Swift Co v. United States 8212 1942

• Decision Date: 04 May 1942
• Docket Number: No. 595,595
• Parties: SWIFT & CO. et al. v. UNITED STATES et al. Argued March 6—9, 1942
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

316 U.S. 216

62 S.Ct. 948

86 L.Ed. 1391

SWIFT & CO. et al.

v UNITED STATES et al.

No. 595.

Argued March 6—9, 1942.

Decided May 4, 1942.

As Amended on Denial of Rehearing June 1, 1942.

Appeal from the District Court of the United States for the Northern District of Illinois.

Mr. Ross Dean Rynder, of Chicago, Ill., for appellants Swift & Co. et al.

Mr. Paul E. Blanchard, of Chicago, Ill., for appellant Armour & Co.

Mr. Hugh B. Cox, of Washington, D.C., for appellees the United States and Interstate Commerce Commission.

Mr. Douglas F. Smith, of Chicago, Ill., for appellees Alton R. Co. et al.

Mr. Justice JACKSON delivered the opinion of the Court.

Swift & Company and Omaha Packing Company, its wholly-owned subsidiary, filed with the Interstate Commerce Commission a complaint against the common carriers by railroad which served the Chicago Union Stock Yards, operated by the Union Stock Yard & Transit Company.¹ They were later joined by Armour & Com- pany as intervenor to constitute the interest referred to herein as the packers. Although Armour sought no relief, it was allowed to intervene because it was at the time litigating in the courts a similar complaint, which was later passed on by this Court in Armour & Co. v. Alton R. Co., 312 U.S. 195, 61 S.Ct. 498, 85 L.Ed. 771. The complaint in this case concerned practices of the Union Stock Yard & Transit Company and charges collected by it from the packers, but the Yard Company was not a party to the proceedings. The packers sought a revision of the Yard Company's practices, which they said were part of the carrier-shipper relation, through the exercise of the Interstate Commerce Commission's jurisdiction over the railroads and over transportation.

The complaint charged that the packers shipped over lines of defendant carriers from various points of origin throughout the United States to Chicago, Illinois, what are known as 'direct shipments' of livestock. 'Direct shipments' refers to livestock consigned directly to a packer at the Union Stock Yards, as distinguished from a shipment consigned to a commission merchant at the Stock Yards for sale.² Direct shipments are generally of livestock which has been purchased by the packer or its buyers at country points or at markets other than Chicago. On arrival the cars containing the livestock are placed at unloading or chute pens of the Yard Company by the railroad employees and the stock is then unloaded and placed in the pens by employees of the Yard Company. For this unloading service the Yard Company is paid at published tariff rates³ by the railroads, which absorb the charge out of their line-haul rates.

The packers desire immediately to take their consignments from these unloading pens and insist that they desire no further services and, of course, desire to incur no further charges.

The Yard Company, however, under tariffs filed with the Secretary of Agriculture pursuant to the Packers and Stockyards Act⁴ imposes upon the packers a schedule of charges known as yardage charges, which vary from ten cents to forty-five cents per head of stock. The packers say that they desire none of the services, such as weighing, watering, feeding, or holding, which yardage charges compensate, and desire only to move their stock immediately from the unloading pens to the public streets without payment of the yardage charges. Contending that it is their legal right so to obtain delivery, the packers made sufficient demand upon the Yard Company and upon the railroad companies for immediate and free delivery of their stock from the unloading pens. This was refused, and yardage charges have been paid to the Yard Company under protest. The packers demanded from the Commission relief by way of reparation and asked the Commission to establish rules and practices under which they may obtain delivery to themselves by the railroads of direct shipments at the Union Stock Yards in convenient, safe, and suitable pens, with egress for the immediate removal of the livestock to the nearest public street, by a way to be designated by the railroads, without the payment of any yardage charges to the Union Stock Yards & Transit Company, and without the payment of any charges other than the linehaul transportation charges of the railroads.

The Commission after hearings denied the packers relief for reasons later to be considered. It found that the delivery of stock consigned by the packers to themselves at the Stock Yards into the Yard Company's pens without affording free egress for the shipments is not an unreasonable practice on the part of the carriers and that the yardage charges thereafter assessed by the Union Stock Yard & Transit Company are not subject to the Commission's jurisdiction. 238 I.C.C. 179.

Appellants Swift and Omaha then brought suit in a district Court of three judges for a decree permanently suspending and annulling the order of the Commission and for a remand of the complaint for decision in accordance with principles of law to be determined by the court. Appellant Armour intervened and participated in the trial. The railroads which had been named as defendants before the Commission also intervened, as defendants in the District Court. After hearing, the District Court held without opinion that the Commission's findings were properly supported by evidence; that the findings made by the Commission were adequate to support its conclusion; that the practices complained of were not unreasonable; and that the Commission did not have jurisdiction of the yardage charges. It dismissed the packers' complaint, and appeal was taken to this Court.⁵

The many assignments of error may be grouped under three inquiries: (1) Do the packers have an absolute right as a matter of law to take their direct shipments of livestock from the unloading pens free from yardage charges? (2) If there is no such absolute right, was the Commission in error in considering the history of dealings between packers and the Yard Company together with other facts bearing on the reasonableness of the carriers' method of delivery at the Stock Yards? (3) If the practice as to delivery was correctly held a reasonable method of terminating the carriers' obligation to furnish transportation, did the Commission have jurisdiction in a proceeding against the railroad companies to inquire into or prescribe the yardage charges complained of?

I.

The packers' contention that they are entitled as a matter of absolute right to delivery of their livestock from the unloading pens without payment of yardage charges is based upon the decision of this Court in Covington Stock-Yards Co. v. Keith, 139 U.S. 128, 11 S.Ct. 461, 35 L.Ed. 73, and the subsequently enacted § 1(3) of the Interstate Commerce Act, 49 U.S.C.A. § 1(3).

In the Covington case, decided on facts antedating the Interstate Commerce Act, this Court said that 'A carrier of livestock has no more right to make a special charge for merely receiving or merely delivering such stock, in and through stockyards provided by itself, in order that it may properly receive and load, or unload and deliver, such stock, than a carrier of passengers may make a special charge for the use of its passenger depot by passengers when proceeding to or coming from its trains, or than a carrier may charge the shipper for the use of its general freight depot in merely delivering his goods for shipment, or the consignee of such goods for its use in merely receiving them there within a reasonable time after they are unloaded from the cars. If the carrier may not make such special charges in respect to stock-yards which itself owns, maintains, or controls, it cannot invest another corporation or company with authority to impose burdens of that kind upon shippers and consignees. The transportation of live-stock begins with their delivery to the carrier to be loaded upon its cars, and ends only after the stock is unloaded and delivered, or offered to be delivered, to the consignee, if to be found, at such place as admits of their being safely taken into possession.' 139 U.S. at pages 135, 136, 11 S.Ct. at page 463, 35 L.Ed. 73.

After the decision in this case there was enacted § 1(3) of the Interstate Commerce Act, providing that 'The term 'transportation' as used in this chapter shall include * * * all instrumentalities and facilities of shipment or carriage, irrespective of ownership or of any contract, express or implied, for the use thereof, and all services in connection with the receipt, delivery, elevation, and transfer in transit, * * * storage, and handling of property transported. * * *' 36 Stat. 539, 545, 49 U.S.C. § 1(3)(a), 49 U.S.C.A. § 1(3) (a).

After the enactment of § 1(3), this Court decided Adams v. Mills, 286 U.S. 397, 52 S.Ct. 589, 76 L.Ed. 1184, which arose before the enactment of § 15(5), set forth below. The propriety of an additional charge for the unloading of livestock at the Chicago Union Stock Yards was in issue, and it was said: 'That the yards are, in effect, terminals of the railroads is clear. They are in fact used as terminals; and necessarily so. Whether the unloading in the yards was a part of transportation was not a pure question of law to be determined by merely reading the tariffs. Compare Great Northern R. Co. v. Merchants Elevator Co., 259 U.S. 285, 294, 42 S.Ct. 477 (480), 66 L.Ed. 943. The decision of the question was dependent upon the determination of certain facts, including the history of the Stock Yards and their relation to the line-haul carriers; the history of the unloading charge at these yards; and the action of the parties in relation thereto. If there was evidence to sustain the Commission's findings on these matters, its conclusion that the collection of the extra charge from the shippers was an unreasonable and unlawful practice must be sustained. Atchison, T. & S.F.R. Co. v. United States, 232 U.S. 199, 221, 34 S.Ct. 291 (297), 58 L.Ed. 568; Los Angeles Switching Case (...