Reider v. Thompson/Dissent Frankfurter

by Felix Frankfurter

United States Supreme Court

339 U.S. 113

Reider  v.  Thompson

 Argued: Feb. 7, 1950. --- Decided: March 13, 1950

Mr. Justice FRANKFURTER, dissenting.

The problem presented by this case is whether a shipment which constitutes an organic transaction in commerce between a nonadjacent foreign country and the continental United States for every other aspect of the Interstate Commerce Act should be treated as such for purposes of § 20(11) of that Act, familiarly known as the Carmack Amendment. 49 U.S.C. § 20(11), 49 U.S.C.A. § 20(11). Since I agree with the answer given by the Court of Appeals I ought not to join in reversing its decision.

That court's position is supported by this Court's view of the matter in Missouri Pacific R. Co. v. Porter, 273 U.S. 341, 344, 345, 47 S.Ct. 383, 384, 71 L.Ed. 672, read in the light of the criteria for determining what constitutes a shipment in foreign commerce. See United States v. Erie R. Co., 280 U.S. 98, 50 S.Ct. 51, 74 L.Ed. 187. To be sure, the precise question now here was not the issue in the Porter case. But what was there said as to the scope of the Carmack Amendment in relation to such commerce with a nonadjacent foreign country was relevant to the immediate question in the Porter case considered in its true aspect. In order to decide the precise question of that case the Court had to consider the regulatory scheme of liability under the Interstate Commerce Act in its entirety. The conclusion of the Porter case-that the Carmack Amendment does not apply to an unbroken transaction of commerce with a nonadjacent foreign country-carried the authority of the two Justices, Butler and Brandeis, who between them had had the most comprehensive experience with the working of the Interstate Commerce Act. As Judge Hutcheson indicated in his concurring opinion below, the answer to our problem is not to be had by taking words of the Carmack Amendment out of the illuminating context of the regulatory scheme of which they are a part. A legal faggot ought not to be broken into verbal sticks.

Notes