Consolidated Freightways Corp. of Del. v. Nicholas

• Decision Date: 16 November 1965
• Docket Number: No. 51648,51648
• Citation: 258 Iowa 115,137 N.W.2d 900
• Parties: CONSOLIDATED FREIGHTWAYS CORPORATION OF DELAWARE, Appellee. v. William H. NICHOLAS, Commissioner, Iowa State Highway Commission, and Member of Iowa Reciprocity Board, Carl F. Schach, Deputy Member and Chairman of Iowa Reciprocity Board, Bernard J. Martin, Commissioner, Iowa State Commerce Commission, and Member of Iowa Reciprocity Board, Robert Powell, Deputy Member of Iowa Reciprocity Board, Carl Pesch, Commissioner of Public Safety, and Member of Iowa Reciprocity Board, John Carlson, Deputy Member of Iowa Reciprocity Board, Joy B. Boyce, Executive Secretary of Iowa Reciprocity Board, Appellants.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

Page 900

137 N.W.2d 900

258 Iowa 115

CONSOLIDATED FREIGHTWAYS CORPORATION OF DELAWARE, Appellee. v. William H. NICHOLAS, Commissioner, Iowa State Highway Commission, and Member of Iowa Reciprocity Board, Carl F. Schach, Deputy Member and Chairman of Iowa Reciprocity Board, Bernard J. Martin, Commissioner, Iowa State Commerce Commission, and Member of Iowa Reciprocity Board, Robert Powell, Deputy Member of Iowa Reciprocity Board, Carl Pesch, Commissioner of Public Safety, and Member of Iowa Reciprocity Board, John Carlson, Deputy Member of Iowa Reciprocity Board, Joy B. Boyce, Executive Secretary of Iowa Reciprocity Board, Appellants.

No. 51648.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Nov. 16, 1965.

Lawrence F. Scalise, Atty. Gen., of Iowa, and Bruce M. Snell, Jr., Sp. Counsel, for the State of Iowa, Ida Grove, for appellants.

More & More, of Harlan, Larson & Larson, Harlan, and Morrison, Foerster, Holloway, Clinton & Clark, San Francisco, Cal., for appellee.

LARSON, Justice.

This suit in equity involves the construction, interpretation and application of Chapter 250, Laws of the 58th General Assembly, known as Chapter 326 of the 1962 Code of Iowa. Consolidated Freightways, a corporation, appellee, is an interstate motor carrier which operates its trucks on Iowa highways in the course of its business as a common carrier. Defendant-appellants are the members of the Iowa Reciprocity Board. Suit was brought to enjoin a threatened cancellation of appellee's right to operate its motor trucks in Iowa, to construe the provisions of Chapter 326 of the Code relating to licensing and taxing of interstate motor carriers operating in Iowa, and to recover alleged overpayments of license fees for the years 1961 and 1962. Pursuant to a hearing, a temporary injunction was granted and defendants then counterclaimed for additional license fees.

Upon joinder of issues plaintiff moved for a determination of questions of law under Rule 105, Rules of Civil Procedure, and subsequently filed a motion for judgment on the pleadings. After due hearings, the trial court entered judgment against defendants and dismissed their counterclaim. They appeal. We affirm the decision.

Chapter 326, Code of Iowa, 1962, established what is known as the Iowa reciprocity board, and provides that it shall have authority to make reciprocity agreements with other states or responsible authorities whereby nonresidents may be exempt from paying the usual registration fees to this state when using Iowa highways. It further provides that such agreements may provide 'with respect to resident or nonresident owners of fleets of two or more (commercial) vehicles which are engaged in interstate commerce, * * * that the registrations of such fleets can be apportioned between this state and other states in which such fleets operate.'

The formula to be used by the board is set out in section 326.2 as follows: 'The percentage of miles such fleets operate in this state as related to the total miles such fleets operate in all states, shall be used by the reciprocity board to determine the amount of registration computed on a dollar basis.' Then follows the time period for computing these respective mileages, and this sentence: 'The apportioned registration fee computed on a dollar basis is equal to the amount obtained by applying the proportion of in-state fleet miles to total fleet miles to the fees which would otherwise be required for total fleet registration in this state and shall mean a percentage of the annual fee on each vehicle of an apportioned fleet, plus the amount of the fees due as hereinafter provided for the issuance of plates, stickers, or other identification for all the vehicles registered in accordance with this chapter.'

It is further provided that 'When a nonresident fleet owner has registered his vehicles on an apportionment basis, his vehicles shall be considered fully registered insofar as interstate commerce is concerned.'

In section 326.3 the fleet owner is required to submit under oath information necessary for the board's consideration of his application, and from which it may compute apportionment. It is then stated: 'If the fees for such apportioned registration are not paid to each contracting state, * * * entitled thereto within a reasonable time as shall be determined by the board, the board shall redetermine fees due this state; and, if the additional fees due this state are not paid by the owner within twenty (20) days after the mailing to him of a notice by certified mail of the additional fees due, the registration in this state shall be canceled; and, in addition, the additional fees due for registration in this state shall be a debt due to the state of Iowa.'

The primary dispute gravitates around the plaintiff's contention that the language of the statute is clear and the formula fixed for computing fees mandatory and complete, and the defendants' contention that there is ambiguity in the reciprocity statute and that it 'provides for a determination of truck license fees by a formula that results in the equivalent of one full fee being divided among those states that have agreed to prorate fees.'

The principal issues before the court when adjudicating law points (R.C.P. 105) were, (1) whether the formula for determining registration, stated in section 326.2 as the percentage of miles such fleets operate in this state as related to the total miles such fleets operate in all states, is based upon miles operated in all states or miles traveled in only those states with which Iowa has an opportioning agreement; and (2) whether section 326.3 authorizes a redetermination of fees due Iowa, when all license fees, taxes, or other assessments due each other contracting state entitled thereto are paid in full.

Appellant contends the chapter and its various sections, as shown by substantial extrinsic evidence introduced over plaintiff's objections, disclose the legislative intent to confine the percentage formula to only those apportioning states, that miles traveled outside those states are not counted in figuring the percentage due each contracting state, that the aggregate percentage of registration fees paid to prorating states must equal 100%, and if it does not and this state is the base plate state, it can claim the percentage difference. Unless these contentions have foundation in the language used, of course extrinsic evidence as to the legislative intent would be inadmissible. Our first duty, then, is to examine the statutes and, unless a contrary intention is evident, give the words used their ordinary and commonly-understood meaning. Unless the words are of doubtful meaning, or it appears an adherence to the strict letter would lead to injustice, to absurdity, or to contradictory provisions, we are powerless to search for another meaning.

I. The rules of statutory construction in this jurisdiction are quite well established. Where the language of a statute is plain and unambiguous and its meaning clear and unmistakable, there is no room for construction and we are not permitted to search for its meaning beyond the statute. Herman v. Muhs, Iowa, 126 N.W.2d 400, 401, and citations.

We have said a statute is open to construction where the language used in the statute requires interpretation--that is, where the statute is ambiguous, or will bear two or more constructions, or is of such doubtful or obscure meaning that reasonable minds might be uncertain and disagree as to its meaning. Smith v. Board of Trustees of Policemen's Pension Fund of City of Des Moines, 238 Iowa 127, 128, 25 N.W.2d 858; Palmer v. State Board of Assessment & Review, 226 Iowa 92, 283 N.W. 415; 50 Am.Jur. 204, § 225.

We have also said we need not go beyond the plain and ordinary use of the words in the statute itself, and the meaning to be given the words used will be determined from the character of their use, and they will be given their natural, plain, ordinary and commonly-understood meaning in the absence of any statutory or well-established technical meaning. Case v. Olson, 234 Iowa 869, 14 N.W.2d 717, and citations; Re Highland Perpetual Maintenance Soc., 254 Iowa 164, 172, 117 N.W.2d 57, and citations; section 4.1(2), Code, 1962.

We said in Meredith Publishing Co. v. Iowa Employment Security Comm., 232 Iowa 666, 6 N.W.2d 6, that legislative intent must be deduced from the clear language of the statute and such language must be construed according to its plain and ordinary meaning. We reasoned therein that if the words used were to have any other meaning or the term was being used in a sense different from its accepted meaning, the legislature could and should expressly define the meaning of the term as it is to be used in that statute. Having not done so, we presume the terms used were to be given no other than their plain, ordinary, and accepted meaning. The rule seems applicable here.

When a statute uses the word 'shall' in directing a public body to do certain acts, the word is to be construed as mandatory, not permissive, and excludes the idea of discretion. Hansen v. Henderson, 244 Iowa 650, 665, 56 N.W.2d 59, and citations. Here the statute plainly states the board shall use the prescribed formula.

Appellants seem to recognize those rules, but contend that the words 'all states' and 'total fleet miles', due to the character of their use, refer to 'all apportioning states' and to 'total fleet miles in apportioning states.' The word 'all' is commonly understood and usually does not admit of an exception, addition or exclusion. Cedar Rapids Community School Dist. v. City, 252 Iowa 205, 211, 106 N.W.2d 655, 659; 50 Am.Jur., Statutes, § 286, p. 269. The use here admits no exclusions, and we see no logical reason to hold it means less than all states in which the carrier travels. It was the feeling of the trial court that such modification was not permissible and that even if defendants' extrinsic evidence were considered, it would not...