Court Opinion

ID: 9421550
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:58:50.499004+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:31.086986
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Harlan,
whom The Chief Justice and Mr. Justice Burton join,
dissenting.
I think that the Court moves with unnecessary haste in striking down this California statute which was intended to deal with rate-cutting practices of California carriers handling the heavy volume of military traffic in that State. These practices, the State tells us, have a seriously depressing influence upon revenues of carriers and might lead to a deterioration of the economic position of the California carrier industry as a whole. To guard against this possibility, the California Legislature amended § 530 of the Public Utilities Code by extending rate regulation to carriers dealing with the Federal Government. Maintenance of the proper balance between federal and state concerns in this area should lead us to proceed with caution before deciding that this regulatory statute is unconstitutional. We should not reach this conclusion before giving California an opportunity to interpret and implement this enactment so that we can fairly judge whether it does in truth trespass upon paramount federal interests. Accordingly, I dissent upon the several grounds given below.
*547I.
Although Congress can no doubt foreclose a State from regulation of transportation rates between the Government and private carriers, such a purpose must be made manifest. The excerpts from federal procurement statutes and regulations quoted in the Court’s opinion provide, in my view, an inadequate foundation for the conclusion that Congress has directéd procurement officers to by-pass state minimum-price or rate regulation. It is difficult to believe that so important a decision has been taken in such an obscure manner. In contrast to the situation presented by the express exemption in § 22 of the Interstate Commerce Act, 49 U. S. C. § 22, of transportation for the United States from the rate provisions of that Act, no procurement statute declares inapplicable rate schedules covering intrastate transportation pursuant to state law, and there is no indication that federal procurement officers were not to operate within the framework of state economic regulation in negotiating to secure the best terms possible. The statutes and regulations relied upon by the Court as a manifestation of congressional intent to displace state economic regulation are substantially the same as those found wanting in this respect in Penn Dairies, Inc., v. Milk Control Comm’n of Pennsylvania, 318 U. S. 261, where this Court said (at 275):
“An unexpressed purpose of Congress to set aside statutes of the states regulating their internal affairs is not lightly to be inferred and ought not to be implied where the legislative command, read in the light of its history, remains ambiguous. Considerations which lead us not to favor repeal of statutes by implication [citing cases] should be at least as persuasive when the question is one of the nullification of state power by Congressional legislation.”
*548H-1
In the absence of an express federal policy to nullify state regulation, this Court’s decisions make clear that the fact that the Government may not henceforth receive more advantageous shipping rates in California than those applicable to other intrastate shippers is not sufficient by itself to vitiate this state statute. The fact that the economic incidence of state price regulation or taxation falls upon the Government no longer alone gives rise to an implied constitutional immunity from such regulation. E. g., Penn Dairies, supra, at 269; Alabama v. King & Boozer, 314 U. S. 1; James v. Dravo Contracting Co., 302 U. S. 134. In Penn Dairies, the Court upheld a Pennsylvania law setting minimum prices for milk as applied to a dealer selling milk in Pennsylvania to the United States for consumption at military camps. I can see no constitutional distinction between state regulation of the price of milk the Government must buy and of the price at which the Government must ship the milk it has bought. And surely, insofar as economic effect is concerned, nothing turns on the character of the commodity shipped, whether it be milk or a hydrogen bomb. Apart from discriminatory application of such a regulatory statute to the Government and other considerations not pertinent here, the constitutional validity of this California statute depends entirely on its noneconomic impact upon the Government — that is, upon a determination whether this statute interferes with the performance of governmental functions by military personnel or other federal employees. See Johnson v. Maryland, 254 U. S. 51; Arizona v. California, 283 U. S. 423.
III.
The aspects of the California statute which the Court finds fatal to its constitutionality simply reflect antici*549patory views as to how the rate regulation will work in practice. I consider this to be an insufficient basis on which to proceed to the serious business of striking down state regulation, and I believe that final judgment as to constitutionality should be deferred until we know how California intends to apply § 530 of its Public Utilities Code and to accommodate the state interest in a stable rate structure with the federal interest in unimpeded performance of military and other governmental functions. In view of the fact that the possible effect of § 530 in imposing an increased economic burden upon the Government does not in itself require invalidation of this statute, it is to my mind no answer to say that a decision upon the statute’s constitutionality need not be deferred pending recourse by the Government to the state Commission and courts, because the statute is unconstitutional on its face in that it subjects government arrangements with California carriers to control by the Commission. Indeed, the very intention of the California Legislature in making special provision for the Government to negotiate with the Commission was to enable it to secure advantageous rates which would not even have been possible if the rate schedules were binding upon all shippers without the possibility of administratively granted exceptions. Cf. Penn Dairies, supra.
The purpose in requiring the Government to proceed through the state Commission in the first instance, the path which I think should be followed here, would not be to permit the state Commission or courts to pass upon the statute’s constitutionality. That of course is the ultimate responsibility of this Court. Rather the purpose would be to determine if the statute can be so implemented as to overcome objections which the Government could present to the Commission. After such proceedings, we would not be compelled to consider the constitutional question under the uninformed view as to *550the actual operation of the statute which we now have. More than abstract or potential impingement upon, or the mere possibility of interference with, some federal function should be shown before we are justified in thwarting otherwise legitimate state policy.
Some examples of the factors stressed by the Government as indicating the obstructive effect of this statute upon military functions suffice, I think, to demonstrate that the Court has acted prematurely in passing on constitutionality at this stage: (1) The Government has contended that disproportionately high rates would be imposed on military traffic because special “commodity” rates normally have not been established for many articles peculiar to military transportation, thus requiring recourse to higher “class” rates. The State has countered with the suggestion that the Commission might authorize retroactive rates which would enable the Government in effect to achieve commodity rates after shipments of presently unscheduled items. (2) It is alleged that excessive delay of vital military shipments may result if army officers are required to determine in advance applicable rates for all items in a varied shipment. Again the State suggests that retroactive determination of rates after the shipment may be the solution. (3) We are told that national security may be prejudiced if the military is forced to reveal the content of particular shipments to determine applicable rates in existing schedules, in lieu of following the present practice of negotiating a general rate for an entire shipment without specifying its content. This obviously important concern is recognized by the State, which emphasizes the Commission’s ability to cope with this problem, as by exempting from the usual procedures under § 530 all shipments declared to be “security shipments” by a responsible federal authority. (4) The “freight all kinds” rate noted by the Court as in current widespread use in military shipments is not expressly *551provided for by the California statute. Appellant, although frankly stating that this rate is a major vehicle for the price-cutting practices which the amended § 530 was designed to prevent, raises the possibility that a comparable method less productive of such practices might be approved by the Commission. If so, major administrative problems portrayed by the Government would evaporate. (5) The Court adverts to the possibility that state criminal statutes punishing certain parties for deviation from established rates might be applied against federal procurement officers. It will be time enough to dispose of this problem if such a prosecution should ever be brought, a possibility the State here emphatically discards.
I do not, of course, venture to predict whether the Commission might have been able to meet all objections of the Government by restricting the statute to purely economic regulation if it had been given the opportunity, but I do not see how we can say that such a possibility does not exist. It may be that what is now envisioned by the Government would not come to pass at all, for we should not assume that California will be less sensitive than others to the serious considerations urged by the Government with respect to shipments of vital military supplies. Moreover, it is hardly likely that the objections asserted against the application of the statute to military shipments would have the same force with respect to shipments of nonmilitary commodities by other government agencies; yet as to these too the Court annuls the statute.
Unless something more than the remote possibility of hindrance of government functions is enough to justify invalidation of such state statutes, I fail to see why under this decision all state tariff regulation is not automatically ineffective as against the Federal Government. I would not so extend the doctrine of implied *552federal immunities, especially when Congress has the undoubted power to deal directly with such matters according to its assessment of the competing state and federal interests involved. The Court has not heretofore gone to the extreme of this decision, and I find it anomalous that the very Term which witnesses a further diminution of the doctrine of implied intergovernmental tax immunities should produce this decision. See, e. g., City of Detroit v. Murray Corp., 355 U. S. 489, decided this day.
IV.
This Court should scrupulously withhold its hand from voiding state legislation until the effect on federal interests has appeared with reasonable certainty through clarifying construction and implementation of the challenged enactment by the State. Past decisions of the Court reflect the application of this general principle in a variety of situations involving state statutes or administrative .action. Railroad Comm’n of Texas v. Pullman Co., 312 U. S. 496, 501; Spector Motor Service, Inc., v. McLaughlin, 323 U. S. 101, 105; Letter Minerals, Inc., v. United States, 352 U. S. 220, 228-229. Cf. Alabama Federation of Labor v. McAdory, 325 U. S. 450, 471; Public Service Comm’n of Utah v. Wycoff Co., 344 U. S. 237, 246-247. In Spector Motor, the Court stated: “[A]s questions of federal constitutional power have become more and more intertwined with preliminary doubts about local law, we have insisted that federal courts do not decide questions of constitutionality on the basis of preliminary guesses regarding local law.” 323 U. S., at 105. And the language of the Court in Alabama Federation of Labor v. McAdory, 325 U. S., at 471, is very much in point here:
“The extent to which the declaratory judgment procedure may be used in the federal courts to control *553state action lies in the sound discretion of the Court. ... It would be an abuse of discretion for this Court to make a pronouncement on the constitutionality of a state statute . . . when the Court is left in uncertainty, which it cannot authoritatively resolve, as to the meaning of the statute when applied to any particular state of facts. ... In the exercise of this Court’s discretionary power to grant or withhold the declaratory judgment remedy it is of controlling significance that it is in the public interest to avoid the needless determination of constitutional questions and the needless obstruction to the domestic policy of the states by forestalling state action in construing and applying its own statutes.”
I see no good reason for departing now from that wise policy. In my view the Government should be remitted to the California Commission and courts to test there, in the first instance, the application of this statute, and the federal courts should withhold final judgment on constitutionality until the true effect of the statute has thus become known. The Government, however, should be permitted to proceed during this period as it had before § 530 was amended, for any possibility of state interference with military or other governmental operations would thereby be avoided. I would therefore vacate the judgment below and so frame a remand as to enable the District Court to stay the operation of this statute until proceedings before the state Commission or courts have run their full course. Cf. Lexter Minerals, Inc., supra. The proper accommodation of the state and federal concerns here involved makes this in my view the appropriate disposition of this case.