Missouri, Kansas Texas Railway Company of Texas v. Cade

• Decision Date: 11 May 1914
• Docket Number: No. 522,522
• Parties: MISSOURI, KANSAS, & TEXAS RAILWAY COMPANY OF TEXAS, Plff. in Err., v. L. C. CADE
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

233 U.S. 642

34 S.Ct. 678

58 L.Ed. 1135

MISSOURI, KANSAS, & TEXAS RAILWAY COMPANY OF TEXAS, Plff. in Err.,

v L. C. CADE.

No. 522.

Submitted February 24, 1914.

Decided May 11, 1914.

Messrs. Joseph M. Bryson, Aldis B. Browne, Alexander S. Coke, and A. H. McKnight for plaintiff in error.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 643-645 intentionally omitted] No appearance for defendant in error.

Mr. Justice Pitney delivered the opinion of the court:

This action was brought in the justice court to recover the sum of $10.75 alleged to be due as wages from the defendant (now plaintiff in error) to the plaintiff below, with an attorney's fee of $9. The fee was claimed only by virtue of an act of the legislature, approved March 19, 1909, Laws, p. 93, now forming arts. 2178 and 2179, Tex. Rev. Civ. Stat. 1911. Defendant specially excepted to this part of plaintiff's claim, on the ground that the act was invalid as constituting a burden upon interstate commerce, contrary to the commerce clause of the Federal Constitution and the act to regulate commerce and amendments thereof, and as violating the 'equal protection' and 'due process' clauses of the 14th Amendment. Notwithstanding these contentions, judgment was rendered in favor of plaintiff for the amount claimed, including the attorney's fee. Under the local practice, no appeal lies from a decision of the justice court to a higher state court in a case involving less than $20, and so the judgment is brought directly here by writ of error for a review of the Federal questions.

The statute in question (including its caption) is set forth in the margin. This is the same act that was held invalid under the state Constitution by the court of civil appeals in Ft. Worth & D. C. R. Co. v. Loyd, ——Tex. Civ. App. ——, 132 S. W. 899, because of which decision this court, in Gulf, C.

'An Act to Regulate the Presentation and Collection of Claims for Personal Servces or for Labor Rendered or for Material Furnished, or for Overcharges in Freight or Express, or for Any Claim for Lost or Damaged Freight, or for Stock Killed or Injured by Any Person or Corporation, against Any Person or Corporation Doing Business in This State, and Providing a Reasonable Amount of Attorney's Fees to be Recovered, in Cases Where the Amount of Such Claims Shall Not Exceed Two Hundred ($200) Dollars, and Declaring an Emergency.

'Section 1. That hereafter any person in this state, having a valid, bona fide claim against any person or corporation doing business in this state, for personal services rendered, or for labor done, or for material furnished, or for overcharges on freight or express, or for any claim for lost or damaged freight, or for stock killed or injured by such person or corporation, its agents or employees, may present the same to such person or corporation, or to any duly authorized agent thereof, in any county where suit may be instituted for the same; and if, at the expiration of thirty days after the presentation of such claim, the same has not been paid or satisfied, he may immediately institute suit thereon in the proper court and if he shall finally establish his claim, and obtain judgment for the full amount thereof, as presented for payment to such person or corporation in such court, he shall be entitled to recover the amount of such claim and all costs of suit, and in addition thereto a reasonable amount as attorney's fees, provided he has an attorney employed in the case, not to exceed twenty ($20) dollars, to be determined by the court or jury trying the case; provided, however, that nothing in this act shall be construed to repeal or in any manner affect any provision of the law now in force giving a remedy to persons having claims of the character mentioned in this act, but the same shall be considered as cumulative of all other remedies given to such a person or persons.

'Sec. 2. The fact that there is no law now in force in this state providing an effectual remedy for persons having such claims as are mentioned in this act creates an emergency and an imperative public necessity requiring the suspension of the constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several days, and this act shall take effect from and after its passage, and it is so enacted.

'Approved March 13, 1909.' & S. F. R. Co. v. Dennis, 224 U. S. 503, 56 L. ed. 860, 32 Sup. Ct. Rep. 542, reversed a judgment that included an attorney's fee, without passing upon the question whether the act contravened the 14th Amendment. And see Gulf, C. & S. F. R. Co. v. Thorn, 227 U. S. 675, 57 L. ed. 699, 33 Sup. Ct. Rep. 327. Since that time the supreme court of Texas, overruling the decision in the Loyd Case, has upheld the act under the Texas Constitution, in Missouri, K. & T. R. Co. v. Mahaffey, 105 Tex. 394, 150 S. W. 881. We must therefore now consider the Federal questions.

But first, we should note the construction placed upon the act by the state court of last resort. Section 35 of article 3 of the Constitution of 1876 declares that no bill except appropriation bills shall contain more than one subject, which shall be expressed in its title; 'but if any subject shall be embraced in an act, which shall not be expressed in the title, such act shall be void only as to so much thereof as shall not be so expressed.' In the case last mentioned (105 Tex. 394, 398), the court construed the act as limited in its operation to the purpose expressed in the title; that is, as relating only to the collection of claims not exceeding $200 in amount, and as conferring no right upon persons having claims exceeding that amount which did not exist independently of the act. In reaching this conclusion, the court said: 'Surely, the leigslature did not intend to limit attorney's fees to $20 in a case involving $1,000, and there is no apparent reason for allowing additional attorney's fees of $20 in a case involving so large an amount, but there is a sound reason for allowing and limiting the amount of fee on small claims. If the claim be $200 or less, and suit must be instituted, which makes an attorney necessary, it is a heavy tax on the claimant; therefore, if he present a just demand which is refused, the recovery of the full amount claimed shows that the demand of payment should have been granted, and this law compels one refusing payment of such demand to pay the cost and attorney's fees, not to exceed $20. The limitation of the amount of the fee to $20 and to cases in which an attorney has been actually employed practically implies that such action might be prosecuted without an attorney, which in effect limits the amount of the claim to $200 because the only court in which suits of that character could be instituted by nonprofessional claimants, without the services of an attorney, is that of justice of the peace, whose jurisdiction cannot exceed $200; therefore, the limitation in the caption is in effect the same as that of the body of the law, because the proviso in the law can be harmonized with the title by no other construction.'

So far as the present attack is founded upon the commerce clause and the act to regulate commerce, it is sufficient to say that the judgment under review was not based upon a claim arising out of interstate commerce, and hence plaintiff in error does not bring itself within the class with regard to whom it claims the act to be in this respect repugnant to the Constitution and laws of the United States. Seaboard Air Line R. Co. v. Seegers, 207 U. S. 73, 76, 52 L. ed. 108, 109, 28 Sup. Ct. Rep. 28; Tyler v. Registration Ct. Judges, 179 U. S. 405, 409, 45 L. ed. 252, 254, 21 Sup. Ct. Rep. 206; Hooker v. Burr, 194 U. S. 415, 419, 48 L. ed. 1046, 1050, 24 Sup. Ct. Rep. 706; New York ex rel. Hatch v. Reardon, 204 U. S. 152, 160, 51 L. ed. 415, 422, 27 Sup. Ct. Rep. 188, 9 Ann. Cas. 736; Southern R. Co. v. King, 217 U. S. 524, 534, 54 L. ed. 868, 871, 30 Sup. Ct. Rep. 594; Standard Stock Food Co. v. Wright, 225 U. S. 540, 550, 56 L. ed. 1197, 1201, 32 Sup. Ct. Rep. 784; Rosenthal v. New York, 226 U. S. 260, 271, 57 L. ed. 212, 217, 33 Sup. Ct. Rep. 27; Farmers' & M. Sav. Bank v. Minnesota, 232 U. S. 516, 530, 58 L. ed. ——, 34 Sup. Ct. Rep. 354; Plymouth Coal Co. v. Pennsylvania, 232 U. S. 531, 544, 58 L. ed. , 34 Sup. Ct. Rep. 359.

Upon the other questions, plaintiff in error relies chiefly upon Gulf, C. & S. F. R. Co. v. Ellis, 165 U. S. 150, 41 L. ed. 666, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 255. In that case a previous act of the legislature of Texas (act of April 5, 1889, Laws p. 131; Supp. to Sayles's Tex. Civ. Stat. art. 4266a; p. 768) was held repugnant to the 14th Amendment. That act allowed the recovery of plaintiff's attorneys' fees in certain classes of cases, but only where the defendant was a railroad company, and it was adjudged to be invalid...