Case Name: CHICAGO & ALTON RAILROAD CO. v. THE UNITED STATES; YAZOO & MISSISSIPPI VALLEY RAILROAD CO. v. THE UNITED STATES
Court: Supreme Court of the United States
Jurisdiction: United States
Decision Date: 1917-01-15
Citations: 52 Ct. Cl. 515
Docket Number: 
Parties: CHICAGO & ALTON RAILROAD CO. v. THE UNITED STATES; YAZOO & MISSISSIPPI VALLEY RAILROAD CO. v. THE UNITED STATES.
Judges: 
Reporter: United States Court of Claims Reports
Volume: 52
Pages: 515–517

Head Matter:
CHICAGO & ALTON RAILROAD CO. v. THE UNITED STATES; YAZOO & MISSISSIPPI VALLEY RAILROAD CO. v. THE UNITED STATES.
[49 C. Cls. R., 463 ; 50 Id., 15; 242 U. S. R., 621.]
The Postmaster General issued order No. 165, whereby he gave notice to the plaintiff and other railroad companies engaged in carrying the mails that for the quadrennial term commencing July 1, 1907, lie would use for a divisor, in ascertaining the average daily weights of the mails, the number of days included in the weighing period, and since then the average daily weights have been ascertained accordingly. The plaintiff contends that the mails should have been weighed for 105 days. The aggregate of these weighings taken as a dividend and 90 as a divisor and the quotient be accepted as the average weight per day, insisting that such had been the practice of the department for over 30 years under the act of 1873, 17 Stat. L., 558, which, however, was amended in 1905, 33 Stat. L., 1088. The plaintiff has been paid quarterly since July, 1907, upon the basis of 105 for a divisor, but now contends that by the use of 90 as a divisor it would receive much more, and it is to recover this difference this suit was brought. The principal question, therefore, is upon the construction of the act of March 3, 1873, and the several acts amendatory thereof.
The court below decides:
In the consideration of a doubtful and ambiguous law the contemporaneous construction of those who were called upon to act thereunder and were appointed to carry its provisions into effect is entitled to great respect and ought not to be overruled without cogent reasons and may be accepted as determining its meaning.
It is well established that debates, committee reports, and opinions of individual Members of Congress can not be considered as interpreting the meaning of statutes enacted by Congress, but the rule does recognize that such congressional records may be consulted in the ascertainment of the history of the period of the enactment of the statute.
Where the statute authorized a readjustment of the compensation for transporting the mails upon “ the conditions and terms ” mentioned therein and one of these conditions is that in the matter of weights the statutory rule shall be used to find the average weight of the mails carried per day, the aggregate of “the actual weighings of the mails for such a number of successive working days not less than thirty," as the Postmaster General may direct, furnishes the dividend, the number of successive working days so used furnishes the divisor, and the quotient the average daily weight of the mails carried per day.
Where the ascertainment of the average weight of the mails carried per day by the departmental method was because of discretionary power granted by the statute, that discretion must be held to have existed in each successive Postmaster General and still to continue.
The general rule is that the reenactment of a statute that has received a judicial construction amounts to a legislative adoption of such construction.
Where certain words in a statute have received a construction by the Supreme Court, Congress is presumed to have knowledge of it, and like words being again repeated by Congress, it may well be considered that a like construction was intended and was expected to be given those words.
Where the meaning of a statute is clear, executive exposition or construction of it is given little consideration by the courts in its construction. It is only where the statute is ambiguous or doubtful that resort is had to contemporaneous construction given to it in the departments. The reenactment of a statute which had been construed by the executive department would not carry into the new statute that construction unless the older statute were itself ambiguous and doubtful.
Where a statute, together with the amendments, does not authorize the application of the rule if contemporaneous and long continued executive exposition it should, and will, be given the construction which its words in their usual and generally accepted meaning import, and an amendment is not an adoption of any preexisting departmental practice which is controlling upon the interpretation to be given by the courts.
Where matters of such grave importance as the transportation of the mails are involved it is of prime importance that the terms and regulations as between the carriers and the Government should be known and the plaintiff having the right to refuse the terms offered should be held to the effect of his action in proceeding with the performance of the work and receiving payments based upon the department’s understanding of the contract.

Opinion:
The decision of the court below is affirmed by an equal] / divided court, January 15, 1917.