Opinion ID: 340779
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The ICC's Power to Suspend or Terminate Certificates, Permits, or Licenses.

Text: 12 In Congress's statutory framework for the regulation of motor carriers, one section, 49 U.S.C. § 312, purports to define the limits of the ICC's power to suspend or terminate certificates, permits, or licenses. Under section 312, only a motor carrier's willful failure to comply with a provision of the motor carrier chapter of the Act, a pronouncement of the ICC, or a condition of the certificate, permit, or license can trigger the Commission's suspension or termination power. And section 312 states that certificates, permits, or licenses shall remain in effect until suspended or terminated as herein provided. 13 Although section 312 purports to be the exclusive source of the ICC's suspension or termination authority, the Supreme Court has held that 49 U.S.C. § 17, which mandates that (t)he Commission shall conduct its proceedings . . . in such manner as will best conduce . . . to the ends of justice, gives the ICC the power to modify certificates to correct inadvertent ministerial errors. American Trucking Associations, Inc. v. Frisco Transportation Co., 358 U.S. 133, 145, 79 S.Ct. 170, 3 L.Ed.2d 172 (1958). In Frisco, the Court allowed the ICC to insert into a rail-affiliated carrier's operating certificate a caveat permitting the Commission to restrict the carrier to operations related to its rail services. The record showed that all parties had intended that the caveat be part of the certificate, but that the Commission staff had omitted it through clerical error. 14 Since Frisco, the ICC has expanded its power outside of section 312 to alter certificates. This expansion has occurred primarily in the so-called failure-of-notice cases. Greenstein Trucking Co., 113 M.C.C. 489 (1971), aff'd, Greenstein Trucking Co. v. United States, 343 F.Supp. 194 (N.D.Ga.1972); Curtis, Inc., 113 M.C.C. 170 (1971), aff'd, No. C-3498 (D.Colo. July 21, 1975); Clarence M. May, 106 M.C.C. 118 (1967), aff'd, May Trucking Co. v. United States, 290 F.Supp. 38 (D.Idaho 1968); Carl Subler Trucking, Inc., 103 M.C.C. 307 (1966), aff'd, Carl Subler Trucking, Inc. v. United States, 313 F.Supp. 971 (S.D.Ohio 1970). In each of these cases, there was a disparity between the authority actually granted in the carrier's certificate and the carrier's representations to competing carriers regarding the authority sought, the authority granted being broader than that reflected in the notice to competitors. The competing carriers, taken by surprise, were allowed to intervene in the reopened proceedings to attempt to show that the certificates should be altered to conform to the applicant's representations. The Commission justified its action on two bases the competing carriers' statutory right to notice 7 and the constitutional guarantee of procedural due process. 8 15 The ICC cites one of these failure-of-notice cases, Curtis, Inc., supra, and also the Supreme Court's Frisco decision, as demonstrating the Commission's power to alter Eagle's operating authority here. The Commission contends that alteration was justified for three reasons: (1) Eagle misrepresented, either intentionally or unintentionally, the tacking capabilities of the Sub-No. 272 authority; (2) Eagle's application in the Federal Register, which stated that the authority sought could not be tacked, was inadequate notice to competing carriers; and (3) Eagle benefited from the Commission's inadvertence in failing to place a no-tacking restriction on the Sub-No. 272 certificate. 16 Assuming that the ICC's power as exercised in the failure-of-notice cases does exist and Eagle does not seriously challenge this the application of that power in the instant case might be justified. Moreover, if it could be shown that the absence from the Sub-No. 272 certificate of a no-tacking restriction resulted from an inadvertent clerical error, then Frisco would be a source of ICC authority to alter Eagle's operating rights. 17 The defect in the ICC's position is not that it lacks the power to act, but rather that it has acted without giving Eagle the same due process right to be heard that the ICC has so diligently guarded with respect both to competing carriers, and, as the following discussion will demonstrate, to others in situations similar to Eagle's. 18