1. The Interstate Commerce Commission's finding, supported by
evidence, that application of the Motor Carrier Act to the
transportation of passengers between the District of Columbia and
Government installations in nearby Virginia was necessary to carry
out the national transportation policy, wherefore the
transportation was within an exception to the commercial zone
exemption prescribed by § 203(b)(8), justified the exercise of
jurisdiction over such transportation, including the rates thereof,
by the Commission. P.
325 U. S.
360.
2. The Interstate Commerce Commission's findings, supported by
evidence, justify its order, under the Motor Carrier Act,
prescribing fares for interstate transportation by a company which
operates streetcars and buses as an integrated unit in such
interstate service, and prescribing joint fares for interstate
transportation furnished by such company and participating bus
lines. P.
325 U. S.
362.
3. Though some passengers paid a combination of two rates, one
for travel wholly within the District, the other for travel between
the District and Virginia, and the journey from their residences to
Virginia and return was made in two segments, the total interstate
trip was nevertheless on a "through route." P.
325 U. S.
363.
56 F. Supp. 670 reversed.
Appeal from a decree of a district court of three judges which
set aside an order of the Interstate Commerce Commission.
Page 325 U. S. 358
MR. JUSTICE BLACK delivered the opinion of the Court.
A federal district court of three judges, one judge dissenting,
set aside and permanently enjoined enforcement of an order of the
Interstate Commerce Commission, 258 I.C.C. 559, on the ground that
the findings were inadequate, and that the Commission acted beyond
its jurisdiction. 56 F. Supp. 670.
* The case is here
on direct appeal. 28 U.S.C. § 345.
At the request of the Secretaries of War and the Navy, the
Interstate Commerce Commission instituted an investigation into the
reasonableness of the fares of four carriers, transporting
passengers by bus between points in the District of Columbia and
nearby points in the Virginia, where are located certain military
and naval offices and installments employing more than 40,000
government workers. More than half these workers live in the
District, so that the number of individual passenger trips to and
from government work on the four motor lines is in excess of 31,000
per day. The fares of the different lines were not identical for
performance of substantially the same interstate transportation,
and dissatisfaction of
Page 325 U. S. 359
Army and Navy employees and officials had arisen on the ground
that the charges of all the companies were excessive. The
Commission, after a hearing, found some existing fares to be
reasonable and others unreasonable. Its order required some of the
rates to be reduced, but permitted others to be increased.
A complicating factor arose from the distinctive type of
business carried on by Capital Transit, one of the four companies
transporting passengers to and from the Virginia government
agencies. In addition to its District-Virginia bus service, it
operated an urban and suburban transportation system, carrying
passengers both by bus and streetcar. Since District terminals of
all the bus companies were located in or adjacent to the central
business sections, most government employees, in going to and
returning from their work, were compelled to begin or complete
their trips by utilizing buses or streetcars of Capital Transit. It
accorded to its own bus and streetcar passengers, but denied to
passengers on other Virginia buses, a privilege of transfers to and
from some of its Virginia buses which lowered the total fares
between District residences and their Virginia places of work. The
Commission treated Transit Company's local bus and streetcar
business as an integrated unit, and its findings, supported by
evidence, show that its intra-company transfer practices were the
equivalent of establishment by Transit of through interstate routes
with joint rates to and from District residences to the Virginia
points. Accordingly, it ordered that analogous joint arrangements
as to fares, including transfer privileges, be established between
Transit and the other bus lines carrying passengers to and from
Virginia government agencies. This, and other elements of the
Commission order not passed on by the district court, were
separately attacked here. In order that final disposition of the
case may not be further delayed, we shall consider all questions
argued before us.
Page 325 U. S. 360
First. It is argued that the Commission is without
jurisdiction to regulate any of the District-Virginia
transportation here involved. The argument emphasizes that the
movement begins and ends in a single "community," all within an
area which the Commission has previously recognized as the
"commercial zone" of Washington. 3 M.C.C. 243. We are referred here
to the holding of this Court in 1912 that a street-railway,
carrying passengers between Omaha, Nebraska and Council Bluffs,
Iowa, was "local," serving the use of a "single community," and was
not the kind of "railroad" which the Interstate Commerce Act
empowered the Commission to regulate.
Omaha & C.B. St. R.
Co. v. Interstate Commerce Comm'n, 230 U.
S. 324.
Cf. United States v. Village of
Hubbard, 266 U. S. 474,
266 U. S.
479-480. The same principle, we are told, should exclude
similar local bus operations. But this Court's decision in the
Omaha & C.B. St. R. Co. case did not hold that
Congress could not authorize the Commission to regulate movements
that took place across state lines in a single local community. The
power of Congress over such movements cannot be doubted. The
Omaha & C.B. St. R. Co. case only decided that
Congress had not granted such power to the Commission under the law
as it then existed.
We must now test the Commission's power in this case by the
provisions of a statute enacted subsequent to the
Omaha &
C.B. St. R. Co. case,
supra, the Motor Carrier Act,
49 Stat. 543, under which the order here was entered. Section
203(b) of that Act provides the controlling rule. It specifically
defines the circumstances under which the Commission can regulate
interstate activities which happen to take place in a single
"commercial zone."
That Section, to a limited extent, excludes from the
Commission's jurisdiction
"The transportation of passengers or property in interstate or
foreign commerce wholly within a municipality or between contiguous
municipalities or within a zone adjacent to and commercially a part
of
Page 325 U. S. 361
any such municipality or municipalities. . . ."
Other parts of the same Section authorize the Commission to
apply the Act to these zone activities, however, if it finds that
(1) "such application is necessary" to carry out the national
transportation policy declared in the Act, or (2) if the carrier is
not "engaged in . . . intrastate transportation of passengers over
the entire length of such interstate route." The Commission held
that the four bus companies came within both these exceptions, and
therefore were not excluded from its jurisdiction. We need not
consider whether they came within the second exception, because of
our conclusion that the Commission's findings justified its order
under the first exception. Those findings were that it was
necessary for the Commission to exercise its jurisdiction in order
to carry out the Act's declared policy,
"to encourage the establishment and maintenance of reasonable
charges for transportation services, without unjust
discriminations, . . . to the end of developing, coordinating, and
preserving a national transportation system . . . adequate to meet
the needs of the commerce of the United States, of the Postal
Service, and of the national defense."
54 Stat. 899.
On its second hearing, the Commission heard evidence from
employees of the Army and Navy as to dissatisfaction with the
fares. The Secretaries of both War and Navy made complaints
concerning the situation produced by the rate structure. A number
of witnesses testified as to the dissatisfaction of employees with
the prevailing rates. If evidence was necessary to prove that
unreasonably high rates were calculated to disturb the morale of
workers forced to pay them, and thus to impair the national defense
program, there can be no doubt but that the findings of the
Commission were well supported. It is to be remembered that these
were interstate rates for interstate travel which applied almost
exclusively to workers engaged in national defense. Neither the
District
Page 325 U. S. 362
nor Virginia had power adequately to regulate the rates; nor had
they attempted to do so. Their regulation was rightfully a matter
of concern to Army and Navy Departments charged with the serious
responsibility of conducting a war. The employees worked in the
very center of activities essential in that cause. Congress
unequivocally reserved to the Commission power to regulate
reasonableness of interstate rates in the light of the needs of
national defense. The findings of the Commission on this issue were
clear and complete,
cf. Yonkers v. United States,
320 U. S. 685, and
justified the Commission in exercising its jurisdiction.
Second. It is argued that the Commission exceeded its
authority in prescribing joint fares between the Capital Transit
Company and the other bus companies. This contention rests on two
assumptions grounded upon the difference in the way the parties
view the facts and the law governing them. The first argument of
the companies is substantially the same as the one just rejected --
that all of the Transit Company's operations, by both bus and
streetcar, are purely local, and therefore not subject to the
Commission's jurisdiction. The second contention is this: Sections
216(c) and (e) permit but do not require motor carriers to
establish through routes and joint rates with other types of
carriers; since the companies view the facts as failing to show
that through routes or joint rates have voluntarily been
established as to Transit's streetcars and the Virginia buses, they
argue that the Commission cannot require their establishment. The
Commission found, however, that Transit had voluntarily established
through routes, and contends its finding has support in the
evidence, and consequently sustains its order. It also relies on
its power under Section 216(e) to prescribe through rates for all
segments of an interstate transportation carried on between motor
carriers. This power, it argues, is broad enough to authorize an
order for
Page 325 U. S. 363
joint rates for interstate carriage conducted by a company
which, as it found this one did, uses streetcars and buses as an
integrated unit in carrying out interstate transportation. We think
that, under the facts and circumstances shown, the Commission's
findings are not subject to attack, and that it acted within its
statutory authority in prescribing the through rates.
As previously pointed out, twice a day, more than 15,000
government employees traveled between the Virginia agencies and
their homes via one of the four bus systems. Most of them either
went to or from these bus terminals from or to their homes over any
of Transit's then available buses or streetcars. Their travel was
at certain hours each day at which special rush hour buses and cars
were made available for their carriage. Their interstate journey to
work actually began at the time the boarded a Transit bus or
streetcar near their home, and actually ended when they alighted
from the Virginia-going bus at their place of work. On returning
from work, their interstate journey actually began when they
boarded a bus near their work and actually ended when they alighted
from a Transit streetcar or bus near their home. True, their
interstate trip was broken at the District termini of the Virginia
buses, when they stepped from one vehicle to another. But, in the
commonly accepted sense of the transportation concept, their entire
trip was interstate.
Baltimore & Ohio S.W.R. R. Co. v.
Settle, 260 U. S. 166. And
the fact that, except as to Transit, they paid a combination of two
rates, one for travel wholly within the District and the other for
travel between the District and Virginia, and the journey from
their residences to Virginia and back again was taken in two
segments, does not mean that the total interstate trip was not on a
"through route."
Virginian R. v. United States,
272 U. S. 658,
272 U. S.
666-667;
St. Louis S.W. R. Co. v. United
States, 245 U. S. 136,
245 U. S.
139-140.
Page 325 U. S. 364
Moreover, Transit Company itself conducted its own traffic to
and from Virginia and District residential points as one continuous
journey. As previously noted, a Virginia worker could board its
local bus or streetcar, ride to a District terminal of Transit's
Virginia bound bus, board it, and obtain the benefit of a transfer
supplied by Transit. So also could Transit's passenger get the
benefit of a transfer on the return journey home from work. Had
Transit not owned the separate vehicles used in the transportation,
these arrangements would have constituted "joint rates" for a
"through route" within the statutory meaning of the term. As
carried out by Transit, the arrangements were the exact equivalent
of transportation on a "through route" for a joint fare. Had
Transit not owned the vehicles transporting the passengers on each
leg of this interstate journey, it could not have established
consistently within the Interstate Commerce Act, joint rates with a
particular Virginia bus line, to the exclusion of its competitors,
for the reason that one given a monopoly of through traffic could
"soon be able to drive its competitors out of business."
United
States v. Pennsylvania R. Co., 323 U.
S. 612,
323 U. S. 617.
The Motor Carrier Act, which is part of the Interstate Commerce
Act, need not be interpreted so as to permit the accomplishment of
such a result.
Section 216(e) expressly authorizes the Commission to declare
unlawful any unreasonable, preferential, or prejudicial rule,
classification, regulation, or practice arising from any
"individual or joint rate, fare, or charge, demanded, charged,
or collected by any common carrier or carriers by motor vehicle or
by any common carrier or carriers by motor vehicle in conjunction
which any common carrier or carriers by railroad . . . ,"
and to "prescribe the lawful rate, fare, or charge . . .
thereafter to be observed. . . ." We think that, under the
Commission's findings, supported by evidence, it did have power to
declare these
Page 325 U. S. 365
rates unreasonable and unlawful as it did, and thereafter to
prescribe the lawful rate to be charged for the interstate trip.
This did not, as argued, constitute a regulation of intrastate
commerce.
Other contentions urged by the carriers have been considered,
but need not be discussed, since we are satisfied with the
disposition made of them by the Interstate Commerce Commission.
Finding no error in the order of the Commission, the judgment of
the district court declining to enforce it is reversed.
Reversed.
MR. JUSTICE ROBERTS is of the opinion that the Commission had no
jurisdiction of the fares in question, for the reasons set forth in
the opinions below, 55 F. Supp. 51, and 56 F. Supp. 670. MR.
JUSTICE REED and MR. JUSTICE DOUGLAS dissent from part Second of
the opinion.
* The district court had previously set aside a Commission order
in the same case because of inadequate findings. 55 F. Supp. 51,
256 I.C.C. 769. Thereafter, the Commission heard additional
evidence, made additional findings, and entered the order here
under review.