United States Supreme Court Cases & Opinions

U.S. Supreme Court

United States v. American Sheet & Tin Plate Co., 301 U.S. 402 (1937)

United States v. American Sheet & Tin Plate Co.

No. 734

Argued April 9, 12, 1937

Decided May 17, 1937

301 U.S. 402

Syllabus

1. Orders of the Interstate Commerce Commission requiring carriers to desist from spotting cars on industrial plant tracks as part of the service rendered under interstate line-haul rates and from granting allowances out of the line-haul rates to industries doing such spotting held adequately supported by the Commission's findings in each case that the interchange tracks of the respective industries are reasonably convenient points for the receipt and delivery of interstate shipments, and that the industry performs no service beyond those points of interchange for which the carrier is compensated under its interstate line-haul rates. P. 301 U. S. 406.

These findings are an adjudication by the Commission that the spotting service within the plants is not transportation service which the carriers are bound to render in respect of receipt and delivery of freight.

2. The Commission is not foreclosed by its earlier decisions from investigating the varied practice of making allowances for plant switching and from making proper orders to regulate the practice and prevent performance of a service not within the carriers' transportation obligation. P. 301 U. S. 407.

3. Upon finding that the carriers' service of transportation is complete upon delivery to the industries' interchange tracks, and that

Page 301 U. S. 403

spotting within the plants is not included in the service for which the line-haul rates were fixed, there is power in the Commission to enjoin the performance of that additional service or the making an allowance to the industry which perform it. P. 301 U. S. 408.

4. The Commission's findings are sustained by the evidence. P. 301 U. S. 409.

15 F.Supp. 711 reversed.

Appeal from a decree of the District Court, of three judges, setting aside orders of the Interstate Commerce Commission concerning the spotting of cars. The case was a consolidation of several cases, each brought by a different industrial corporation, which were tried together and disposed of by one decree.