United States v. Koenig Coal Co
| Decision Date | 12 April 1926 |
| Docket Number | No. 216,216 |
| Citation | 46 S.Ct. 392,70 L.Ed. 709,270 U.S. 512 |
| Parties | UNITED STATES v. P. KOENIG COAL CO |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
The Attorney General, and Messrs. William D. Mitchell, Sol. Gen., Blackburn Esterline, Asst. Sol. Gen., both of Washington, D. C., and William H. Bonneville, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., for the United States.
Messrs. Harold Goodman and Edwin R. Monnig, both of Detroit, Mich., for defendant in error.
[Argument of Counsel from page 513 intentionally omitted] Mr. Chief Justice TAFT delivered the opinion of the Court.
The P. Koenig Coal Company was indicted in the District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, under the Elkins Act (Comp. St. §§ 8597-8599), for knowingly receiving as a shipper concessions from a carrier under the Interstate Commerce Act (Comp. St. § 8563 et seq.) in respect to transportation of property in interstate commerce obtained by deceitful representation made to the carriers on which the carriers innocently and in good faith relied. The District Court sustained a demurrer to the indictment, and the United States prosecutes a writ of error under the Criminal Appeals Act (), which provides that a writ of error from the District Court may be taken directly to this Court from a judgment sustaining a demurrer to any indictment or any count thereof where such judgment is based upon the invalidity or construction of the statute upon which the indictment is founded.
The District Court held that section 1 of the Elkins Act of February 19, 1903, c. 708, 32 Stat. 847 (), under which the indictment was found, applies only to a shipper who knowingly receives a concession from a carrier when such concession is knowingly granted by the carrier in equal guilt with the shipper. United States v. P. Koenig Coal Co., 1 F. (2d) 738.
The Koenig Coal Company is a Michigan corporation doing business in Detroit. The defendant was indicted on 18 counts applying respectively to 18 carloads of coal. The shipments originated in West Virginia, and were moved to Detroit in August, 1922, over the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad Company as the initial carrier for each car.
On July 25, 1922, the Interstate Commerce Commission, acting under the Transportation Act of February 28, 1920 (chapter 91, tit. 4, § 402 (15), 41 Stat. 456, 476 (Comp. St. Ann. Supp. 1923, s 8563)), issued its service order No. 23. Paragraph 15 gives the Commission, when shortage of equipment, congestion of traffic, or other emergency requires action in any section of the country, authority to suspend its rules as to car service, and to make such reasonable rules with regard to it as in the Commission's opinion will best promote the service in the interest of the public and the commerce of the people, and to give direction for performance or priority in transportation or movement of traffic. Service Order No. 23 declared that there was an emergency upon the railroad lines east of the Mississippi river, and directed that coal cars should be furnished to the mines according to a certain order of purposes, numbered in classes 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5, and that no coal embraced in classes 1, 2, 3, and 4 should be subject to reconsignment, or diversion except for some purpose in the same or a superior class. The order required that the carriers should give preference and priority in the placement and assignment of cars for the loading of coal to those required for the current use of hospitals which were placed in class 2, in priority to cars for the loading of coal required for the manufacture of automobiles or automobile parts, which were placed in class 5 and later in class 3. The order remained in force from July 25 to September 20, 1922. The first count of the indictment charged that the defendant intending to obtain a preference and priority in transportation, which it was not then lawfully entitled to receive, and to procure the coal for the use of Dodge & Co., engaged in the manufacture of automobiles and parts thereof, sent a telegraphic order to the Monitor Coal & Coke Company, of Huntington, W. Va., asking the shipment of carloads of coal to the Koenig Coal Company at Detroit for the use of the Samaritan Hospital; that it thereby secured the furnishing by the C. & O. Company on August 5, 1922, at the request of the Monitor Company, of one car suitable for the loading and transportation of coal on its line in West Virginia, which was billed and consigned in accordance with the telegraphic order; that, when it reached Detroit, the defendant diverted the car to Dodge Bros., who used the coal, the Samaritan Hospital not needing or requiring the coal, and not having authorized or requested the defendant to send the order; that the concession and discrimination was thus obtained by a deceitful device of which the carriers had no knowledge. The other 17 counts are similar and refer to different cars of coal, some of them to different mines and consignors, and some to different beneficiaries of the trick as actual consumers of the coal.
The demurrer challenged the indictment on various grounds: First, that the facts charged did not constitute a concession given or a discrimination practiced as defined by the Elkins Act; second, that the restrictions imposed by the Interstate Commerce Commission's Service Order No. 23 were beyond the power of the Interstate Commerce Commission, in that they were an exercise of purely legislative power which could not be delegated; third, that the service order exceeded the authority conferred upon the Interstate Commerce Commission; fourth, in that it was beyond the power of the federal government thus to affect the use, consumption, price, and disposition of coal in what was the exercise of a local police power reserved to the states; fifth, that the order is so arbitrary and unreasonable as not to be within the power of the national government and to be an encroachment on the powers of the several states; sixth, that the service order violated the Fifth Amendment in depriving defendant of liberty and property without due process of law; and, seventh, that it was invalid because it gave preference to the Lake Erie ports of Ohio and Pennsylvania over the ports of other states in respect to the transportation and shipment of coal.
All of these objections, except the first and third, are covered by the decision of this court in Avent v. United States, 45 S. Ct. 34, 266 U. S. 127, 69 L. Ed. 202, where we held that Congress might consistently with the Fifth Amendment require a preference in the order of purposes for which coal might be carried in...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
United States v. Union Pacific Railroad Company
...70 L.Ed. 713; Baltimore and Ohio R. R. Co. v. United States, 305 U. S. 507, 59 S.Ct. 284, 83 L.Ed. 318; United States v. P. Koenig Coal Co., 270 U.S. 512, 46 S.Ct. 392, 70 L.Ed. 709; Pennsylvania R. Co. v. International Coal Mining Co., 230 U.S. 184, 33 S.Ct. 893, 57 L.Ed. 3. The defendant'......
-
Town of Green River v. Bunger
... ... the object and purpose of the ordinance. U.S. v. Koenig, ... (Mich.) 70 L.Ed. 709. No case can be found that has ever ... gone ... in Connecticut and sold directly to consumers throughout the ... United States. [50 Wyo. 58] Sales are made on orders obtained ... by house to ... enactment. United States v. Koenig Coal Co., 270 ... U.S. 512, 520, 70 L.Ed. 709, 46 S.Ct. 392; Donnelley v ... ...
-
Unio Pac Co v. United States
...145 F. 1007, 1012, likewise decided before the amendment; Dye v. United States, 4 Cir., 262 F. 6; United States v. Koenig Coal Co., 270 U.S. 512, 520, 46 S.Ct. 392, 394, 70 L.Ed. 709. 15 Southern Pacific Terminal Co. v. Interstate Commerce Commission, 219 U.S. 498, 31 S.Ct. 279, 55 L.Ed. 31......
-
State v. PRINCE
...118 P.2d 280;State v. Nance, 32 N.M. 158, 252 P. 1002; Commonwealth v. Barney, 115 Ky. 475, 74 S.W. 181. United States v. P. Koenig Coal Co., 270 U.S. 512, 46 S.Ct. 392, 70 L.Ed. 709. Every accused who, over the past quarter of a century, approximately, has served time following conviction ......
-
Coming to terms with strict and liberal construction.
...maritime liability statute because that would "result in a frustration of the purpose of the Act"); United States v. P. Koenig Coal Co., 270 U.S. 512, 520 (1926) ("The general rule that criminal statutes are to be strictly construed has no application when the general purpose of the legisla......