Eagle Cotton Oil Co. v. Southern Ry. Co.
Decision Date | 05 February 1931 |
Citation | 46 F.2d 1006 |
Parties | EAGLE COTTON OIL CO. v. SOUTHERN RY. CO. et. al. |
Court | U.S. District Court — Southern District of Mississippi |
E. B. Williams, of Meridian, Miss., for plaintiff.
Joseph P. Cook, of Washington, D. C., and Baskin, Wilbourn & Miller and Bozeman & Cameron, all of Meridian, Miss., for defendants.
This suit was tried by the court under a written stipulation waiving a jury. It is brought under section 16 of the Interstate Commerce Act as amended (49 USCA § 16), and is based on an order of the Interstate Commerce Commission, made and entered on November 11, 1929, in the case of Eagle Cotton Oil Company v. Southern Railway Company et al., being Interstate Commerce Commission docket No. 17485. In that order the Interstate Commerce Commission directed the defendants herein to pay to plaintiff herein the sum of $3,283.01 as reparation on numerous shipments of coal from mines in what is known as the Birmingham district to Meridian, Miss. The defendants, having refused to pay the award of reparation, plaintiff filed this suit and asks judgment in the sum of $5,083.01, which includes the amount of $3,283.01 as above stated, interest in the sum of $750, and attorneys' fee for $1,050.
A special plea was filed by defendants to the declaration in which it was alleged that the order of the Interest Commerce Commission, upon which this suit is based, was void and of no effect in so far as the reparation ordered and adjudged therein is concerned, because (1) the said rate of $2.03, which was held by the Interstate Commerce Commission to be unreasonable and excessive, was a rate which had theretofore been fixed and prescribed as a reasonable and lawful rate by the said Interstate Commerce Commission; and (2) the Interstate Commerce Commission is without power or jurisdiction to award and require defendants to pay reparation for the collection of rates on any shipments which moved prior to the effective date of the rate established as reasonable for the future by said order of March 9, 1928. Issue was joined on the special plea.
In order to properly understand the issues in this case, it is necessary to set out briefly the evidence of record. At the time the complaint was filed before the Interstate Commerce Commission in docket 17485, the rate on coal to Meridian, Miss., from mines in the Birmingham district was $2.03 per ton. The Eagle Cotton Oil Company, in behalf of itself and various interveners, filed a complaint in which it was alleged that the rate of $2.03 was unreasonable and in violation of sections 1, 2, 3, and 4 of the Interstate Commerce Act (49 USCA § 1-4). The complaint was heard on March 8, 1926. As a result of the decision of the Commission of March 9, 1928, 140 I. C. C. 131, the Birmingham group was disrupted. In other words, the Commission prescribed, as reasonable, rates of $1.85 and $1.95 per ton. The rate of $1.85 was to apply from Southern Railway groups Nos. 2 and 5, and the rate of $1.95 was to apply from Southern Railway groups Nos. 1, 3, and 4. In its decision the Commission condemned the $2.03 rate as unreasonable and awarded reparation on past shipments. The evidence shows that the $2.03 rate resulted from a rate which the Interstate Commerce Commission prescribed on July 22, 1915, in its decision in Coal and Coke Rates in the Southeast, Investigation and Suspension Docket No. 569, 35 I. C. C. 187. It appears in that case that the carriers proposed a rate of $1.25 from mines in the Birmingham district to Meridian, Miss. The Commission, after a thorough investigation, found that $1.25 was not a reasonable rate, and found that $1.20 would be reasonable for the transportation of coal from mines in the Birmingham district to Meridian, Miss. The evidence further discloses that the $2.03 rate resulted from this $1.20 rate which the Interstate Commerce Commission prescribed in the case just mentioned. The method by which the $1.20 rate became $2.03 is shown by evidence of record. In the steps by which the rate of $1.20 finally became $2.03, the evidence shows that none of the increases or decreases resulted from the action of defendants, but resulted solely from the action of the Interstate Commerce Commission or the Director General of Railroads.
The evidence that the $2.03 rate was made and prescribed as a reasonable rate by the Interstate Commerce Commission is uncontroverted. In fact, the Interstate Commerce Commission in its decision in 140 I. C. C. 131, recognized that "it is true that the rate assailed resulted from a rate prescribed in Coal and Coke Rates in the Southeast, 35 I. C. C. 187." In its decision in Coal from Illinois, Kentucky and Alabama to Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, Arkansas, Louisiana, and Texas, 128 I. C. C. 113, decided May 25, 1927, the Commission again approved the reasonableness of the rate of $2.03 from the Birmingham district to Meridian, Miss. There is no doubt in my mind that the $2.03 rate, which was found to be unreasonable, was a rate which was prescribed by the Interstate Commerce Commission as a reasonable and lawful rate.
1. The power of the Interstate Commerce Commission with respect to awards of reparation rests principally under section 8 of the Interstate Commerce Act (49 USCA § 8). Section 8 of the act provides as follows: That, "in case any common carrier subject to the provisions of this chapter shall do, cause to be done, or permit to be done any act, matter, or thing in this chapter prohibited or declared to be unlawful, or shall omit to do any act, matter, or thing in this chapter 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 chapter, together with a reasonable counsel or attorney's fee, to be fixed by the court in every case of recovery, which attorney's fee shall be taxed and collected as part of the costs in the case."
It will be observed from the above that the Commission is empowered to award reparation where there has been a violation of the Interstate Commerce Act by the carriers or that the rate charged and collected or act complained of has been unlawful or in contravention of some provision of the act. The Commission and courts have repeatedly held that its power to award damages can only be exercised when a violation of the act has occurred.
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City of El Paso v. El Paso City Lines, 4664
...to be reasonable, and its collection cannot be held to have been unlawful, and reparations cannot be decreed. See Eagle Cotton Oil Co. v. Southern Ry. Co., D.C., 46 F.2d 1006, and authorities there This case was reversed in 5 Cir., 51 F.2d 443, because it was held that the rate in that case......