United States of America v. Baltimore Ohio Southwestern Railroad Company

• Decision Date: 11 November 1912
• Docket Number: No. 648,648
• Citation: 226 U.S. 14,33 S.Ct. 5,57 L.Ed. 104
• Parties: UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Cincinnati & Columbus Traction Company, and Interstate Commerce Commission, Appts., v. BALTIMORE & OHIO SOUTHWESTERN RAILROAD COMPANY and Norfolk & Western Railway Company
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

226 U.S. 14

33 S.Ct. 5

57 L.Ed. 104

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Cincinnati & Columbus Traction Company, and Interstate Commerce Commission, Appts.,

v BALTIMORE & OHIO SOUTHWESTERN RAILROAD COMPANY and Norfolk & Western Railway Company.

No. 648.

Decided November 11, 1912.

Assistant Attorney General Denison, Special Assistant Attorney General Thurlow M. Gordon, and Messrs. Charles W. Needham for appellants.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 15-17 intentionally omitted] Messrs. R. Walton Moore, Edward Barton, Theodore W. Reath, Joseph I. Doran, and F. Markoe Rivinus, for appellees.

Mr. C. B. Matthews, for appellants.

Mr. Justice Holmes delivered the opinion of the court:

This is a suit to set aside an order of the Interstate Commerce Commission, directing the appellees to establish switch connections with the road of the appellant, and also through routes to and from points on that road. 20 Inters. Com. Rep. 486. The commerce court made a decree as prayed (195 Fed. 962), and an appeal was taken to this court. The facts material to our decision are as follows: The Baltimore & Ohio Southwestern Railroad and the Norfolk & Western Railway are trunk lines of steam railroads running east and west across the state of Ohio. After almost touching each other at Norwood, a suburb of Cincinnati, they draw apart, the former in a northerly, the latter in a southerly, direction, but come together again at Hillsboro, about 53 miles further to the east. The line of the Traction Company is an 'interurban' electric railway, for passengers and some freight, running under a state charter between Norwood and Hillsboro, through the middle of the diamond inclosed by the steam roads, and authorized to go on to Columbus. For a number of miles easterly from Norwood to Stonelick, near Boston, the last-mentioned road is very near and almost parallel to the tracks of one or the other of the steam roads, as it is again for the last 5 miles before reaching Hillsboro. In the intervening space, between Boston and Dodsonville, the towns and villages on the electric line are from 5 to 10 or 12 miles by wagon distant from the nearest station on one of the steam roads. The Traction Company applied to the Commission for switch connections, and they were ordered as we have said.

Some technical objections were raised, but the substantial question is whether the Traction Company is a 'lateral branch line of railroad' within the meaning of the 1st section of the act to regulate commerce, amended by act of June 18, 1910, chap. 309, § 7, 36 Stat. at L. 539, 547. That section requires carriers subject to the act to establish switch connections with such lines on certain conditions; and, as amended, permits owners of such lines as well as shippers to make complaint to the Commission in case of the carriers' failure upon written application, and authorizes the Commission to hear, investigate, and determine whether the conditions exist, and to make an order directing the carrier to comply with the act. It will be seen without much argument that, unless the ...