Barrett v. New York/Opinion of the Court

by Charles Evans Hughes

United States Supreme Court

232 U.S. 14

Barrett  v.  New York

 Argued: December 3 and 4, 1913. --- Decided: January 5, 1914

This suit was brought to restrain the enforcement against the Adams Express Company of a group of ordinances of the Board of Aldermen of the city of New York, upon the ground that, as applied to that company, these ordinances constitute an unconstitutional interference with interstate commerce and deny to it the equal protection of the laws. The ordinances are contained in chapter 7 of the Code of Ordinances adopted in the year 1906, as amended (Cosby's ed. 1911), and the material sections, together with portions of the context, are set forth in the margin.

The chapter relates to specified businesses in which no one is permitted to engage except under an annual license granted by the mayor and revocable by him. Among these is the business of 'expressmen' (§§ 305, 306). It is provided that no person is to be licensed 'except a citizen of the United States, or one who has regularly declared intention to become a citizen' (§ 307). The license fee is 'for each express wagon,' $5, and 'for each driver of any licensed vehicle,' 50 cents, with provision for renewal at one-half these rates (§ 308). Every person driving a licensed 'express' is to be 'licensed as such driver, and every application for such license shall be indorsed, in writing, by two reputable residents of the city of New York, testifying to the competence of the applicant' (§ 315). Every vehicle 'kept or used for the conveyance of baggage, packages, parcels, and other articles within or throught the city of New York for pay' is to be deemed a public express (§ 330). It is to bear a designation according with its official number (§ 331). Its owner is to give a bond to the state for 'every vehicle licensed in a penal sum of $100, with sufficient surety, approved by the mayor or chief of the Bureau of Licenses, conditioned for the safe and prompt delivery' of all articles (§ 332). Provision is also made for the regular inspection of 'all licensed vehicles and places of business' (§ 374), the report of any change of residence to the Bureau of Licenses (id. the exhibition of licenses upon demand (§ 375), and the display of the prescribed letters and numbers (§ 376). Penalties are provided for the violation of these requirements, and any person carrying on any business regulated by the ordinance, without license, is guilty of a misdemeanor (§§ 307, 315, 379).

The Adams Express Company, an unincorporated association organized under the laws of New York, has been engaged in interstate commerce, as a common carrier of packages, since the year 1854. It transacts its business in many states; and in the city of New York it handles daily about 50,000 interstate shipments, employing 341 wagons and 68 automobiles. About one half of these wagons are stabled in Jersey City. Its shipments from New York City to the south and west are hauled to Jersey City and there loaded on express cars of the Pennsylvania Railroad; those destined to points east are taken to the terminal in New York city of the New York, New Haven, & Hartford Railroad; and there is also traffic for points on the New York, Ontario, & Western Railroad, and tributary thereto, which is carried to the terminal of that road at Weehawken, New Jersey. Shipments received from out of the state for delivery in New York city are taken by the company's vehicles to the consignees either directly from these railroad terminals or through intermediate distributing offices. The company also does a local business in the city of New York, and, in addition, receives packages for transportation between that city and such points within the state of New York as are on the line of the New York, New Haven, & Hartford Railroad. The interstate business, however, in the number of packages, comprises 98 per cent of the total business transacted in New York city, and, it being impracticable to effect a separation, the local and the other intrastate shipments are handled in the same vehicles, and by the same men, that are employed in connection with the interstate transportation. It was not until recently that the city sought to compel the company, in the transaction of this business, to comply with its license ordinances, although there have been ordinances requiring licenses for both express wagons and their drivers for over fifty years (Kent's ed. [1856]; Valentine's ed. [1859] pp. 374, 375; Shepard & Shafer's ed. [1881] §§ 380-386; Laird's ed. [1894] §§ 380-386; Percy & Collins's ed. §§ 497-504). The provisions here involved (except § 315) received their present form in 1899. (Ord. app. May 22, 1899, ante, p. 25 note.) It is conceded that the company has never been compelled to obtain a license for the conduct of its interstate express business, and that its wagons and drivers employed therein have never been licensed, except 'that for several years last past about fourty licenses for wagons and drivers have been taken out.' The evidence shows that in 1908 an arrangement was made, by way of compromise, that the forty licenses should be issued (twenty having been taken out the year before). The company agreed to this number, without prejudice, asserting that it was larger in proportion to the total number of wagons than the local business warranted, and also that the latter was merely incidental to the interstate business, and hence not subject to the license requirements. In the fall of 1910, however, at a time when the business of the company was interrupted by a strike of its drivers, and it was endeavoring to replace those who had stopped work, the city, through its officers, undertook to enforce the ordinances with respect to all the wagons and drivers of the company, threatening to arrest unlicensed drivers of unlicensed wagons notwithstanding they might be engaged in interstate transportation, and to remove, if necessary, unlicensed wagons from the streets. This was the occasion of the present suit.

The circuit court held that §§ 305 and 306 were inoperative so far as they purported to require the complainant to obtain a local license for transacting its interstate business, and further, that the requirement of licenses as to express automobiles and chauffeurs had been superseded by a state statute (Laws of 1910, chap. 374). To this extent the city and its officers, who were codefendants, were enjoined. But with respect to the payment of license fees for express wagons and drivers, and the other regulations which we have briefly described, the court held that the enactments were valid and an injunction was refused. 189 Fed. 268. Both parties appeal, the company insisting that it was entitled to the entire relief sought, and the city, that no relief whatever should have been granted.

In restraining the enforcement of §§ 305 and 306, as stated, we think that the court was right. In the absence of a controlling state decision construing the group of ordinances in question and the statute authorizing the city to license businesses (Greater New York charter, § 51), we are not satisfied that they were designed, despite the broad definition contained in § 330, to apply to interstate business. The practical construction which they received before the present controversy arose is very persuasive to the contrary (New York City v. New York City R. Co. 193 N. Y. 543, 549, 86 N. E. 565; United States v. Cerecedo Hermanos y Compa nia, 209 U.S. 338, 339, 52 L. ed. 821, 822, 28 Sup. Ct. Rep. 532.) But, if the above-mentioned sections are to be deemed to require that a license must be obtained as a condition precedent to conducting the interstate business of an express company, we are of the opinion that, so construed, they would be clearly unconstitutional. It is insisted that, under the authority of the state, the ordinances were adopted in the exercise of the police power. But that does not justify the imposition of a direct burden upon interstate commerce. Undoubtedly, the exertion of the power essential to assure needed protection to the community may extend incidentally to the operations of a carrier in its interstate business, provided it does not subject that business to unreasonable demands and is not opposed to Federal legislation. Smith v. Alabama, 124 U.S. 465, 31 L. ed. 508, 1 Inters. Com. Rep. 804, 8 Sup. Ct. Rep. 564; Hennington v. Georgia, 163 U.S. 299, 41 L. ed. 166, 16 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1086; New York, N. H. & H. R. Co. v. New York, 165 U.S. 628, 41 L. ed. 853, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 418; Lake Shore & M. S. R. Co. v. Ohio, 173 U.S. 285, 43 L. ed. 702, 19 Sup. Ct. Rep. 465. It must, however, be confined to matters which are appropriately of local concern. It must proceed upon the recognition of the right secured by the Federal Constitution. Local police regulations cannot go so far as to deny the right to engage in interstate commerce, or to treat it as a local privilege, and prohibit its exercise in the absence of a local license. Crutcher v. Kentucky, 141 U.S. 47, 35 L. ed. 649, 652, 11 Sup. Ct. Rep. 851; Robbins v. Taxing Dist. 120 U.S. 489, 496, 30 L. ed. 694, 697, 1 Inters. Com. Rep. 45, 7 Sup. Ct. Rep. 592; Leloup v. Mobile, 127 U.S. 640, 645, 32 L. ed. 311, 313, 2 Inters. Com. Rep. 134, 8 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1380; Stoutenburgh v. Hennick, 129 U.S. 141, 148, 32 L. ed. 637, 639, 9 Sup. Ct. Rep. 256; Rearick v. Pennsylvania, 203 U.S. 507, 51 L. ed. 295, 27 Sup. Ct. Rep. 159; International Text Book Co. v. Pigg, 217 U.S. 91, 109, 54 L. ed. 678, 686, 27 L.R.A.(N.S.) 493, 30 Sup. Ct. Rep. 481, 18 Ann. Cas. 1103; West v. Kansas Natural Gas Co. 221 U.S. 229, 260, 55 L. ed. 716, 728, 35 L.R.A. (N.S.) 1193, 31 Sup. Ct. Rep. 564; Buck's Store & Range Co. v. Vickers, 226 U.S. 205, 215, 57 L. ed. 189, 192, 33 Sup. Ct. Rep. 41; Crenshaw v. Arkansas, 227 U.S. 389, 57 L. ed. 565, 33 Sup. Ct. Rep. 294; Minnesota Rate Cases (Simpson v. Shepard), 230 U.S. 352, 401, 57 L. ed. 1511, 1542, 33 Sup. Ct. Rep. 729. As was said by this court in Crutcher v. Kentucky, supra, 'a state law is unconstitutional and void which requires a party to take out a license for carrying on interstate commerce, no matter how specious the pretext may be for imposing it.'

The requirements of §§ 305 and 306, with the schedule of fees in § 308, cannot be regarded as imposing a fee, or tax, for the use of the streets; if they were such, the question would at once arise as to the validity of the discrimination involved in such an exaction. Nor can they be considered as a regulation in the interest of safety in street traffic. Other ordinances provide for the 'rules of the road' to which wagons of express companies, as well as those of other persons, are subject (Code of Ordinances, chap. 12). The sections now under consideration constitute a regulation of the express 'business.' Article I. is entitled, 'Business Requiring a License;' § 305, containing the enumeration, provides that 'the following businesses must be duly licensed;' and § 306, that 'no person shall engage in or carry on any such business without a license therefor' under a stated penalty (ante, p. 24, note). The right of public control, in requiring such a license, is asserted by virtue of the character of the employment; but while such a requirement may be proper in the case of local or intrastate business, it cannot be justified as a prerequisite to the conduct of the business that is interstate. Not only is the latter protected from the action of the state, either directly or through its municipalities, in laying direct burdens upon it, but, in the present instance, Congress has exercised its authority and has provided its own scheme of regulation in order to secure the discharge of the public obligations that the business involves. Act of June 29, 1906, chap. 3591, 34 Stat. at L. 584, U.S.C.omp. Stat. Supp. 1911, p. 1288; Adams Exp. Co. v. Croninger, 226 U.S. 491, 505, 57 L. ed. 314, 319, 44 L.R.A. 257, 33 Sup. Ct. Rep. 148; United States v. Adams Exp. Co. 229 U.S. 381, 57 L. ed. 1237, 33 Sup. Ct. Rep. 878.

It would seem to follow, necessarily, that the annual license fees prescribed by § 308 (ante, p. 25, note) cannot be exacted, so far as the interstate business is concerned. They cannot be regarded as coming within the category of inspection fees, which are sustained when fairly commensurate with the cost of local supervision of such matters as are under local control (Western U. Teleg. Co. v. New Hope, 187 U.S. 419, 425, 47 L. ed. 240, 243, 23 Sup. Ct. Rep. 204; Atlantic & P. Teleg. Co. v. Philadelphia, 190 U.S. 160, 164, 47 L. ed. 995, 1000, 23 Sup. Ct. Rep. 817). The provisions of § 308 are inseparably connected with those of §§ 305 and 306. The sums fixed 'for each express wagon' and 'for each driver' measure the amount to be exacted for the granting of the license required for the carrying on of business. And it is difficult to see how the payment can be enforced as to the interstate business if the taking out of the license therefor cannot be compelled.

Similar considerations are controlling with respect to the provision of § 332 for the giving of license bonds. This in terms is related to the requirement of § 305. It is provided that a bond shall be given 'for each and every vehicle licensed,' and it is to be conditioned 'for the safe and prompt delivery of all baggage, packages,' etc., intrusted to the owner or driver 'of any such licensed express.' As applied to the company's business of interstate transportation, it must fall with the provision regarding the license, and, further, it must be regarded as repugnant to the exclusive control asserted by Congress in occupying the field of regulation with regard to the obligations to be assumed by interstate express carriers. Adams Exp. Co. v. Croninger, supra; Southern R. Co. v. Reid, 222 U.S. 424, 56 L. ed. 257, 32 Sup. Ct. Rep. 140; Southern R. Co. v. Reid, 222 U.S. 444, 447, 56 L. ed. 263, 264, 32 Sup. Ct. Rep. 145.

Section 315 provides for separate licenses for drivers. We may assume the propriety of suitable provision to insure careful driving over the city streets, and the existence of ample power to meet this local necessity. It is also clear that regulations for this purpose, when the movement of interstate traffic is involved, should be entirely reasonable and should not arbitrarily restrict the facilities upon which it must depend. If the provision of § 315 could be regarded as severable from the requirement of a license for the conduct of business, we should still have great difficulty in sustaining it as a reasonable regulation with regard to drivers employed in the interstate transportation which has been described. Reading § 315 in connection with § 307, as we understand the city contends it should be read, no driver can be licensed except a citizen of the United States, or one who has regularly declared intention to become a citizen, and the assurance of his qualifications does not depend simply upon the applicant's ability to meet appropriate tests so as to satisfy the official judgment, but the application must be accompanied by the indorsement in writing of two reputable residents of the city testifying to his competence. When the importance to the entire country of promptness and facility in the conduct of the business of the express companies in New York City, and the obvious convenience of their being able to secure drivers in Jersey City as well as in New York, are considered, the provision would seem to be unnecessarily burdensome. We are not called upon, however, to decide this point. Section 315 relates exclusively to drivers of a 'licensed hack or express.' There is no such provision as to drivers of wagons generally. While the driver's license is separate, the ordinance refers only to such drivers as are employed in the business for the carrying on of which a license may be required. Whatever might otherwise be the city's power as to the regulation of drivers, this provision cannot be divorced from the license scheme of which it is a part.

Other requirements, such as the marking of the vehicles with their official numbers, the exhibition of licenses upon demand, and the inspection of 'licensed vehicles and places of business' have obvious reference to the same license plan.

We conclude that the complainant was entitled to an injunction restraining the enforcement of the ordinances in question against the company with respect to the conduct of its interstate business and its wagons and drivers employed in interstate commerce. In this view it is unnecessary to consider whether the ordinances have been superseded, as to automobiles, by the state statute.

The decree of the Circuit Court is reversed and the case is remanded to the District Court, with direction to enter a decree in favor of the complainant in conformity with this opinion.

It is so ordered.

Notes