Baltimore Ohio Southwestern Railroad Company v. United States
Citation | 220 U.S. 94,55 L.Ed. 384,31 S.Ct. 368 |
Decision Date | 04 March 1910 |
Docket Number | Nos. 7,8,s. 7 |
Parties | BALTIMORE & OHIO SOUTHWESTERN RAILROAD COMPANY, Plff. in Err., v. UNITED STATES |
Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
'The act to prevent cruelty to animals while in transit,' approved June 29, 1906 (34 Stat. at L. 607, chap. 3594, U. S. Comp. Stat. Supp. 1909, p. 1178), provides:
Under this act eleven actions were instituted in the southern district of Ohio against the Baltimore & Ohio Southwestern Railroad Company.
The complaint in each case gave the name of the station in Illinois from which the animals were shipped to Cincinnati, the marks of the cars in which they were shipped, the hour on February 2, 1907, when they were loaded, and the various periods of confinement, which varied from thirty-seven to forty-five hours. The separate shipments consisted of one, two, three, and four car-load lots, aggregating twenty-one cars, containing several hundred cattle and hogs. Most of the shipments were loaded at different times; but because one (1872) was forwarded under the thirty-six hour rule, the time for its unloading was the same as that of another shipment (1871), made eight hours later under the twenty-eight hour rule, from a different station. At another station there were three shipments of one car load each of cattle belonging to different owners, loaded at the same time, but two (1869, 1873) of the cars were forwarded under the twenty-eight hour rule, and the other (1874) under the thirty-six hour rule.
The railroad company filed a separate plea in each case, admitting the allegations of the complaint, but setting up that 'the shipment therein was forwarded to Cincinnati on its train No. 98, on which there were also loaded and forwarded other cattle, referred to in each of the other suits, and in the said several causes the said plaintiff is entitled to recover but one penalty, not to exceed $500, which it is ready and willing to pay, and it pleads the said separate suits in bar to the recovery of more than $500 for all of the same.'
The district attorney's motions for separate judgments on the admission in the several pleas were overruled. The court sustained the company's motion to consolidate the causes, entered judgment for a single penalty, and ordered 'that the within order in case 1866 shall apply to, operate upon, and be conclusive of, all the rights of the plaintiff in each of the several causes, to wit, 1867-1874, 1880 and 1884.' The government sued out a writ of error in case 1866, and, apparently out of abundant cau- tion, another in 1867, later entering into a stipulation in the circuit court of appeals that the result in these two cases should control all the others.
The circuit court of appeals for the sixth circuit (86 C. C. A. 223, 159 Fed. 33) held that the order of consolidation was proper, but reversed the judgment on the ground that the United States were entitled to recover eleven penalties, or one for each of the eleven shipments.
Messrs. Edward Colston, Judson Harmon, A. W. Goldsmith, and George Hoadly for plaintiff in error.
[Argument of Counsel from pages 97-100 intentionally omitted] Solicitor General Bowers for defendant in error.
Assistant Attorney General Denison for defendant in error on reargument.
[Argument of Counsel from pages 100-103 intentionally omitted] Mr. Justice Lamar, after making the foregoing statement, delivered the opinion of the court:
The consolidated record of the eleven cases shows that several hundred cattle and hogs of eleven different owners, shipped in twenty-one cars, loaded at different stations at various hours on February 2, 1907, were in one train at the time of the expiration of the successive periods for the unloading required by the act of 1906, 'to...
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