Where defendant in the state court contends that, consistently
with the Interstate Commerce Act, the state court has no power to
grant the relief, and such contention is essentially involved and
expressly, and, in order to support the judgment, necessarily,
decided adversely to the defendant, a federal question exists and
this Court can review the judgment on writ of error under § 709,
Rev.Stat.
Where the state court determined a case involving railroad rates
on the hypothesis conceded by counsel on both sides that the rate
was one of a lawful schedule duly filed and published in accordance
with the Interstate Commerce Act, the contention that the rate was
not so filed and published and therefore was not a legal rate is
not open in this Court.
While repeals by implication are not favored, and a statute will
not be construed as abrogating an existing common law remedy, it
will be so construed if such preexisting right is so repugnant to
it as to deprive it of its efficacy and render its provisions
nugatory.
The Interstate Commerce Act was intended to afford an effective
and comprehensive means for redressing wrongs resulting from unjust
discriminations and undue preference, and to that end placed upon
carriers
Page 204 U. S. 427
the duty of publishing schedules of reasonable and uniform
rates; and, consistently with the provisions of that law, a shipper
cannot maintain an action at common law in a state court for
excessive and unreasonable freight rates exacted on interstate
shipments where the rates charged were those which had been duly
fixed by the carrier according to the act and had not been found to
be unreasonable by the Interstate Commerce Commission.
85 S.W. 1052 reversed.
The facts are stated in the opinion.
Page 204 U. S. 430
MR. JUSTICE WHITE delivered the opinion of the Court.
The oil company, the defendant in error, sued to recover
$1,951.83. It was alleged that, on shipments of carloads of cotton
seed, made in September and October, 1901, over the line of the
defendant's road from various points in Louisiana east of
Alexandria, in that state, to Abilene, Texas, the carrier had
exacted, over the protest of the oil company, on the delivery of
the cotton seed, the payment of an unjust and unreasonable rate
which exceeded in the aggregate, by the sum sued for, a just and
reasonable charge. There were, moreover, averments that the rate
exacted was discriminatory, constituted an undue preference, and
amounted to charging more for a shorter than for a longer haul.
Besides a general traverse, the railway company defended on the
ground that the shipments were interstate, and were therefore
covered by the act of Congress to regulate commerce. It was averred
that, as the rate complained of was the one fixed in the rate
Page 204 U. S. 431
sheets which the company had established, filed, published, and
posted, as required by that act, the state court was without
jurisdiction to entertain the cause, and, even if such court had
jurisdiction, it could not, without disregarding the Act to
Regulate Commerce, grant relief upon the basis that the established
rate was unreasonable when it had not been found to be so by the
Interstate Commerce Commission.
The trial court made findings of fact. Those relating to the
subject of the establishing, filing, and publishing by the railway
company of rate sheets containing the rate which was complained of
were as follows:
"7th. That the Western Classification Committee, agent and
representative of numerous railways and of defendant, filed with
the Interstate Commerce Commission what is known as the Western
Classification, giving classifications of different articles or
items of merchandise, and in same cotton seed is classed as 'A;'
that this was the joint act of a number of roads, and the defendant
adopted said joint classification; that, on May 30, 1901, the
Southwestern Freight Committee, agent of a number of roads and
agent of defendant, filed with the said Commission a supplement for
numerous roads in connection with defendant, whereby the rate on
cotton seed from all points in Louisiana east of Alexandria was
fixed at 67 cents per 100 pounds to all points in Texas from all
points in Louisiana east of Alexandria and west of Alexandria."
"8th. That said classification and said rate schedule was
adopted by defendant and was filed by said S.W. Freight Committee
with said Interstate Commerce Commission in behalf of
defendant."
"9th. That copies of said schedule and said tariffs and
classifications were kept in the office of said defendant at said
points of shipment and at said Abilene -- that is, in the freight
office and depots, for the inspection of the public, as admitted by
plaintiff, which admission is found in the statement of facts."
"10th. That, other than said schedule and classification,
nothing has been filed with the Interstate Commerce Commission
Page 204 U. S. 432
by or in behalf of defendant in the way of classifications,
schedules, or rates on cotton seed from points on its road in
Louisiana to points on its road in Texas."
From the facts found, the court stated the following as its
conclusions:
"1st. The facts so found show that this was an interstate
shipment."
"2d. The facts so found show that the defendant complied with
the interstate commerce law, and said rates and classifications
were thereby properly established and in force, except that the
rate charged on cotton seed in carload lots was unreasonable and
excessive."
"3d. I find that the rate charged by the defendant was that
established under the interstate commerce law."
As nothing in these conclusions relates to the averments of
discrimination, undue preference, or a greater charge for a shorter
than for a longer haul, those subjects, it may be assumed, were
considered to have been eliminated in the course of the trial.
There was judgment for the railway company. When the controversy
came to be disposed of by the court of civil appeals, to which the
cause was taken, that court deemed there was only one question
presented for decision -- that is, whether, consistently with the
Act to Regulate Commerce, there was power in the court to grant
relief upon the finding that the rate charged for an interstate
shipment was unreasonable, although such rate was the one fixed by
the duly published and filed rate sheet, and when the rate had not
been found to be unreasonable by the Interstate Commerce
Commission. In opening its opinion, the court said (85 S.W.
1052):
"Adopting the construction of the pleadings evidently given them
in the briefs, and treating it as presented, the case, briefly
stated, is an action by appellant for damages for a violation of an
alleged common law right, in that appellee demanded and coercively
collected from appellant freight charges in excess of a reasonable
compensation, for the transportation
Page 204 U. S. 433
of a number of carloads of cotton seed from the Town of
Cottonport and other designated towns in the State of Louisiana to
the City of Abilene in the State of Texas."
After referring to the findings as to the unreasonableness of
the charge exacted, and after pointing out that the railway company
had not, by a cross-assignment, challenged the correctness of the
findings of the trial court as to the unreasonableness of the rate,
it was said:
"So that we are relieved from a consideration of the
difficulties discussed in some of the cases in ascertaining the
fact, and therefore now have squarely before us the questions
whether, in a state court, a shipper in cases of interstate
carriage can, by the principles of the common law, be accorded
relief from unjust and unreasonable freight rates exacted from him,
or shall relief in such cases be denied merely because such
unreasonable rate has been filed and promulgated by the carrier
under the Interstate Commerce Act?"
Proceeding in an elaborate opinion to dispose of the question
thus stated to be the only one for consideration, the conclusion
was reached that jurisdiction to grant relief existed, and that to
do so was not repugnant to the Act to Regulate Commerce. Applying
these conclusions to the findings of fact, the relief prayed was
allowed. he court said:
"We therefore adopt the trial court's findings of fact, and,
applying thereto the principles of law we have deduced, reverse the
judgment, and here render judgment in appellant's favor for the
said sum of $1,951.83, excessive freights charged, together with
interest. . . ."
The assigned errors are addressed exclusively to the operation
of the Act to Regulate Commerce upon the jurisdiction of the court
below to entertain the controversy, and its power, in any event, to
afford relief to the oil company based upon the alleged
unreasonableness of the rate under the circumstances disclosed.
Before we take up the consideration of that subject, however, two
questions must be disposed of. First, it is insisted that this
Court is without jurisdiction, because no
Page 204 U. S. 434
federal question is presented. We think it suffices to say that
it obviously results from the statements previously made that a
question of that character was presented by the pleadings, was
passed upon by the trial court, was expressly and necessarily
decided by the court below, and is also essentially involved in the
cause as it is before us. Second, it is urged that the effect of
the Act to Regulate Commerce upon the right of the oil company to
recover need not be passed upon, since, even if error on that
subject was committed below, a review of the decision in that
regard is unnecessary because, if the correct legal inference be
drawn from the facts found by the trial court, which were adopted
by the appellate court, it will result that the railway company had
not established a legal schedule of rates in compliance with the
Act to Regulate Commerce, and therefore the jurisdiction of the
court and its right to afford relief was not at all affected by the
provisions of the act. We do not presently stop to consider whether
the consequences as to jurisdiction and right to recover which are
asserted would result if the premise was well founded, because we
think the premise is either shown by the findings to be unfounded
or it is not open for contention on the record. The premise rests
upon two propositions of fact:
a. that the findings of the
trial court show that the rate sheet filed was joint, and therefore
did not necessarily relate to a shipment entirely over the road of
the railway company. This contention, we think, is shown by the
findings to be without merit, since those findings clearly point
out that the rate sheet was filed by an agent of the defendant
railroad, was by it adopted, and constituted the only rate sheet
embracing the traffic in question.
b. Although it is
conceded that the evidence showed that the schedule of rates was
established and filed with the Interstate Commerce Commission, and
was kept at the stations of the railway company for public
inspection, and that the oil company had knowledge of the fact, it
is insisted that the facts found do not justify the conclusion that
there was a compliance with the requirements of the Act to Regulate
Commerce
Page 204 U. S. 435
as to the posting of the established schedule. We think this
contention is not open on this record. As we have seen, the trial
court expressly concluded that the railway company had complied
with the Act to Regulate Commerce in the matter of filing, etc.,
its schedule of rates, and the appellate court opened its opinion
by the statement that the course of the trial and the briefs of
counsel confined the issue for determination to the question of the
effect of the Act to Regulate Commerce upon the rights of the
parties, manifestly upon the assumption that the correctness of the
conclusion of the trial court as to compliance with the act was
conceded by both parties. In other words, as the court below, in
deciding the case, expressly declared that the course of the
argument and briefs of counsel before it had confined the case to
the issue of whether there was a right to recover upon the
hypothesis that a schedule of rates had been filed and published,
we do not think that it is now open to contend that that which the
court below in effect declared was conceded in the briefs of
counsel to be a lawful schedule of rates was not such.
Non
constat that, if the court of civil appeals, having the
evidence before it, had not treated the case as presented, it might
not have considered the facts in relation to the publication of the
schedule and affirmatively found facts inevitably compelling the
conclusion that the Act to Regulate Commerce had been fully
complied with, even if such inference was not sufficiently
sustained by the findings of the trial court which the appellate
court adopted. Because we thus find the question not open for
consideration, we must not be considered as conceding the
correctness of the conclusion attempted to be drawn from the
supposed failure to post.
We are thus brought to the underlying proposition in the case --
viz., the effect of the Act to Regulate Commerce upon the
claim asserted by the oil company. As presented below and pressed
at bar, the question takes a seemingly two-fold aspect -- the
jurisdiction of the court below as affected by the Act to Regulate
Commerce and the right to the relief sought consistently
Page 204 U. S. 436
with that act, even if jurisdiction existed. We say that these
questions are only seemingly different because they present but
different phases of the fundamental question, which is the scope
and effect of the Act to Regulate Commerce upon the right of a
shipper to maintain an action at law against a common carrier to
recover damages because of the exaction of an alleged unreasonable
rate, although the rate collected and complained of was the rate
stated in the schedule filed with the Interstate Commerce
Commission and published according to the requirements of the Act
to Regulate Commerce, and which it was the duty of the carrier
under the law to enforce as against shippers. We come therefore
first to the consideration of that subject.
Without going into detail, it may not be doubted that, at common
law, where a carrier refused to receive goods offered for carriage
except upon the payment of an unreasonable sum, the shipper had a
right of action in damages. It is also beyond controversy that,
when a carrier accepted goods without payment of the cost of
carriage or an agreement as to the price to be paid, and made an
unreasonable exaction as a condition of the delivery of the goods,
an action could be maintained to recover the excess over a
reasonable charge. And it may further be conceded that it is now
settled that even where, on the receipt of goods by a carrier, an
exorbitant charge is stated, and the same is coercively exacted,
either in advance or at the completion of the service, an action
may be maintained to recover the overcharge. 2 Kent, Comm. 599, and
note
a; 2 Smith, Lead.Cas. pt. 1, 8th ed., Hare &
Wallace notes, p. 457.
As the right to recover which the court below sustained was
clearly within the principles just stated, and as it is conceded
that the Act to Regulate Commerce did not in so many words abrogate
such right, it follows that the contention that the right was taken
away by the Act to Regulate Commerce rests upon the proposition
that such result was accomplished by implication. In testing the
correctness of this proposition, we
Page 204 U. S. 437
concede that we must be guided by the principle that repeals by
implication are not favored, and, indeed, that a statute will not
be construed as taking away a common law right existing at the date
of its enactment unless that result is imperatively required --
that is to say unless it be found that the preexisting right is so
repugnant to the statute that the survival of such right would in
effect deprive the subsequent statute of its efficacy -- in other
words, render its provisions nugatory.
Both parties concede that the question for decision has not been
directly passed upon by this Court, and that its determination is
only persuasively influenced by adjudications of other courts. They
both, hence, mainly rely upon the text of the Act to Regulate
Commerce as it existed at the time the shipments in question were
made. The case therefore must rest upon an interpretation of the
text of the act and is measurably one of first impression.
Let us, without going into detail, give an outline of the
general scope of that act, with the object of fixing the rights
which it was intended to conserve or create, the wrongs which it
proposed to redress, and the remedies which the act established to
accomplish the purposes which the lawmakers had in view.
The act made it the duty of carriers subject to its provisions
to charge only just and reasonable rates. To that end, the duty was
imposed of establishing and publishing schedules of such rates. It
forbade all unjust preferences and discriminations, made it
unlawful to depart from the rates in the established schedules
until the same were changed as authorized by the act, and such
departure was made an offense punishable by fine or imprisonment,
or both, and the prohibitions of the act and the punishments which
it imposed were directed not only against carriers, but against
shippers, or any person who, directly or indirectly, by any
machination or device, in any manner whatsoever, accomplished the
result of producing the wrongful discriminations or preferences
which the act forbade. It was made the duty of carriers subject to
the act
Page 204 U. S. 438
to file with the Interstate Commerce Commission created by that
act copies of established schedules, and power was conferred upon
that body to provide as to the form of the schedules, and penalties
were imposed for not establishing and filing the required
schedules. The Commission was endowed with plenary administrative
power to supervise the conduct of carriers, to investigate their
affairs, their accounts, and their methods of dealing, and
generally to enforce the provisions of the act. To that end, it was
made the duty of the district attorneys of the United States, under
the direction of the Attorney General, to prosecute proceedings
commenced by the Commission to enforce compliance with the act. The
act specially provided that, whenever any common carrier subject to
its provisions
"shall do, cause to be done, or permit to be done any act,
matter, or thing in this act prohibited or declared to be unlawful,
or shall omit to do any act, matter, or thing in this act required
to be done, such common carrier shall be liable to the person or
persons injured thereby for the full amount of damages sustained in
consequence of any such violation of the provisions of this act. .
. ."
Power was conferred upon the Commission to hear complaints
concerning violations of the act, to investigate the same, and, if
the complaints were well founded, to direct not only the making of
reparation to the injured persons, but to order the carrier to
desist from such violation in the future. In the event of the
failure of a carrier to obey the order of the Commission, that
body, or the party in whose favor an award of reparation was made,
was empowered to compel compliance by invoking the authority of the
courts of the United States in the manner pointed out in the
statute,
prima facie effect in such courts being given to
the findings of fact made by the Commission. By the ninth section
of the act, it was provided as follows:
"That any person or persons claiming to be damaged by any common
carrier subject to the provisions of this act may either make
complaint to the Commission, as hereinafter provided for or may
bring suit in his or their own behalf for the recovery
Page 204 U. S. 439
of the damages for which such common carrier may be liable under
the provisions of this act, in any district or circuit court of the
United States of competent jurisdiction; but such person or persons
shall not have the right to pursue both of said remedies, and must,
in each case, elect which one of the two methods of procedure
herein provided for he or they will adopt. . . ."
And by § 22, which we shall hereafter fully consider, existing
appropriate common law and statutory remedies were saved.
When the Act to Regulate Commerce was enacted, there was
contrariety of opinion whether, when a rate charged by a carrier
was in and of itself reasonable, the person from whom such a charge
was exacted had at common law an action against the carrier because
of damage asserted to have been suffered by a discrimination
against such person or a preference given by the carrier to
another.
Parsons v. Chicago & Northwestern Ry.,
167 U. S. 447,
167 U. S. 455;
Interstate Commerce Commission v. Baltimore & Ohio R.
Co., 145 U. S. 263,
145 U. S. 275.
That the Act to Regulate Commerce was intended to afford an
effective means for redressing the wrongs resulting from unjust
discrimination and undue preference is undoubted. Indeed, it is not
open to controversy that to provide for these subjects was among
the principal purposes of the act.
Interstate Commerce
Commission v. Cincinnati, New Orleans & Texas Pacific Ry.
Co., 167 U. S. 479,
167 U. S. 494.
And it is apparent that the means by which these great purposes
were to be accomplished was the placing upon all carriers the
positive duty to establish schedules of reasonable rates which
should have a uniform application to all, and which should not be
departed from so long as the established schedule remained
unaltered in the manner provided by law.
Cincinnati, New
Orleans & Texas Pacific Ry. v. Interstate Commerce
Commission, 162 U. S. 184,
167 U. S. 167
U.S. 479.
When the general scope of the act is enlightened by the
Page 204 U. S. 440
considerations just stated, it becomes manifest that there is
not only a relation, but an indissoluble unity, between the
provision for the establishment and maintenance of rates until
corrected in accordance with the statute and the prohibitions
against preferences and discrimination. This follows because,
unless the requirement of a uniform standard of rates be complied
with, it would result that violations of the statute as to
preferences and discrimination would inevitably follow. This is
clearly so, for if it be that the standard of rates fixed in the
mode provided by the statute could be treated on the complaint of a
shipper by a court and jury as unreasonable, without reference to
prior action by the Commission, finding the established rate to be
unreasonable, and ordering the carrier to desist in the future from
violating the act, it would come to pass that a shipper might
obtain relief upon the basis that the established rate was
unreasonable, in the opinion of a court and jury, and thus such
shipper would receive a preference or discrimination not enjoyed by
those against whom the schedule of rates was continued to be
enforced. This can only be met by the suggestion that the judgment
of a court, when based upon a complaint made by a shipper without
previous action by the Commission, would give rise to a change of
the schedule rate, and thus cause the new rate resulting from the
action of the court to be applicable in future as to all. This
suggestion, however, is manifestly without merit, and only serves
to illustrate the absolute destruction of the act and the remedial
provisions which it created which would arise from a recognition of
the right asserted. For if, without previous action by the
Commission, power might be exerted by courts and juries generally
to determine the reasonableness of an established rate, it would
follow that, unless all courts reached an identical conclusion, a
uniform standard of rates in the future would be impossible, as the
standard would fluctuate and vary, dependent upon the divergent
conclusions reached as to reasonableness by the various courts
called upon to consider the subject as an original question.
Indeed, the recognition of such a right is
Page 204 U. S. 441
wholly inconsistent with the administrative power conferred upon
the Commission, and with the duty, which the statute casts upon
that body, of seeing to it that the statutory requirement as to
uniformity and equality of rates is observed. Equally obvious is it
that the existence of such a power in the courts, independent of
prior action by the Commission, would lead to favoritism, to the
enforcement of one rate in one jurisdiction and a different one in
another, would destroy the prohibitions against preferences and
discrimination, and afford, moreover, a ready means by which,
through collusive proceedings, the wrongs which the statute was
intended to remedy could be successfully inflicted. Indeed, no
reason can be perceived for the enactment of the provision endowing
the administrative tribunal which the act created with power, on
due proof, not only to award reparation to a particular shipper,
but to command the carrier to desist from violation of the act in
the future, thus compelling the alteration of the old or the filing
of a new schedule, conformably to the action of the Commission, if
the power was left in courts to grant relief on complaint of any
shipper, upon the theory that the established rate could be
disregarded and be treated as unreasonable, without reference to
previous action by the Commission in the premises. This must be,
because, if the power existed in both courts and the Commission to
originally hear complaints on this subject, there might be a
divergence between the action of the Commission and the decision of
a court. In other words, the established schedule might be found
reasonable by the Commission in the first instance and unreasonable
by a court acting originally, and thus a conflict would arise which
would render the enforcement of the act impossible.
Nor is there merit in the contention that § 9 of the act compels
to the conclusion that it was the purpose of Congress to confer
power upon courts primarily to relieve from the duty of enforcing
the established rate by finding that the same as to a particular
person or corporation was so unreasonable as to justify an award of
damages. True it is that
Page 204 U. S. 442
the general terms of the section, when taken alone, might
sanction such a conclusion, but, when the provision of that section
is read in connection with the context of the act and in the light
of the considerations which we have enumerated, we think the broad
construction contended for is not admissible. And this becomes
particularly cogent when it is observed that the power of the
courts to award damages to those claiming to have been injured, as
provided in the section, contemplates only a decree in favor of the
individual complainant, redressing the particular wrong asserted to
have been done, and does not embrace the power to direct the
carrier to abstain in the future from similar violations of the act
-- in other words, to command a correction of the established
schedules, which power, as we have shown, is conferred by the act
upon the Commission in express terms. In other words, we think that
it inevitably follows from the context of the act that the
independent right of an individual originally to maintain actions
in courts to obtain pecuniary redress for violations of the act,
conferred by the ninth section, must be confined to redress of such
wrongs as can, consistently with the context of the act, be
redressed by courts without previous action by the Commission, and
therefore does not imply the power in a court to primarily hear
complaints concerning wrongs of the character of the one here
complained of. Although an established schedule of rates may have
been altered by a carrier voluntarily or as the result of the
enforcement of an order of the Commission to desist from violating
the law, rendered in accordance with the provisions of the statute,
it may not be doubted that the power of the Commission would
nevertheless extend to hearing legal complaints of, and awarding
reparation to, individuals for wrongs unlawfully suffered from the
application of the unreasonable schedule during the period when
such schedule was in force.
And the conclusion to which we are thus constrained by an
original consideration of the text of the statute finds direct
support first in adjudged cases in lower federal courts and
Page 204 U. S. 443
in the construction which the act has apparently received from
the beginning in practical execution, and, second, is persuasively
supported by decisions of this Court, which, whilst not dealing
directly with the question here presented, yet necessarily concern
the same.
1. In
Swift & Co. v. Philadelphia & R. Co., 64
F. 59, it was held that, in an action at law to recover damages for
the exaction of an alleged unreasonable freight charge, the rate
established in conformity with the Act to Regulate Commerce must be
treated by the courts as binding upon the shipper until regularly
corrected in the mode provided by the statute. And in
Kinnavey
v. Terminal R. Association, 81 F. 802, in an able opinion, the
question was carefully considered and the same doctrine was
announced and applied. When it is considered that the Act to
Regulate Commerce was enacted in 1887, and that neither the
diligence of counsel nor our own researches has brought into view
any case except the one now under consideration holding that a
court could, compatibly with the terms of that act, grant relief
upon the basis that the established rate could be disregarded as
unreasonable, it would seem to follow that the terms of the act had
generally been treated in practical execution as incompatible with
the existence of such power or right.
And this is greatly fortified when it is borne in mind that the
reports of the decisions of the Interstate Commerce Commission show
that many cases have been passed upon by that body concerning the
unreasonableness of a rate fixed in an established schedule, which
have resulted in awarding reparation to shippers and to the making
of orders directing carriers to desist from future violation of the
act -- that is to say, in necessary legal effect, correcting
established schedules.
2. The cases of
Cincinnati, New Orleans & Texas Pacific
Ry. Co. v. Interstate Commerce Commission, 162 U.
S. 184;
Louisville & Nashville R. Co. v.
Behlmer, 175 U. S. 648, and
Interstate Commerce Commission v. Louisville & Nashville R.
Co., 190 U. S. 275,
involved the enforcement against carriers
Page 204 U. S. 444
of orders of the Commission. After deciding that the orders of
the Commission were not entitled to be enforced because of errors
of law committed by that body, this Court declined to consider the
question of the reasonableness
per se of the rates as an
original question -- in other words, the correction of the
established schedule without previous consideration of the subject
by the Commission.
It was pointed out that, by the effect of the Act to Regulate
Commerce, it was peculiarly within the province of the Commission
to primarily consider and pass upon a controversy concerning the
unreasonableness
per se of the rates fixed in an
established schedule. It was therefore declared to be the duty of
the courts, where the Commission had not considered such a disputed
question, to remand the case to the Commission to enable it to
perform that duty -- a conclusion wholly incompatible with the
conception that courts, in independent proceedings, were empowered
by the Act to Regulate Commerce equally with the Commission,
primarily to determine the reasonableness of rates in force through
an established schedule.
In
Gulf, Colorado &c. Ry. v. Hefley, 158 U. S.
98, the facts were these: a rate had been fixed by a
carrier in a bill of lading for an interstate shipment, which rate
was less than that established under the provisions of the Act to
Regulate Commerce. On arrival of the goods at destination, the
carrier refused to deliver on tender of payment of the bill of
lading rate, and demanded payment of and collected the higher
established schedule rate. For so doing, the carrier was proceeded
against under a statute of the State of Texas imposing a penalty
upon a carrier for charging more than the rate fixed in a bill of
lading. A judgment of the state court enforcing the penalty was
reversed upon the ground that the state statute, as applied, was
repugnant to the Act to Regulate Commerce, the Court saying (p.
158 U. S.
102):
"The carrier cannot obey one statute without sometimes exposing
itself to the penalties prescribed by the other. Take the case
before us: if, in disregard of the joint tariff established
Page 204 U. S. 445
by the defendant and the St. Louis & San Francisco Railway
Company and filed with the Interstate Commerce Commission, the
latter company, as a matter of favoritism, had issued this bill of
lading at a rate less than the tariff rate, both the defendant
company and its agent would, by delivering the goods upon the
receipt of only such reduced rate, subject themselves to the
penalties of the national law, while, on the other hand, if the
tariff rate was insisted upon, then the corporation would become
liable for the damages named in the state act. In case of such a
conflict, the state law must yield."
In
Texas & Pacific Ry. Co. v. Mugg, 202 U.
S. 242, the facts were as follows: on an interstate
shipment, a given rate, less than the lawful schedule rate, was
quoted to the shipper by the agent of the railroad at the point of
shipment. On the arrival of the goods at their destination, the
road exacted the schedule rate, whilst the shipper insisted he was
entitled to the lower and quoted rate. And a recovery of the excess
collected over the quoted rate was allowed by a court of the State
of Texas. Reversing the judgment, it was here held that the rate
fixed in the schedule filed pursuant to the Act to Regulate
Commerce was controlling, that it was beyond the power of the
carrier to depart from such rates in favor of any shipper, and that
the erroneous quotation of rates made by the agent of the railroad
did not justify recovery, since to do so would be, in effect,
enabling the shipper, whose duty it was to ascertain the published
rate, to secure a preference over other shippers, contrary to the
Act to Regulate Commerce.
In view of the binding effect of the established rates upon both
the carrier and the shipper, as expounded in the two decisions of
this Court just referred to, the contention now made, if adopted,
would necessitate the holding that a cause of action in favor of a
shipper arose from the failure of the carrier to make an agreement,
when, if the agreement had been made, both the carrier and the
shipper would have been guilty of a criminal offense and the
agreement would have been so absolutely void as to be impossible of
enforcement. Nor is
Page 204 U. S. 446
there force in the suggestion that a like dilemma arises from
the recognition of power in the Commission to award reparation in
favor of an individual because of a finding by that body that a
rate in an established schedule was unreasonable. As we have shown,
there is a wide distinction between the two cases. When the
Commission is called upon, on the complaint of an individual, to
consider the reasonableness of an established rate, its power is
invoked not merely to authorize a departure from such rate in favor
of the complainant alone, but to exert the authority conferred upon
it by the act, if the complaint is found to be just, to compel the
establishment of a new schedule of rates applicable to all. And
like reasoning would be applicable to the granting of reparation to
an individual after the establishment of a new schedule because of
a wrong endured during the period when the unreasonable schedule
was enforced by the carrier and before its change and the
establishment of a new one. In other words, the difference between
the two is that which, on the one hand, would arise from destroying
the uniformity of rates which it was the object of the statute to
secure, and on the other, from enforcing of that equality which the
statute commands.
But it is insisted that, however, cogent may be the views
previously stated, they should not control, because of the
following provision contained in section 22 of the Act to Regulate
Commerce, viz.:
". . . Nothing in this act contained shall in any way abridge or
alter the remedies now existing at common law or by statute, but
the provisions of this act are in addition to such remedies."
This clause, however, cannot in reason be construed as
continuing in shippers a common law right, the continued existence
of which would be absolutely inconsistent with the provisions of
the act. In other words, the act cannot be held to destroy itself.
The clause is concerned alone with rights recognized in or duties
imposed by the act, and the manifest purpose of the provision in
question was to make plain the intention that any specific remedy
given by the act should be regarded as cumulative, when other
appropriate
Page 204 U. S. 447
common law or statutory remedies existed for the redress of the
particular grievance or wrong dealt with in the act.
The proposition that, if the statute be construed as depriving
courts generally, at the instance of shippers, of the power to
grant redress upon the basis that an established rate was
unreasonable without previous action by the Commission great harm
will result is only an argument of inconvenience which assails the
wisdom of the legislation or its efficiency, and affords no
justification for so interpreting the statute as to destroy it.
Even, however, if, in any case, we were at liberty to depart from
the obvious and necessary intent of a statute upon considerations
of expediency, we are admonished that the suggestions of expediency
here advanced are not shown on this record to be justified. As we
have seen, although the Act to Regulate Commerce has been in force
for many years, it appears that, by judicial exposition and in
practical execution, it has been interpreted and applied in
accordance with the construction which we give it. That the result
of such long continued, uniform construction has not been
considered as harmful to the public interests is persuasively
demonstrated by the fact that the amendments which have been made
to the act have not only not tended to repudiate such construction,
but, on the contrary, have had the direct effect of strengthening
and making, if possible, more imperative the provisions of the act
requiring the establishment of rates and the adhesion by both
carriers and shippers to the rates as established until set aside
in pursuance to the provisions of the act. Thus, by § 1 of the Act
approved February 19, 1903, commonly known as the Elkins Act,
which, although enacted since the shipments in question, is yet
illustrative, the willful failure upon the part of any carrier to
file and publish "the tariffs or rates and charges," as required by
the Act to Regulate Commerce and the acts amendatory thereof, "or
strictly to observe such tariffs until changed according to law,"
was made a misdemeanor, and it was also made a misdemeanor to
offer, grant,
Page 204 U. S. 448
give, solicit, accept, or receive any rebate from published
rates or other concession or discrimination. And in the closing
sentence of section 1, it was provided as follows:
"Whenever any carrier files with the Interstate Commerce
Commission or publishes a particular rate under the provisions of
the Act to Regulate Commerce or acts amendatory thereof, or
participates in any rates so filed or published, that rate, as
against such carrier, its officers, or agents, in any prosecution
begun under this act, shall be conclusively deemed to be the legal
rate, and any departure from such rate or any offer to depart
therefrom shall be deemed to be an offense under this section of
this act."
And, by section 3, power was conferred upon the Interstate
Commerce Commission to invoke the equitable powers of a circuit
court of the United States to enforce an observance of the
published tariffs.
Concluding, as we do, that a shipper seeking reparation
predicated upon the unreasonableness of the established rate must,
under the Act to Regulate Commerce, primarily invoke redress
through the Interstate Commerce Commission, which body alone is
vested with power originally to entertain proceedings for the
alteration of an established schedule, because the rates fixed
therein are unreasonable, it is unnecessary for us to consider
whether the court below would have had jurisdiction to afford
relief if the right asserted had not been repugnant to the
provisions of the Act to Regulate Commerce. It follows, from what
we have said that the court below erred in the construction which
it gave to the Act to Regulate Commerce.
The judgment below is therefore reversed, and the case
remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this
opinion.