Louisville & N.R. Co. v. Coquillard Wagon Works' Assignees

Decision Date16 March 1912
Citation147 Ky. 530,144 S.W. 1080
PartiesLOUISVILLE & N. R. CO. v. COQUILLARD WAGON WORKS' ASSIGNEES.
CourtKentucky Court of Appeals

Appeal from Circuit Court, Henderson County.

Action by the Coquillard Wagon Works' Assignees against the Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company. Judgment for plaintiffs, and defendant appeals. Reversed.

Yeaman & Yeaman, Benjamin D. Warfield, and Chas. H. Moorman, for appellant.

Montgomery Merritt, for appellees.

LASSING J.

The assignees of the Coquillard Wagon Works, at Henderson, Ky instituted a suit against the Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company, in which they sought to recover $342, alleged to be due said company as a rebate on shipments made over said road from Big Hatchie, Tenn., to Henderson. The company answered in two paragraphs. The first is a traverse. The second pleaded that the shipments of the timber in the rough--that is, the logs--to the company, and the shipment of the manufactured product by the company to various points in the United States, were all regulated and controlled by the interstate commerce law (Act. Feb. 4, 1887, c. 104, 24 Stat. 379 [U. S Comp. St. 1901, p. 3154]), and that the rates which it charged for said shipments and collected were the reasonable usual, and legal freight rates on such shipments. It pleaded that the agreement set up in the petition, by which the defendant obligated itself to refund to the company a portion of the charges, was unauthorized, illegal, and void and in violation of law, and it pleaded and relied upon the interstate commerce act in bar of plaintiff's right to recover. In an amended answer, the defendant further pleaded that all of the shipments from Big Hatchie, Tenn., to Henderson, Ky. were made prior to June 4, 1908, and that, during the time when said shipments were being made, the only lawful rate in effect upon logs and rough material, from Big Hatchie, Tenn., to Henderson, Ky. was 10 cents per 100 pounds, as published in the defendant company's tariff, which became operative on January 1, 1905, and was in full force and effect when these shipments were made; that under said tariff it charged, collected, and retained 10 cents per 100 for all materials so shipped by the plaintiff company over its road. In a reply the plaintiffs traverse all the material allegations of the answer, as amended, and also plead that the agreement which the defendant company entered into with plaintiff was such as it was in the habit of making with customers using its road. The affirmative matter in the reply was traversed. In an amended petition, thereafter filed, the plaintiffs alleged that they had shipped over the defendant company's road 1,253,007 pounds of material manufactured out of logs which it had theretofore shipped over defendant's road from Big Hatchie to Henderson. This amended petition was traversed, and the case submitted to the court for judgment without the intervention of a jury. The contract between the parties was evidenced by certain letters that passed, and they were filed with and made a part of the record and considered by the trial judge. It appears that prior to June 4, 1908, the regular schedule tariff on goods shipped between the points of Big Hatchie, Tenn., and Henderson, Ky. was 10 cents per 100 pounds. On June 4, 1908. A schedule was adopted making a reduction of 2 cents per 100 pounds on all goods re-shipped over its lines, and this traffic arrangement remained in effect until July 1, 1909, when a tariff rate of 10 cents per 100 was posted. All of the logs were shipped from Big Hatchie, Tenn., to Henderson, between June 26, 1907, and February 13, 1908; but the manufactured product was not reshipped from Henderson over the defendant company's lines for some time thereafter, and when a portion of it, at least, was reshipped, the tariff of June 4, 1908, was in effect. It is the contention of appellees' counsel that, inasmuch as the tariff of June 4, 1908, gave a rate of 8 cents on all raw material shipped from Big Hatchie, Tenn., into Henderson, where the manufactured product was shipped out again over the defendant's road, the plaintiff company is entitled to the benefit of that schedule on the raw material shipped from Big Hatchie into Henderson by it under the old schedule of 10 cents per 100 pounds. This is the view the lower court took of the matter, and, accordingly, he entered a judgment for $250; this being the two cents per 100 on the 1,253,007 pounds of manufactured product shown to have been shipped from Henderson over the defendant's road. The railroad company appeals.

This was an interstate commerce shipment, and the rights of the parties must be determined by the federal statute regulating such shipments. At the time all of the logs were shipped, the regular schedule rate from Big Hatchie, Tenn., to Henderson Ky. was 10 cents per 100 pounds. Plaintiff shipped 1,712,100 pounds of logs in the rough, and was required to pay to the railroad $1,712 freight thereon; this being the exact tariff schedule. In the petition the assignees sought to recover 2 cents per 100 pounds rebate on this freight, amounting to $342. In other words, the plaintiff was seeking in this suit to have enforced an agreement which was made with the railroad company by which the...

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12 cases
  • Western Union Telegraph Company v. Arkadelphia Milling Company
    • United States
    • Arkansas Supreme Court
    • January 8, 1923
  • Edenton Cotton Mills v. Norfolk Southern R. Co.
    • United States
    • North Carolina Supreme Court
    • October 8, 1919
    ... ... unenforceable. L. & R. Co. v. Coquillard Wagon ... Works, 147 Ky. 530, 144 S.W. 1080 ... ...
  • Mills v. Norfolk Southern R. Co
    • United States
    • North Carolina Supreme Court
    • October 8, 1919
    ...to refund a part of the rates lawfully charged and collected is in violation of the Act and unenforceable. L. & R. Co. v. Coquillard Wagon Works, 147 Ky. 530, 144 S. W. 1080. Carrier cannot, directly or indirectly, contract for a rate different from that specified in its schedules. St. Loui......
  • Blackford v. St. Louis, I.M. & S. Ry. Co.
    • United States
    • Kentucky Court of Appeals
    • June 11, 1918
    ...Co., 138 Ky. 220, 127 S.W. 779; Id., 226 U.S. 441, 33 S.Ct. 176, 57 L.Ed. 290; Louisville & Nashville R. R. Co. v. Coquillard Wagon Works, 147 Ky. 530, 144 S.W. 1080; Louisville & Nashville R. R. Co. v. Allen, 152 Ky. 145, 153 S.W. 198; Gulf, Colorado & Santa Fé Ry. Co. v. Hefley, 158 U.S. ......
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