Chesapeake Ohio Railway Company v. Commonwealth of Kentucky

• Decision Date: 03 December 1900
• Docket Number: No. 103,103
• Citation: 179 U.S. 388,21 S.Ct. 101,45 L.Ed. 244
• Parties: CHESAPEAKE & OHIO RAILWAY COMPANY, Plff. in Err. , v. COMMONWEALTH OF KENTUCKY
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

179 U.S. 388

21 S.Ct. 101

45 L.Ed. 244

CHESAPEAKE & OHIO RAILWAY COMPANY, Plff. in Err.,

v COMMONWEALTH OF KENTUCKY.

No. 103.

Argued November 13, 14, 1900.

Decided December 3, 1900.

This was a writ of error to review the conviction of the railway company for failing to furnish separate coaches for the transportation of white and colored passengers on the line of its road, in compliance with a statute of Kentucky enacted in 1892, the 1st section of which reads as follows:

'§ 1. Any railroad company or corporation, person or persons, running or otherwise operating railroad cars or coaches by steam or otherwise, on any railroad line or track within this state; and all railroad companies, person, or persons, doing business in this state, whether upon lines of railroad owned in part or whole, or leased by them; and all railroad companies, person, or persons operating railroad lines that may hereafter be built under existing charters, or charters that may hereafter be granted in this state; and all foreign corporations, companies, person, or persons organized under charters granted, or that may be hereafter granted, by any other state, who may be now, or may hereafter be, engaged in running or operating any of the railroads of this state, either in part or whole, either in their own name or that of others, are hereby required to furnish separate coaches or cars for the travel or transportation of the white and colored passengers on their respective lines of railroad. Each compartment of a coach divided by a good and substantial wooden partition, with a door therein, shall be deemed a separate coach, within the meaning of this act, and each separate coach or compartment shall bear in some conspicuous place appropriate words in plain letters indicating the race for which it is set apart.'

The 2d section requires such companies to make no difference or discrimination in the quality, convenience, or accommodations in such coaches; and the 5th provides that conductors 'shall have power, and are hereby required, to assign to each white or colored passenger his or her respective car, or coach, or compartment; and should any passenger refuse to occupy the car, coach, or compartment to which he or she might be assigned by the conductor or manager, the latter shall have the right to refuse to carry such passenger,' and may put him off the train. The 7th section contains an exception of employees of railroads, or persons employed as nurses, or officers in charge of prisoners.

The indictment followed the language of the statute above quoted. The defendant demurred upon the ground that the law was repugnant to the Constitution of the United States, in that it was a regulation of interstate commerce. The demurrer was overruled, and the case tried before a jury which found the defendant guilty, and fixed its fine at $500. The case was carried by appeal to the court of appeals, and the conviction affirmed. The court delivered a brief opinion to the effect that its judgment was concluded by the case of the Ohio Valley R. R. Co. v. Lander, 20 Ky. L. Rep. 913, 47 S. W. 344.

Messrs. John T. Shelby and H. T. Wickham for plaintiff in error.

No counsel appeared for defendant in error.

Mr. Justice Brown delivered the opinion of the court:

This case turns exclusively upon the question whether the separate coach law of Kentucky be an infringement upon the exclusive power of Congress to regulate interstate commerce. The law, in broad terms, requires all railroad companies operating roads within the state of Kentucky, whether upon lines owned or leased by them, as well as all foreign companies operating roads within the state, to furnish separate coaches or cars for the travel or transportation of white and colored passengers upon their respective lines of railroad, and to post in some conspicuous place upon each coach appropriate words in plain letters indicating the race for which it is set apart.

Of course, this law is operative only within the state. It would be satisfied if the defendant, which operates a continuous line of railway from Newport News, Virginia, to Louisville, Kentucky, should take on its westward bound trains a separate coach or coaches for colored people at its first station in Kentucky, and continue the same to Louisville; and upon its eastward bound trains take off such coach at the same station before leaving the state. The real question is whether a proper construction of the act confines its operation to passengers whose journeys commence and end within the boundaries of the state, or whether a reasonable interpretation of the act requires colored passengers to be assigned to separate coaches when traveling from or to points in other states.

Similar questions have arisen several times in this court. In Hall v. De Cuir, 95 U. S. 485, 24 L. ed. 547, an act of the general as- sembly of Louisiana prohibited common carriers of passengers within that state from making any rules or regulations discriminating on account of race or color. Plaintiff took passage upon a steamboat up the river from New Orleans to a landing place within the state, and, being refused accommodations on account of her color in the cabin especially set apart for white persons, brought an action under the provisions of this act. The vessel was engaged in trade between New Orleans and Vicksburg, Mississippi, and defendant insisted that the act was void as a regulation of commerce between these states. The state court held it to be constitutional. This court held 'that, while the act purported only to control the carrier when engaged within the state, it must necessarily influence his conduct to some extent in the management of his business throughout his entire voyage. His disposition of passengers taken up and put down within the state, or taken up within to be carried without, cannot but affect in a greater or less degree those taken up without and brought within, and sometimes those taken up and put down without. A passenger in the cabin set apart for the use of whites without the state must, when the boat comes within, share the accommodations of that cabin with such colored persons as may come on board afterwards, if the law is enforced.'

In Louisville, N. O. & T. R. Co. v. Mississippi, 133 U. S. 587, 33 L. ed. 784, 2 Inters. Com. Rep. 801, 10 Sup. Ct. Rep. 348, an act of the legislature of Mississippi required, almost in the terms of the Kentucky act, that 'all railroads carrying passengers in this state . . . shall provide equal, but separate, accommodations for the white and colored races, by providing two or more passenger cars for each passenger train, or by dividing the passenger cars by a partition, so as to secure separate accommodations.' The road was indicted for a violation of the statute...