Court Opinion

ID: 9418143
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:10:04.066958+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:21:56.116596
License: Public Domain

Me. Justice McKenna,
dissenting.
I am unable to concur in the opinion of the court so far as it applies to the transportation of cattle wholly within Kentucky. The difference between that and interstate transportation is important, for it was conceded at the argument that at least sixty per cent of the business was of domestic cattle.
This is a second review of the controversy between the parties. It was originally started in one of the courts of Kentucky, and there, meeting obstacles arising from the want of jurisdiction over interstate commerce, the latter was made the .subject of a suit in a United States Circuit Court, where the Central Stock Yards Company suffered defeat;- its bill being dismissed for want of equity. This judgment was affirmed by the Circuit Court of Appeals (118 Fed. Rep. 113), and subsequently by this court. 192 U. S. 568. This is pointed out in the Qpinion, but it may be well to see what was decided. In the Circuit Court *146of Appeals these propositions were decided: (1) Independently of statute, the railway could not be required to deliver to the Southern Railway Company for transportation to the Central Stock Yards Company the live stock, though shipped to and ultimately destined to the stock yards company. The Louisville and Nashville Company, the court said, performed its duty under the common law when it provided a place for disembarkar tion of the stock at the Bourbon Stock Yards, though that place was fixed by contract with the latter company. (2) That the refusal of the Louisville and Nashville Company to make such transfer of stock to the Southern Railway Company was not a violation of § 3 of the Interstate Commerce Act. (3) Considering the case more broadly and as involving the right to require one railroad to interchange traffic with another, the position of the Central Stock Yards Company would be untenable, because, as it was held at common law, a railroad is only bound to transport freight at its own terms. (4) If the constitution of Kentucky could be construed to require such delivery of the live stock, it was invalid in so far as it affected interstate commerce. The case, therefore, left local commerce untouched. It declared no principle that precluded a State by legislation, constitutional or statutory, to require such transfer of stock if it applied , only to commerce within the State. The case came to this court, and here also it was considered only as it affected interstate commerce. It is true it was said that “ if the cattle are- to remain in the defendant’s 'cars it cannot, be required to hand those cars over to another railroad without a .contract, and the courts have' no authority to dictate a contract to the deT fendant, or to- require it to maké one.” This expressed only a limit upon the power of the courts, not of a legislature or a constitution, for it was also said “there is no'act of Congress .that attempts to give courts a power to require contracts to be made in a case like this.” And the eases which were cited sustain the view that the impotency of the courts was not because of a right in the railroads, which were exempt from legislative regulation, but a right only exempt from control by'the courts in the *147absence of legislation. None of the cases declare otherwise. They interpreted the then existing legislation, and did not attempt to decide what legislation might be competent. Indeed, Judge Jackson (afterwards a justice of this court) in Kentucky & I. Bridge Co. v. Louisville & Nashville R. R. Co., 37 Fed. Rep. 567, 634, strongly intimated that Congress had the power to do.what he, exercising the powers of the Circuit Court, could not do without legislative authority.
• I will assume, therefore, the power of the State to require an exchange of cars between railroads, and consider only what are the limitations upon the exercise of the power, not broadly, for the case has been'brought into the narrow requirements of provision for compensation and security. Must such provisions be explicit in the law? May not'the principle or rule of regulation be prescribed by law, statutory or constitutional, and the conditions of its application be ascertained and enforced by the courts or an administrative body? To what extent a court may be made an instrumentality in the administration of the laws of a State I may refer to the Virginia Railroad Commission Cases, 211 U. S. 210. See also Kohl v. United States, 91 U. S. 367.
If the State may so distribute its power of regulation it is certainly not within the province of this court to say that it has not done so against a contrary view, expressed or assumed, by the courts of the State. We can only deal with the result, that is, the ultimate action of the State, through any of its instrumentalities, as offending the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States. The procedure is for the determination of the State. This principle is conspicuously illustrated in Waters-Pierce Oil Co. v. State of Texas, ante, p. 86, and is also illustrated by the decisions under, the Massachusetts and New Hampshire mill acts, infra. _ What, then, is the effect of the judgment'under review?
It will be observed that the constitution puts an obligation upon railroad companies to “receive, transfer, deliver and switch empty Or loaded cars,” and to “move, transport, receive, load or unload all the freight in carloads or less quantities *148coming to or going from any railroad . . . with equal promptness and dispatch, and without any discrimination as to charges, preferences, drawback or rebate in favor of any person . . . .in any matter as to payment, transportation^ handling or delivering,” and to “receive and transport all freight, from and to any point where there is a physical connection between the tracks of said companies.” The constitution, therefore, imposes a duty, it is true, but not a duty to be uncompensated. The special emphasis of the prohibition of favor as to charges makes conspicuous and indisputable the right to make and enforce them if made and enforced without “favor to'any person.” There could be no discrimination “as to charges,” if there were no charges, no drawback or rebate from them; and the right to require security for the return of the cars is left untouched. Nor have the constitutional provisions been limited by the decree under review.
It does not adjudge that the service required of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad should not be compensated. The right of the railroad company to charge for the use of its cars is declared. The court said that the transfer of the cars was a use of them in the interest of the public. “If this,” the court further observed, “is in a sense the taking of its property 'for private purposes, appellant [defendant in error], as a common carrier, must submit to it, for it is only a temporary and necessary use of its property. Appellant cannot suffer loss by such use of its cars. If it delivers its cars to the Southern Railway Company to be taken to appellee [Central Stock Yards] for the loading and unloading of stock, that company has no right to detain them longer than a reasonable time for that purpose, and must return them. Appellant may charge a reasonable amount for the use of its cars, and if they are not returned, or if detained more than a reasonable time, it may sue the delinquent road for damages, or apply to a court of equity for a mandatory injunction to compel the return of cars. Indeed, it can suffer no loss which the law may not remedy.” And the court pointed out that by regulations between railroads cars were inter*149changed between them at a fixed charge. It is entirely consistent with the opinion that plaintiff in error may charge for the delivery of its cars, either when the cattle are shipped or when their destination is changed, or at the time of delivery to the Southern Railway Company. It is also entirely consistent with the opinion of the court that plaintiff in error can exact such stipulations from the Southern Railway Company as will protect it fully. The practice of connecting roads should be regarded, I think, when considering so simple a servitude as imposed in this case upon property devoted to a public use, and subject, because of such use, to regulation by the State. In this every right of plaintiff in error would be preserved. In this every power of the State would be preserved. I do not stop to make a comparison between such right and such power, but I submit this court should put no limit upon the latter that is not clearly necessary to preserve the other.
Plaintiff in error makes no question of precedent or ultimate payment for the use of its cars, or the absence of provisions for their return. It is contended that in some way (in what way is not pointed out) the State must exercise its right of eminent domain, and unless the right be exercised through an impartial tribunal there is not due process of law. It is also contended that there is an attempted transfer of terminals, and the duty of a local transfer company imposed on plaintiff in error, which in some way takes its property without due process of law. The question made then is of an inviolable right, impregnable in constitutional protection, against a legislative regulation such- as in the case at bar, and to what contemplation does this bring us? If the right is impregnable in constitutional' protection against regulation in the interest of inirast&te commerce it is also impregnable in such constitutional protection against regulation in the interest- of inferstate commerce. Are we prepared to announce that conclusion? The consequences of it are certainly quite serious.
.The act of June 29,1906, 34 Stat. 584, c. 3591, provided that “The term ‘transportation’ shall include all of the articles, in*150strumentalities and facilities of shipment or carriage,” and further provides that every carrier subject to its provisions shall “ provide and furnish transportation upon reasonable' request therefor, and to establish through routes and just and reasonable rates applicable thereto.” (Section 1.)
The act also provides that, such carriers, upon the application •of any lateral branch line of-railroad or of any shipper, shall construct and operate switch connections and shall furnish cars for the traffic thereover. And the commission is given power to enforce such duty. ■
The commission is also given the power to divide a joint rate and establish joint rates and through routes. The commission further has the power to fix the compensation to be paid to the owner of property transported for any instrumentality furnished by him.
These are some of the regulations of interstate commerce,regulations of great reach and consequence, and they are not more specific as to compensation or security for the use or loss of cars than the constitution of Kentucky. And I submit that the power of"a State over its domestic commerce is as great as the power of the Nation over interstate commerce. 1
The exigencies of this case do not require me to distinguish between those sovereign powers of the State denominated the power of-eminent domain and the police power.-Both may be exercised over private property. By the exercise of the first power property is taken and compensation for it is a necessary condition; by the exercise of the second power property is subjected-to regulation and a provision for compensation is not necessary. When regulation is transcended and becomes a taking of property may, at times, be a close question, but the power, of regulation must not be overlooked or underestimated. It is, as I have said, an exercise of the police power, and that is the most absolute of the sovereign powers of the State. We said in Bacon v. Walker, 204 U. S. 311, that it “extends to dealing with the conditions which exist in a State as to bring out of them the greatest welfare of its people. ” In Otis Co. v. Ludlow Co., 201 *151U. S. 140, this court sustained the Massachusetts Mill Act, which" gave the right of one owner of land on a stream to flow the land of another; against the charge that it was contrary to the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States as taking property without' due process of law, in that it made no adequate provision for the payment of damages caused by an exercise of the rights conferred by the act. The provision for payment was an action for damages. The use of .property in that case was as complete and more enduring than in this, and we said;ofit: “The right of the lower owner only becomes complete when the land is flowed, and as, even then, it is not a right to maintain the water upon the plaintiff’s land, but merely a right to maintain the-dam subject to paying for the harm actually done, we see nothing to complain of in that regard.” See Head v. Amoskeag Mfg. Co., 113 U. S. 9. This court, therefore, has decided that a simple action of damages is sufficient security for compensation for that use of property, which this court, and almost every court in the Union, has held to be a taking. Pumpelly v. Green Bay Co., 13 Wall. 166.
It is true it is held by the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts that the principle upon which the Mill Act is founded is not the right of ^eminent domain, but the resulting general good of all or the public welfare. Murdock v. Stickney, 8 Cush. 113. And this court', yielding also to that purpose, has quite recently declared that a State might, in order to meet new conditions, elevate into a public use of property that which under other conditions had universally been held'to be a private use.
Clark v. Nash, 198 U. S. 361; Strickley v. Highland Boy Mining Co., 200 U. S. 527. See also Offield v. New York & N. H. R. R. Co., 203 U. S. 372.
Other cases may be adduced for illustration. I think, therefore, that it might easily be contended that the service required of plaintiff in error cannot be considered in any legal or practical sense a taking of property. Let us keep steadily in mind what it is that is required and what the requirement involves of the use of plaintiff in error’s cars. It is a use not different from that *152they served from the moment of starting, or would serve if the end of the transportation be the Bourbon Stock Yards. If the end of the transportation be made the Central Stock Yards, there is the added element only that a limited and temporary possession of the cars is given to the Southern Railway Company, a possession, it must be said, not required- in the interest of that company, but in the interest of the commerce of which it and the plaintiff in error are but instrumentalities, and as aids to which they were organized and are permitted to-exist.
But I do not have to take this position, strongly supported as it may be. It is enough for my purpose that the constitution of the State provides for compensation for the duty it imposes on the railroads.
I am authorized to say that Mr. Justice Harlan and Mr. Justice Moody concur in this dissent.