United States v. Berger

66 F. Supp. 950, 11 Alaska 137, 1946 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2456
CourtDistrict Court, D. Alaska
DecidedJune 28, 1946
DocketNo. A-3132
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 66 F. Supp. 950 (United States v. Berger) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, D. Alaska primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Berger, 66 F. Supp. 950, 11 Alaska 137, 1946 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2456 (D. Alaska 1946).

Opinion

DIMOND, District Judge.

Trial on the merits was had, and at the conclusion thereof the Court granted motion of plaintiffs for an instructed verdict. That verdict finds that plaintiffs are entitled to recover from defendants $5,570.67 with interest thereon at the rate of 6% per annum from January 6, 1940. Motion for new trial has been argued and submitted.

This is an action on an injunction bond given by the defendants, Berger, as principal, and Wells, Irvin and McDonald, as sureties, in a suit (No. A-1053) hereinafter referred to as the first suit, brought in this Court in 1938, in which Berger was plaintiff, and Ohlson and Cunningham, individually and as general manager and acting general manager, respectively, of the Alaska Railroad, named as plaintiffs herein, were defendants. The body of the bond reads as follows:

“Whereas, the plaintiff above-named has commenced a suit in the above-entitled Court against the defendants above-named and has made application to the Court for a temporary injunction against the said defendants, enjoining them and restraining them from the commission of certain acts, particularly set forth and described in the complaint on file in said suit, and the Court having, on the 3rd day of June, 1938, issued the temporary injunction prayed for in said complaint on condition that the plaintiff post a good and sufficient undertaking in the amount of $7,500.00, to be approved by the Clerk of the District Court;
“Now therefore, we, the undersigned, residents and householders in the City of Anchorage, Alaska, in consideration of the issuance of said temporary injunction, do hereby, jointly and severally undertake, in the sum of Seventy-five hundred Dollars ($7,500.00), and promise to the effect that the said plaintiff will pay to the parties enjoined in such damages, not exceeding the amount of this undertaking, as such parties may sustain by reason of the said temporary injunction, if the Court finally decides that the plaintiff was not entitled thereto.”

The bond was furnished to make effective the temporary injunction granted by the Court, and that injunction restrained and enjoined Ohlson and Cunningham from interfering with Berger’s use of the City Dock, the roadway leading thereto, Berger’s lighterage operations over said dock, and, in an all inclusive command, “from the acts complained of in the plaintiff’s complaint herein.”

So we are forced to look at the complaint, in which we find Berger asserting that Ohlson and Cunningham “demanded * * * wharfage for cargo coming over the said City Dock and the ground adjacent thereto” (Emphasis supplied.)

Thereafter, this Court, in its final decision, (findings o-f fact and conclusions of law) held that the defendants Ohlson and Cunningham in that cause, had the right, [952]*952as representing the United States Government, “to charge the equivalent of wharf-age for use of uplands owned by the United States,” and “That the plaintiff had and has no right to use the roadway over the Alaska Railroad Terminal Reserve leading from the wharf in question to the Alaska Railroad right of way,” and, further, “That the preliminary injunction * * * be dissolved” and the prayed for “permanent injunction * * * be refused.”

Berger appealed from the judgment of this Court to the United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which affirmed the judgment of the District Court and held that the United States had the right to forbid the use of the City Dock by Berger.

The decision of the District Court, thus "affirmed by the Circuit Court of Appeals, dissolving the injunction was in legal effect, a decision that all of the signers of the bond, namely, all of the defendants in this action, had become liable on the bond. Thereupon, this current action was brought and-the plaintiffs now seek to recover from the defendants the sum above mentioned.

The only matters in dispute in this case are stated in Paragraphs XIII, XX and XXII of plaintiffs’ complaint wherein it is alleged that on May 25, 1938, Cunningham had demanded of Berger wharfage charges on cargo “then moving over said ‘City Dodd and the grounds adjacent thereto * * * at the rates published by the Interstate Commerce Commission, effective at that time for docks and wharves of the Alaska Railroad at Anchorage, Alaska;” that between June 22, 1938 and May 6, 1940, “Berger landed and moved cargo - on and across said ‘City Dock’ and the lands adjacent thereto, all being within said ‘Alaska Railroad Terminal Reserve’ and without paying wharfage thereon” and subject to wharfage charges in the total sum of $5,627.02; and that 'such charges are unpaid.

The granting of motion for instructed verdict was deemed necessary to conform with the views of the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit expressed in its opinion in the first suit (120 F.2d 56), and by the same Court on the former appeal of the instant case by the government from an order of dismissal (9 Cir., 150 F. 2d 56), and the logical conclusions to be drawn from those views. That such action is entirely in harmony with the former decision of this Court in the first suit, is amply indicated by the above quotations from that decision.

The genesis of this action may best be shown by quoting from the opinion of the Circuit Court of Appeals in the first suit (9 Cir., 120 F.2d 56, 57, 58) as follows:

“This is a suit by appellant against appellees to enjoin them from preventing him from discharging cargo over the ‘City Dock’ near Anchorage, Alaska, and hauling it to the city over a roadway across land owned by the government, without the payment of wharfage fees claimed by appellees, O. F. Ohlson, general manager, and J. T. Cunningham, as acting general manager, of the government owned and operated Alaska Railroad. This dock is located on the south side of Ship Creek, a small tidal stream which empties into Knik Arm at the head of Cook Inlet, which connects with the Gulf of Alaska.

“Appellant is engaged in transporting goods by water from Seattle to Anchorage. For some time he has been using small boats (carrying 70 to 118 tons) discharging over the ‘City Dock’, but recently has undertaken to use larger boats (carrying 1,000 tons) lightering the cargo to the City Dock.

“The defendants have not objected to the use of the City Dock for discharging small boats but in using larger boats and lightering cargo to the City Dock appellant seriously competes with the Alaska Railroad, which is also engaged in transporting goods from Seattle to Anchorage. The Railroad’s service between these cities is maintained through its connection with water transportation at Seward. Goods are brought from Seattle to Seward by water and carried from Seward to Anchorage by rail. To -overcome this competition appellees demanded wharfage from plaintiff for the use of the City Dock according to the rates fixed for the use of the Railroad docks at Anchorage.

[953]*953“In May, 1938, while appellant was engaged in landing a cargo of building materials at the City Dock, the roadway from the dock to Anchorage, for which these materials were destined, was blocked by appellees by placing coal cars on the railroad tracks across the roadway to enforce payment of the wharfage fees prescribed by the railroad’s terminal tariff applicable to the wharves of the railroad at Anchorage.

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Bluebook (online)
66 F. Supp. 950, 11 Alaska 137, 1946 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2456, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-berger-akd-1946.