Court Opinion

ID: 9584656
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:51:14.747667+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:12:14.971768
License: Public Domain

Duckworth, Chief Justice,
dissenting. The majority rely upon Rule 14 of the commission and the decision in Western & Atlantic Railroad v. Georgia Public Service Commission, 267 U. S. 493, supra, upholding that rule as against an attack based upon the Constitution. In doing this, I think they fall into two errors. First of all, Rule 22 of the commission is the relevant and controlling rule here. Rule 22 provides that “no regulation of the Commission shall be construed as requiring or authorizing the use of any property of one railroad company by another railroad company for any purpose whatever without the consent of the owner of such property.” This rule simply respects the Constitution and the rights of private property. It is a condition put upon all rules including Rule 14 by the commission itself. Respect for Rule 22 forbids a requirement by any rule, including Rule 14, that the private property belonging to one railroad company be used by another railroad company without the consent of the owner of such property. Every rule of construction known to the law demands that the two rules be construed together and that all other rules be limited as expressly stated in Rule 22. Thus construed none of them means that property of one railroad company can be used by another without the consent of the owner. That is precisely what the commission and the majority of this court has done in defiance of Rule 22 upon the solitary ground of Rule 14. They compel Southern to allow the Coast Line to use Southern’s track without the consent of, and over objection of Southern that its private property be thus used by another.
To contend as the majority does that the Supreme Court de*167cisión in Western & Atlantic Railroad v. Georgia Public Service Commission, 267 U. S. 493, supra, is even remote authority for that ruling is to manifest a glaring misconception of what that case ruled. There, the property involved (a spur track) was the property of the same railroad, which, under Rule 14, the owner railroad company was required to use itself. There, a customer formerly served by the railroad involved complained because the railroad had ceased to use its property to give the complainant the service as before. The objection of the railroad was not, as here, that it was being required to allow, against its will, use of its property by another railroad, but that objection was that its spur track was out of repair, unsafe, and it would be expensive to repair it. That decision amounts to no more than upholding the authority of the commission to compel the railroad company to use its own property as a means of rendering services to its shipper-customers. There is no express or implied ruling in that case on the issue here, which in no way involves the use by Southern of its own property as was true there. Here the issue involved is the compulsion by the commission of the Southern against its wish to allow; the Coast Line to use Southern’s property. No such question as we now have was ruled upon in Railroad Commission of Ga. v. Louisville & Nashville R. Co., 140 Ga. 817 (80 SE 327); Union Dry Goods Co. v. Ga. Public Service Corp., 142 Ga. 841 (83 SE 946); Louisville & Nashville R. Co. v. Mottley, 219 U. S. 467, supra; Chicago, Burlington & Quincy R. Co. v. McGuire, 219 U. S. 549, supra; or Union Dry Goods Co. v. Ga. Public Service Corp., 248 U. S. 372, supra; all of which dealt with the power of the commission to require use of property by the owner to render service to the public.
The construction placed upon Rule 14 would render it clearly unconstitutional as contended, but it is the construction and not the rule, when given its true meaning, that offends both the State and Federal constitutional protection of private property.
Nobody questions the authority of the commission to prevent discrimination by any railroad against any of its customers, but it is a shocking error to stretch this perfectly sensible and just rule to the extent of causing it to require a railroad company to *168surrender its own property to another railroad in order that one desiring to patronize that other road might not be discriminated against by that road, and not the road that owns the property. If the majority ruling stands, it spells the death knell to private property, but I believe, if not now, later, that ruling will fall because of the rank injustice it inflicts. ’Til now I had thought that when parties to a contract had terminated it in strict accord With its expressed terms, they were thereupon released from its obligations. But the contract of 1902 between these railroads whereby Southern allowed the Coast Line to use its tracks, which is here involved, expressly provided for its termination by either party, and it was so terminated, and they were both satisfied that it had ended, and actually executed another but different contract, which disallowed further use by the Coast Line of property belonging to Southern which is here involved. The order of the commission which the majority uphold, is an absolute obliteration of that cancellation contrary to the will of the only parties to the contract and its cancellation. And this for no better reason or excuse than that a shipper who might choose some day to ship by Coast Line which does not have this facility, and hence would charge the shipper more than Southern, which owns the facility would charge. Will they usurp further power to compel Southern to allow the Coast Line to use its cars because they are better and thereby insure the customers of Coast Line the benefit of such better equipment?
I have only touched decisive points in this dissent because I believe they demonstrate the dangerous error of the majority ruling.