Louisville Co v. United States

• Decision Date: 07 January 1918
• Docket Number: No. 91,91
• Citation: Louisville Co v. United States, 245 U.S. 463, 38 S.Ct. 141, 62 L.Ed. 400 (1918)
• Parties: LOUISVILLE & N. R. CO. v. UNITED STATES et al
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

245 U.S. 463

38 S.Ct. 141

62 L.Ed. 400

LOUISVILLE & N. R. CO.

v UNITED STATES et al.

No. 91.

Submitted Nov. 23, 1917.

Decided Jan. 7, 1918.

Mr. Henry L. Stone, of Corsicana, Tex., and Mr. William A. Colston, of Louisville, Ky., for appellant.

Mr. Asst. Atty. Gen. Frierson, for the United States.

Mr. Joseph W. Folk, of Washington, D. C., for the Interstate Commerce Commission.

Mr. Justice BRANDEIS delivered the opinion of the Court.

Bowling Green, Kentucky, is located on the main line of the Louisville & Nashville Railroad, 114 miles south of Louisville and 73 miles north of Nashville. Prior to the year 1910 the railroad had established many rates to and from Bowling Green which were higher than those charged by it for longer distances over the same route in the same direction to and from Louisville and Nashville. The amendment to section 4, of the Act to Regulate Commerce, made June 18, 1910 (c. 309, 36 Stat. 539, 547), prohibits any such higher charges for shorter distances unless previously authorized by the Interstate Commerce Commission; but it provided that carriers might, within six months thereafter, apply to the Commission for authority to continue in effect charges of that nature then lawfully existing. Within the period so fixed the railroad filed such an application covering many hundred different places scattered over its extended system, and including both Louisville and Nashville. That part of the application which sought to continue in effect lower rates to and from Louisville and Nashville than those in effect to and from Bowling Green, was heard separately.¹ The railroad sought to justify the lower charges for the longer distances by showing that it had to meet, particularly as to Nashville traffic, competition both by water and by rail. This contention was opposed by evidence to the effect that at Bowling Green, also, there was water competition, actual or potential and that at Nashville there was no real rail competition. After full hearing an order was entered which (after several revisions) merely denied to the railroad authority to continue on certain traffic through Bowling Green to Louisville and to Nashville lower rates 'than are contemporaneously in effect to Bowling Green.' Bowling Green Business Men's Association v. Louisville & Nashville Railroad Co., 24 Interst. Com. Com'n R. 228.

The railroad then brought this suit in the Commerce Court to set aside the order of the Commission and asked for a temporary injunction.² Upon the abolition of that court by Act of October 22, 1913, c. 32, 38 Stat. 208, 219, the case was heard in the District Court of the United States for the Western District of Kentucky before three judges. The railroad assailed the validity of the order on many grounds; but its main contentions were, that the order complained of was not such a negative order as was contemplated by the fourth section of the Act to Regulate Commerce, was not responsive to the application and hence, was not such an order as the Commission had power to make; and...