United States v. Geddes

• Decision Date: 19 August 1903
• Citation: 180 F. 480
• Parties: UNITED STATES v. GEDDES.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of Ohio

180 F. 480

UNITED STATES v. GEDDES.

United States District Court, S.D. Ohio, Eastern Division.

August 19, 1903

William F. Bundy and John M. Gitterman, for the United States.

W. F Hunter, for defendant.

THOMPSON District Judge.

This suit on behalf of the United States was brought by the United States district attorney for this district to recover penalties under section 6 of the act of Congress approved March 2, 1893 (Act March 2, 1893, c. 196, 27 Stat. 532 (U.S Comp. St. 1901, p. 3175)), as amended April 1, 1896 (Act April 1, 1896, c. 87, 29 Stat. 85), known as the 'safety Appliance Act.' It is alleged in the petition that the defendant is a common carrier, engaged in interstate commerce by railway among the several states of the Union and connecting said interstate commerce between the towns of Bellaire and Zanesville, in the state of Ohio, and it is charged that as such common carrier it used cars in interstate commerce which were not provided with the safety appliances required by said acts of Congress; and for specific violations of these acts in that respect, set forth in the petition, judgment is asked for $400.

The acts of Congress referred to must be construed in connection with the 'Act to regulate commerce,' etc., approved February 4, 1887 (Act Feb. 4, 1887, c. 104, 24 Stat. 379 (U.S. Comp. St. 1901, p. 3154)), as thereafter amended, and known as the 'Interstate Commerce Act' (Act June 29 1906, c. 3591, 34 Stat. 584 (U.S. Comp. St. Supp. 1909, p. 1149)). To that act we must look in order to ascertain what is meant by the words 'engaged in interstate commerce by railroad,' as applied to a common carrier by the first section of the act of March 2, 1893. Manifestly the common carrier described in the act of March 2, 1893, is also the one which is more fully described in the original act as--

'any common carrier engaged in the transportation of passengers or property wholly by railroad, or partly by railroad and partly by water when both are used, under a common control, management, or arrangement, for a continuous carriage or shipment from one state or territory of the United States or the District of Columbia to any other state or territory of the United States or the District of Columbia.'

These laws are parts of one scheme and in furtherance of the same general purpose, which is limited strictly to interstate commerce and was not intended to affect railroads operated wholly within a state independent of outside connections, and it is only when there is an arrangement with outside carriers for a continuous carriage or shipment from one state or territory to another state or territory that such railroad becomes subject to the operation of these statutes.

In the case of Cincinnati, New Orleans & Texas Pacific Railway v. Interstate Commerce Commission, 162 U.S. 193, 16 Sup.Ct. 700, 704, 40 L.Ed. 935, it was said that, when goods shipped under a through bill of lading from a point in one state to a point in another are received in transit by a state common carrier under a conventional division of the charges, such carrier must be deemed to have subjected its road to an arrangement for a continuous carriage or shipment within the meaning of the act to regulate commerce. In that case it appeared that the complainants shipped their goods at first-class rates, by through bills of lading, from...