made concerning the method of rating, which, in effect, charged that such method was discriminatory and preferential, and was put in force so as to operate in favor of the Fairmont Coal Company and the companies affiliated with it, to the prejudice of the Pitcairn Company and other independent coal operators, the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad being interested, it was charged, directly or indirectly, in the Fairmont and its affiliated companies. The method of deduction from the mass of cars for the benefit of the Cumberland & Pennsylvania Railroad was also charged to be discriminatory and preferential, and to have been devised for the purpose of favoring mines on the line of the Cumberland & Pennsylvania, which were affiliated with the Fairmont. The failure to charge against the mines which had received them, individual or private cars, foreign railroad cars, and company fuel cars, as well as the other arbitrary allotments of cars provided for in the regulations to which we have referred, including the Curtis Bay regulation, were all assailed as preferential and discriminatory, it being alleged that, in many instances, the individual cars had been virtually paid for by the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, and that the failure to charge them was in effect a mere means resorted to in order to give a preference contrary to the Act to Regulate Commerce. The prayer was for an alternative writ of mandamus, commanding an equal distribution in accordance with the averments of the petition in effect for the undoing of the regulations referred to, and for the establishment of regulations conformable to the rights which the petition asserted. As the scope of the prayer is important in the view we take of the case, it is excerpted in the margin. * chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
It suffices for the present purposes to say that the answer of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad traversed every averment as to preference and discrimination, asserted the validity of the method of rating and the rules of distribution to which we have referred. In great detail the origin and history of the operation of private or individual cars was set out, various contracts on that subject were annexed to the bill, and a decree rendered by the circuit court of the United States for the Northern District of West Virginia in favor of the Fairmont Coal Company, perpetually enjoining the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Company to deliver certain private cars to the chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
There was voluminous testimony and a protracted trial, each side requesting findings and instructions embodying their respective contentions, and excepting insofar as they were overruled. The court considered all the contentions raised by the pleadings except several which were not pressed at bar. It held that, in view of the relations which the Cumberland and Pennsylvania Railroad had to the Baltimore and Ohio, and chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
the origin of those relations, the method by which coal cars were turned over to the Cumberland road was not preferential or discriminatory. It decided that however amenable, abstractly considered, to criticism, if at all, might be the system of rating, and especially the inclusion therein of the amount of coal shipments, and the large influence attributed to that fact, yet, when the particular facts concerning the Monongah district and the relations of the Baltimore and Ohio to that district were given their proper weight, the system was a just one and ought not to be interfered with. The complaint as to the Curtis Bay premium was also decided to be without merit, and so also was the complaint as to consumer's cars, as to foreign railway fuel cars and company fuel cars. Considering the private cars belonging to mine operators, and, without at all going into the relation of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad with the owners of such cars, it was decided that, while there was a right on the part of the railroad to move the cars, and it would be confiscation to deprive the owners of the right to use them, yet the duty was on the railroad to take account of the cars in fixing the percentage in case of shortage. The court declined to consider the decree which has been rendered in favor of the Fairmont Company against the Baltimore and Ohio in the previous case, which was pleaded, as well as that in another cause, which was relied upon in argument to the same effect as controlling. The mandamus prayed therefore was refused as to every item embraced in the petition but that particular item, and, as to it, the writ was awarded. United States v. Balt. & Ohio R. Co., 154 F.1d 8.
The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company, the Fairmont Companies, and the Pitcairn Coal Company prosecuted error. The circuit court of appeals held as follows: (a) that the system of rating, so far as taking into view the shipments and percentages based thereon was considered, was discriminatory and preferential; (b) that, while the right to allot cars to the Cumberland and Pennsylvania Railroad under the facts found below was lawful, the methods by which the allotment chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
was made was also discriminatory and preferential; (c) that the practice as to the Curtis Bay regulation was also amenable to the same criticism; (d) that the duty existed to take into account the individual cars, the foreign railway fuel cars, and the company fuel cars in making a pro rata division in case of car shortage, and that not to do so would give rise to undue preferences and unlawful discriminations forbidden by the Act to Regulate Commerce. Concluding that the various subjects embraced in the complaint with which it thus dealt were all controlled by the Act to Regulate Commerce, it was expressly decided that the right to rectify the wrongs by the issue of the writ of mandamus as prayed for was sanctioned by the twenty-third section of the Act to Regulate Commerce, and the case was remanded to the court below, with directions to allow the writ of peremptory mandamus, in accordance with the opinion. 165 F.1d 3. The case is here upon error prosecuted by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad and the Fairmont Coal Companies.
To a consideration of this question it is essential to at once summarily and accurately fix the subject matter of the alleged grievances and the precise character of the relief, required in order to remedy the evils complained of upon the chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The controversy is controlled by the considerations which governed the ruling made in Texas & Pacific Ry. Company v. Abilene Cotton Oil Co., 204 U. S. 426. In that case, suit was brought in a court of the State of Texas to recover, because of an exaction by a carrier, on an interstate shipment, of an alleged unreasonable rate, although the rate charged was that stated in the schedules duly filed and published in accordance with the Act to Regulate Commerce. After great consideration, it was held that the relief prayed was inconsistent with the Act to Regulate Commerce since, by that act, the rates, as filed, were controlling until they had been declared to be unreasonable by the Interstate Commerce Commission on a complaint made to that body. It was pointed out that any other view would give chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
rise to inextricable confusion, would create unjust preferences and undue discriminations, would frustrate the purposes of the act, and, in effect, cause the act to destroy itself. The ruling there made dealt with the provisions of the act as they existed prior to the amendments adopted in 1906, and when those amendments are considered they render, if possible, more imperative the construction given to the act by that ruling, since, by § 15, as enacted by the amendment of June 29, 1906, the Commission is empowered, indeed it is made its duty, in disposing of a complaint, not only to determine the legality of the practice alleged to give rise to an unjust preference or undue discrimination, and to forbid the same, but, moreover, to direct the practice to be followed as to such subject for a future period, not exceeding two years, with power in the Commission, if it finds reason to do so, to suspend, modify, or set aside the same, the order, however, to become operative without judicial action. In considering § 15 in the case of Interstate Commerce Commission v. Illinois Central Railroad Co., just decided, ante, p. 215 U. S. 452, it was pointed out that the effect of the section was to cause it to come to pass that courts, in determining whether an order of the Commission should be suspended or enjoined, were without power to invade the administrative functions vested in the Commission, and therefore could not set aside an order duly made on a mere exercise of judgment as to its wisdom or expediency. Under these circumstances, it is apparent, as we have said, that these amendments add to the cogency of the reasoning which led to the conclusion in the Abilene case, that the primary interference of the courts with the administrative functions of the Commission was wholly incompatible with the Act to Regulate Commerce. This result is easily illustrated. A particular regulation of a carrier engaged in interstate commerce is assailed in the courts as unjustly preferential and discriminatory. Upon the facts found, the complaint is declared to be well founded. The administrative powers of the Commission are invoked concerning a regulation of like character upon a similar complaint. chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
We say this record, because, as has been pointed out, one of the questions which we would be called upon to decide if the merits were open is whether the court below was right in holding that, if anything but the physical capacity of a mine was taken into consideration by a railroad company in rating the mine for car distribution in time of car shortage, the Act to Regulate Commerce would be violated, and therefore the system adopted by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company was repugnant to the act, because it made not alone the physical capacity, but past shipments, factors to be considered. But the reports of the Interstate Commerce Commission show that, on a complaint made to that body on the subject of the system of mine rating of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company, the Commission, before the decision of the circuit court of appeals in this case was announced, had expressly refused to hold that the system was either preferential or prejudicial within the Act to Regulate Commerce. In that report, speaking of the Baltimore and Ohio system of mine rating, it was said (Rail & River Coal Co. v. B. & O. R. Co., 14 I.C.C. 94): chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
And the destructive effect upon the system of regulation devised by the Act to Regulate Commerce, which these illustrations show must be the result of construing that act as giving authority to the courts, without the preliminary action of the Commission, to consider and pass upon the administrative questions which the statute has primarily confided to that body, may be greatly multiplied. This is shown by the opinion of the Commission in the Baltimore and Ohio case, to which we have already referred, where the decisions of chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
As it was settled in the Abilene case that the right to question in the courts the rates established in accordance with the Act to Regulate Commerce without previous resort, by complaint, to the Commission, in order to determine their unreasonableness, would be destructive of the act, and therefore was not permissible, that ruling is equally applicable to the provision as to furnishing cars, contained in § 23, which is here relied upon. But as we are required, for the determination of the case now before us, to consider the scope of the Act to Regulate Commerce as now existing, as a result of the amendments of 1906, we shall not rest our conclusion alone upon the persuasive force, of the reasoning which constrained to the conclusion announced in the Abilene case. Speaking generally, it is true to say that, prior to 1889, although the prohibitions of the Act to Regulate Commerce as to preferences and discriminations were far-reaching, the mechanism provided by the statute for the enforcement of orders of the Commission on the subject, as well as those concerning a finding as to unreasonable rates, were deemed to be in many respects ineffective, or at least tardy in operation or unsatisfactory in prompt remedial results, and this because immediate effect was not given to the orders of the Commission, but the aid chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
of judicial authority was required as a prerequisite for such result. Section 23, here relied upon, was not part of the original act, but, as we have said, was added thereto on March 2, 1889, for the obvious purpose of making the remedial processes of the act more speedy and efficacious. Now it cannot in reason be questioned that among the purposes contemplated by the amendments adopted in 1906 was the curing of the presumed remedial inefficiency of the act by supplying efficient means for giving effect to the orders of the Commission, made in the exertion of the authority conferred upon that body. To that end, one of the amendments, § 15, gives operative effect to the orders of the Commission without the sanction of previous judicial authority, and endows that body with the power, not only as to unreasonable rates, but as to practices found upon complaint to be unduly prejudicial and unjustly discriminatory, to correct the same by its order, which order should have effect within the period fixed in the statute, and, to enforce these provisions, penalties and forfeitures are provided. Sec. 16. It being demonstrable, as we have seen, that to give to § 23 the broad meaning which the court below fixed to it would be to destroy or render inefficacious the remedial purposes of the amendments enacted in 1906, it must follow that such construction cannot be adopted, since to do so would compel us to hold that the wide and far-reaching remedies created by the amendments of 1906 were, in effect, destroyed by the narrower remedial processes which had been previously enacted in 1889. This conclusion being in reason impossible, it must follow that, construing the provisions of § 23 in the light of and in harmony with the amendments adopted in 1906, the remedy afforded by that section, in the cases which it embraces, must be limited either to the performance of duties which are so plain and so independent of previous administrative action of the Commission as not to require a prerequisite exertion of power by that body, or to compelling the performance of duties which plainly arise from the chanroblesvirtualawlibrary