Court Opinion

ID: 9831790
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 21:21:35.020099+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:37.981201
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
The insistence of the appellee that this court was in error in applying the freight rate applicable to the controversy, as shown in our original opinion, actuates the following extension of reasons upon that subject: He says in the argument upon his motion:
“The evidence conclusively shows that the appellant the Wichita Falls & Wellington Railway Company of Texas, and its connecting carriers, had failed to file, print, and keep open to public inspection a separately established local rate applying between Wichita Falls and Wellington, and intermediate stations on said line, and in default of such established local rates direct between Wichita Falls and Wellington, Tex., appellants seek to subject this shipment to 23 cents per hundredweight, established for a haul of 317 miles, by way of Amarillo to Shamrock, and an additional two cents per hundredweight for being in Rock Island differential territory 72 miles (Amarillo to Shamrock), while the shipment proceeded directly from Wichita Falls to Wellington, a distance of about 130 miles, claiming, as authority for thus attempting to construct a local rate between Wichita Falls and *1120Wellington, Supplement No. 24 to Texas Lines Basing Tariff No. 2, Interstate Commerce Commission, effective December 25, 1911, 'which made the rates between Wellington and all other points * * * the same as between Shamrock, Tex., * * * and many other Texas points being named in said tariff.”
If the evidence conclusively shows that, as to the appellants particularly, they had “failed to file * * * separately established local rates applying between Wichita Palis and Wellington,” then it necessarily follows as to an interstate shipment a properly filed and published rate issued by the Interstate Commerce Commission would be the only one applicable. The law (Act June 29, 1900, c. 3591, § 2, 34 Stat. 5S6 [U. S. Comp. St. 1913, § 8569]) now provides:
“That every common carrier * * * shall file with the Commission * * * schedules showing all the rates, fares, and charges for transportation between different points on its own route,” etc.
And further provides:
“Nor shall any carrier charge or demand or collect or receive a greater or less, or different compensation for such transportation of * * * property * * * between the points named in such tariffs than the rates, fares, and charges which are specified in the tariff filed and in effect at the time. * * * ”
In the case of Texas & Pacific Railway Co. v. American Tie & Timber Co., 234 U. S. 146, 34 Sup. Ct. 887, 58 L. Ed. 1255, involving a refusal of the railway company to receive and transport ties- on the ground that it had no established filed rates for that purpose, the Supreme Court of the United States said:
“There is no room for controversy that the law required a tariff, and therefore, if there was no tariff on cross-ties, the making and filing of such tariff conformably to the statute was essential.”
[10] Hence, as the law now exists, the filed and published rate as to an interstate shipment, whatever the combination may be, is conclusive. See Texas & Pacific Railway Co. v. Mugg, 202 U. S. 242, 26 Sup. Ct. 628, 50 L. Ed. 1011.
[11] This would seem fundamental, and we really conceive that appellee’s insistence is that, because the Wichita Vayey Railway Company is excepted from the through tariff indicated, the tariff from Wichita Palls to Wellington as indicated in said supplement, could not be used to show a through rate from Spur to Wellington. Appellee says:
“Appellants claim that this exception prevented the through rate established by the tariff referred to applying between Spur and Wellington, and then seek to use the same tariff to establish a local rate of 25 cents for the haul between Wichita Palls and Wellington, rejecting the tariff rate for one purpose because of the Wichita Valley connection with this shipment, and' seeking to use the tariff for another purpose in handling the same shipment. * * * ”
We attempted to thoroughly consider this reasoning on the original consideration of the case, though not answering it specifically in the opinion.
While the Wichita Valley would not concur in this rate and was excepted from the scope of its operation by the Interstate Commerce Commission, and in consequence the basis between Shamrock, Tex., on the Chicago, Rock Island & Gulf Railway Company, to Texas points, as shown in the tariff, was not applicable to said Wichita Valley as a through rate for the shipment of goods, either from or to points on its line, however, the rate from Wichita Palls to Wellington is an established rate by this same supplement No. 2, promulgating this basis, which rate would have to be used by the road making up the combination for a through rate. It is not excepted from the rate between Wichita Palls and Wellington in making the combination for the through rate.
In our main opinion, though we considered all the assignments in appellant’s brief, we desire to note the second assignment of error and the following proposition thereunder:
“In a suit against carriers for damages, where the carriers pleaded that the shipment had moved under a written contract duly executed by the appellee’s agent, and the testimony of ap-pellee’s agent was to the effect that he signed the contract when it was presented to him, it was error for the court to permit the witness, over the objection of the appellants, to testify that he did not know what was written in the contract, although he signed it, and that he thought he had to sign it in order for the shipment to move forward, and that he did not know the written contract was different from an alleged verbal contract which it was claimed his father had made with the agent prior to the execution of the written contract, for the reason that said testimony had the effect of changing the terms of the written contract, was irrelevant, immaterial, and prejudicial.”
Most of the testimony, on page 20 of appellants’ brief, of the agent who signed the contract of shipment is so clearly admissible as against the objections made, though one of the statements may be questioned; the latter, however, is not separated sp this court could consider it. The preliminary questions and answers of this witness, shown on pages 18 and 19 of the brief, in connection with bis father’s testimony, and of his own in other portions of the record, are relevant upon the question of the agent’s authority to make a contract different from that which the father (the principal) claims was made and consummated between the latter and the agent prior to the shipment. We infer, though not wholly clear, that the son, the agent, testified that he signed the contract of shipment after the goods had been loaded upon the car. In the case of Railway Co. v. Barnett, 27 Tex. Civ. App. 501, 66 S. W. 476, the agent who signed the contract said, “I was authorized and directed by plaintiff to sign said contract;” and the appellate court said there was no evidence when the contract was signed with reference to loading, and also found that plaintiff “contemplated and expected written contracts to be entered into before the cattle left,” which elements are not in the record.
*1121We can see no error in tlie court excluding tlie witness Fontaine from tlie courtroom after tlie rule had been invoked; and as to appellee’s insistence that we committed error in our construction of the Carmack amendment, as not being applicable to this character of shipment, we also have attempted to carefully investigate all federal acts material upon this matter, and we see no reason to change our original opinion on that subject.
The motion for rehearing is in all things overruled.