Interstate Commerce Commission v. Union Pacific Railroad Company/Opinion of the Court

United States Supreme Court

222 U.S. 541

Interstate Commerce Commission  v.  Union Pacific Railroad Company

 Argued: October 18 and 19, 1911. --- Decided: January 9, 1912

These appeals raise the single question as to whether, in making the 45-cent rate, the Commission acted within or beyond its power. As the statute makes its finding prima facie correct (Cincinnati, H. & D. R. Co. v. Interstate Commerce Commission, 206 U.S. 154, 51 L. ed. 1000, 27 Sup. Ct. Rep. 648), it will be more convenient to consider the case from the standpoint of the carriers, who first insist that the order was void because made without evidence or finding that the 50-cent rate was unreasonable.

There has been no attempt to make an exhaustive statement of the principle involved, but in cases thus far decided, it has been settled that the orders of the Commission are final unless (1) beyond the power which it could constitutionally exercise; or (2) beyond its statutory power; or (3) based upon a mistake of law. But questions of fact may be involved in the determination of questions of law, so that an order, regular on its face, may be set aside if it appears that (4) the rate is so low as to be confiscatory and in violation of the constitutional prohibition against taking property without due process of law; or (5) if the Commission acted so arbitrarily and unjustly as to fix rates contrary to evidence, or without evidence to support it; or (6) if the authority therein involved has been exercised in such an unreasonable manner as to cause it to be within the elementary rule that the substance, and not the shadow, determines the validity of the exercise of the power. Interstate Commerce Commission v. Illinois C. R. Co. 215 U.S. 470, 54 L. ed. 287, 30 Sup. Ct. Rep. 155; Southern P. Co. v. Interstate Commerce Commission, 219 U.S. 433, 55 L. ed. 283, 31 Sup. Ct. Rep. 288; Interstate Commerce Commission v. Northern P. R. Co. 216 U.S. 544, 54 L. ed. 609, 30Sup. Ct. Rep. 417; Interstate Commerce Commission v. Alabama Midland R. Co. 168 U.S. 146, 174, 42 L. ed. 414, 425, 18 Sup. Ct. Rep. 45.

In determining these mixed questions of law and fact, the court confines itself to the ultimate question as to whether the Commission acted within its power. It will not consider the expediency or wisdom of the order, or whether, on like testimony, it would have made a similar ruling. 'The findings of the Commission are made by law prima facie true, and this court has ascribed to them the strength due to the judgments of a tribunal appointed by law and informed by experience.' Illinois C. R. Co. v. Interstate Commerce Commission, 206 U.S. 441, 51 L. ed. 1128, 27 Sup. Ct. Rep. 700. Its conclusion, of course, is subject to review, but, when supported by evidence, is accepted as final; not that its decision, involving, as it does, so many and such vast public interests, can be supported by a mere scintilla of proof, but the courts will not examine the facts further than to determine whether there was substantial evidence to sustain the order.

2. We proceed, then, to a consideration of the carriers' contention that the order was void because made without any testimony that the 50-cent rate of 1907, to St. Paul, was unreasonable. We find that, as far back as 1893, the rate on fir lumber was reduced to 40 cents, on the theory that after a carrier had been paid for transporting a carload of freight from the East to the West, it was better to haul it back loaded with lumber at 40 cents, thereby earning something, than to take it back empty and get nothing. But if, after the empty-car movement had been reversed, the carrier had to be at the expense of hauling cars empty to the West for the purpose of returning them loaded with lumber at the unremunerative rate of 40 cents, there would be a double loss,-it got nothing for hauling the empty car from St. Paul to the coast, and it derived no profit for hauling it back at the low rate. They contend that this situation, in connection with the enormous increase in the cost of operation, not only justified, but required, an advance over the 40-cent rate. And this view of the testimony seems to have been taken by the two commissioners who dissented. If there was no other evidence, the Commission's order could not be sustained.

But these facts do not stand alone. In the first place there was no appeal from the master's finding that:

'The carriers concede that they are unable to determine the cost of this traffic, in and of itself; and that they are unable to say, with any satisfactory accuracy, whether or not they make a profit upon it; but they have all conceded that, in their judgment, speaking as experts, the lumber traffic has not been confiscatory, and has not been performed for less than cost.' This concession, of course, does not cover the question at issue, but it does fix a starting point. It establishes an important fact in dealing with the difficult question of determining what is a reasonable rate on a particular article. Where the rates as a whole are under consideration, there is a possibility of deciding, with more or less certainty, whether the total earnings afford a reasonable return. But whether the carrier earned dividends or not sheds little light on the question as to whether the rate on a particular article is reasonable. For, if the carrier's total income enables it to declare a dividend, that would not justify an order requiring it to haul one class of goods for nothing, or for less than a reasonable rate. On the other hand, if the carrier earned no dividend, it would not have warranted an order fixing an unreasonably high rate on such article. But the absence of direct testimony that the 50-cent rate was unreasonably high is unimportant. Neither can any specific effect be given to the statement of witnesses that the 40-cent rate was low. The reasonableness of rates cannot be proved by categorical answers, like those given, where a witness may, in terms, testify that the goods were worth so much per pound, or the services worth so much a day. Too many elements are involved in fixing a rate on a particular article, over a particular road, to warrant reliance on such method of proof. The matter has to be determined by a consideration of many facts.

In this case the Commission had before it many witnesses and volumes of reports, statistics, and estimates, including the rates on lumber charged by other roads, and those charged by these carriers on other classes of freight. There was evidence that during the fourteen years when the forty-cent rate was in force, the carriers had, by proper management and without wasteful economies, kept their properties in a high state of efficiency, and after paying all the costs of operation, maintenance, depreciation, fixed charges, and sinking funds, had been able to pay reasonable dividends.

There was evidence as to the value of the road, the amounts expended in betterments and paid out in dividends, ratio between the increased earnings and increased expenses, with many tables and estimates tending to show the cost of hauling empty cars, fully loaded cars, and those carrying an average load.

With that sort of evidence before them, rate experts of acknowledged ability and fairness, and each acting independently of the other, may not have reached identically the same conclusion. We do not know whether the results would have been approximately the same. For there is no possibility of solving the question as though it were a mathematical problem to which there could only be one correct answer. Still there was in this mass of facts that out of which experts could have named a rate. The law makes the Commission's finding on such facts conclusive. There was then, under the statute, nothing for the companies to do except to comply with the order, or act on the suggestion thrown out in the Commission's answer, and apply for a rehearing, in reliance upon its power and duty to modify its order if the new evidence warranted such change.

3. When the bills were filed, the carriers insisted that the order was the result of a mistake of law, in that the Commission held that the long maintenance of the 40-cent rate raised a presumption that it was reasonable, because the carriers had been earning a reasonable profit. But we need not consider whether, under such circumstances, the maintenance of the admittedly low rate raised any presumption of reasonableness; or, if so, whether it is not neutralized by the presumption of right conduct by the carrier as primary rate maker (Interstate Commerce Commission v. Chicago G. W. R. Co. 209 U.S. 119, 52 L. ed. 712, 28 Sup. Ct. Rep. 493). For whatever influenced the Commission in restoring the rates to the Pembina line, -as to which there is now no appeal,-it is evident that, as to points east of that line, they did not act on any presumption that the old 40-cent rate was reasonable. On the contrary, they acted directly contrary to any such presumption, and instead of maintaining the old rate, allowed a new and higher rate to St. Paul, permitting an advance of 5 cents per hundred, or 12 1/2 per cent, or between $500,000 and $1,000,000 per annum, to the Great Northern road alone.

4. And this brings us to a consideration of the master's finding, approved by the circuit court, that in fixing a rate of 45 cents to St. Paul, the order on its face was void, because, with traffic conditions over the three roads practically the same, the Commission allowed the high rate of 50 cents to the short road and the law rate of 45 cents to the long route. It was argued that when the Commission had adjudged that a rate of 50 cents for 1,800 miles was reasonable, it was manifestly unreasonable to allow a rate of 45 cents for 2,052 miles, and that such order was so palpably unjust and unreasonable as to be beyond the substance, if not beyond the form, of the Commission's power.

It does not follow, as a matter of law, that rates should be the same for the same distance over two different roads, and this would be especially true if the cost of transportation was greater over the Union Pacific than over the Northern lines, because it crossed the mountains 2,000 feet higher than they.

But, with the master's finding that traffic conditions were practically the same, it might be that the order would appear unreasonable on its face, if it fixed the high rate over the short route, and the low rate, with less revenue per ton, per mile, over the long route. But the order cannot be considered by itself alone. It must be read in the light of the entire record, including the important fact that the carriers themselves, difference between the long and the difference between the ong and the short line. By their own tariffs they clearly show that they did not consider mere distance a controlling factor in fixing the rates now under attack. And this is not exceptional, for it appears that they make rates from basing points to common points, with the result that two cars of lumber, of the same weight, may be shipped from the same place, over the same line, at the same rate, to different points, although the distance one car is hauled may be several hundred miles greater than the other.

But the fact that the carriers themselves, in 1893, 1901, and 1907, charged more to Omaha than to St. Paul, is a much weightier fact in considering this attack on the order. In making the difference between these two cities the Commission only did what the carriers themselves had done, under their old and new rates. After 1901, the rate to Omaha was 50 cents and the rate to St. Paul, over the longer route, was 40 cents. In the 1907 tariff, now under consideration, the rate to Omaha, over the short route, was fixed by them at 55 cents; and that to St. Paul, for the longer route, was fixed at 50 cents. This was a difference of 5 cents in favor of the short route. The Commission made the same difference in favor of the same road.

This difference is supported by what the record shows as to rates to points on the Pembina line. Inasmuch as no appeal was taken from the refusal to enjoin their restoration, we may assume that all parties admit these rates to be reasonable. But there was a difference as to rates to points on this line which shows that the per mile ratio cannot be regarded as a necessary standard. For example, the rate to Omaha, on the lower part of this line, was 50 cents, while the rate to points on the northern end was 40 cents. This was a difference of 20 per cent in favor of Omaha, although there was no such difference in the distance. Again, timber shipped from the coast to St. Paul passed through this 40-cent point on the northern end of the Pembina line. The distance from the coast to St. Paul was one-eighth greater, and the advance allowed was one eighth, or 5 cents, over the 40-cent rate.

It is quite true that the carriers may do what they could not be compelled to do. But it is not to be assumed that they made and continued these different rates between these two cities arbitrarily and without reason. It was proper for the Commission to consider the weight and the character of these reasons and the causes which prompted and justified the carriers in charging these different rates. When the Commission maintained the same ratio of difference as that made by the carriers themselves, it cannot be fairly said that such an order was so arbitrary as to be palpably and gravely unjust, and beyond the substance, if not the form, of its power.

5. A final point remains to be considered, although it involves an issue not presented by the pleadings, not included in the master's report, and not passed on by the circuit court. It is, however, argued that on this appeal the record may be searched and the decree affirmed because, in making its order, the Commission was influenced solely by a consideration of the effect of the advance in rates on the lumber industry.

It does appear that the lumber men, in their complaints before the Commission, alleged that the advanced rates were unreasonable; and, approved on the theory that the injurious effect on their business would sustain that contention, they alleged that the new rate would destroy the lumber industry. Issue seems to have been joined on both propositions, and there were mutual criminations and recriminations of prosperity,-the lumber men insisting that the railroads had made large profits under the old rate, and did not need the advance, which would destroy the ability of the lumber men to ship lumber to the East.

The carriers, on the other hand, contended that the 40-cent rate had opened up new markets and developed the lumber business to a point where it had become enormously profitable, and would continue so under the advanced rates, because white pine had practically disappeared from the market, and that the increased price of lumber more than made up for the increased cost of timber and labor.

It is true, also, that the Commission examined into the effect of the old and the new rate on carrier and lumber men alike. But we do not find that it made the order because of the effect on the lumber industry. In the Willamette Case (219 U.S. 445, 55 L. ed. 287, 31 Sup. Ct. Rep. 288), counsel for the mill men admitted that the rate there under attack was reasonable in and of itself, but insisted that statements of officers and action of the carrier operated to estop the road from raising a low rate up to a reasonable rate.

Nothing of the sort is found here. The rates were attacked as unreasonable, and, on evidence already referred to, the Commission found that the old rates to the Pembina line were reasonable and could not be changed, but that there might be a reasonable increase to points east of that line, not to exceed 5 cents.

While there is language in the opinion which, looked at alone, might suggest that the Commission was attempting to decide more than the single question as to what was a reasonable rate, yet, taking the opinion as a whole, it affirmatively appears that the Commission confined itself to the exercise of its statutory powers to fix rates. In its opinion it did discuss the issue of prosperity presented by mill men and carriers alike, but held that -

' . . . This controversy cannot be determined wholly upon the ground that complainants have injoyed the lower rate for many years, and that interests have been built up thereunder, and that loss of business investments, profits, and markets will result under the increased rates. It must be determined on the justness or reasonableness of the rates in controversy. . . . If the old rates were too low to be just and reasonable, complainants [mill men] cannot urge their loss as a ground for maintaining them; if the old rates were just and reasonable, the defendants cannot justify the advance on the ground of the prosperity of the lumber business.'

Considering the case as a whole, we cannot say that the order was made because of the effect of the advance on the lumber industry; nor because of a mistake of law as to presumption arising from the long continuance of the low rate, when the carrier was earning dividends; nor that there was no evidence to support the finding. If so, the Commission acted within its power, and, in view of the statute, its lawful orders cannot be enjoined. The decree, therefore, must be reversed.

Notes