United States v. Philadelphia & R. Ry. Co.

232 F. 946, 1916 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1705
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. Pennsylvania
DecidedMay 26, 1916
DocketNo. 18
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 232 F. 946 (United States v. Philadelphia & R. Ry. Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Philadelphia & R. Ry. Co., 232 F. 946, 1916 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1705 (E.D. Pa. 1916).

Opinion

THOMPSON, District Judge.

Indictment No. 18 contains 60 counts. Fifty-nine counts charge the defendant as a common carrier with engaging and participating in interstate transportation of .anthracite coal over a route partly by rail and partly by water without having filed with the Interstate Commerce Commission tariffs showing the rates for the water transportation, and are practically identical in form and substance, except for the changes necessary to identify a different shipment under each count. The sixtieth count charges the defendant with extending to a shipper privileges and facilities in interstate transportation not specified in tariffs filed.

The first count charges:

(1) That the defendant from Otcober 1, 1913, to March 25, 1915, was a common carrier engaged in the transportation of anthracite coal shipped -from divers mines via St. Clair and Schuylkill Haven, Pa., wholly by railroad and waybilled and transported from St. Clair and Schuylkill Haven to Port Richmond Piers, Philadelphia, Pa., another point on its route, where it connected with a barge line known as the Philadelphia & Reading Transportation Dine.

[948]*948(2) That the name “Philadelphia & Reading- Transportation Line” is' applied to a line of barges and tugs operated by the defendant, and that, through the instrumentality of the barge line, the defendant was engaged in the transportation of anthracite coal by water from Port Richmond Piers, Philadelphia, to New England points, including East Cambridge, Mass.

(3) That during the said period the defendant was also engaged in the transportation partly by rail and partly by water in interstate commerce under a common control, management, and arrangement for the continuous carriage and shipment of anthracite coal waybilled and transported from St. Clair and Schuylkill Haven to Port Richmond Piers, Philadelphia, by rail, and thence transported to East Cambridge and other New England points through the instrumentality and by the means of the transportation line by water, and that so it had established during the said period through routes, for the transportation of property in interstate commerce partly by rail and partly by water under a common control, management, or arrangement for a continuous carriage and shipment from St. Clair and Schuylkill Haven, Pa., to- East Cambridge, Mass.

(4) That on December 3, 1913, the defendant engaged and participated in transportation as defined by the act to regulate commerce tinder a common control, management,, and arrangement for a continuous carriage and shipment partly by rail and partly by water from St. Clair to East Cambridge of a carload of anthracite coal, which had been transported by the defendant from St. Clair to Port Richmond Piers, Philadelphia, in a railway car initialed “P. & R.” and numbered “31719,” and was at Port Richmond Piers, Philadelphia, dumped by the defendant from the said car into a barge known as the “Coleraine,” by transporting the coal in the said barge over its water route from Port Richmond Piers to East Cambridge at some rate and charge, the amount of which is to the grand jury unknown, and this without the rate and charge or any rate and charge for the water transportation service having been filed with the Interstate Commerce Commission, that is to say, without the defendant or any other person or corporation having filed with the commission any schedules showing any separately established rate or charge, any joint rate or charge, or any evidence of concurrence by the defendant in or acceptance of any rate or charge applicable, or, by the defendant applied jointly, to such rail and water transportation, or separately to such water part of such through transportation of the property by means of the barge line. That the property then and there was anthracite coal consigned by the Philadelphia & Reading Coal & Iron Company to Metropolitan Coal Company at East Cambridge.

The defendant demurs for the following reasons:

(a) Because it is not averred in the indictment that the carload of coal in question was consigned at the point of origin as a continuous shipment for continuous carriage over a through route partly by rail and partly by water to the point of destination at the terminus of the water part of the transportation, but it is averred, on the contrary, that the carload of coal was waybilled from St. Clair, Pa., to Port Richmond [949]*949Piers, Pa., and there is no averment that it was waybilled from St. Clair to East Cambridge.

(b) That there is no averment that the carload in question moved either as a continuous shipment or on a through consignment over,a through route at the direction of the consignor or consignee by rail to Port Richmond Piers, and thence to East Cambridge by means of the barge line operated by the defendant, and without passing into the possession or custody of cither the consignor or consignee at Port Richmond Piers, the point of transshipment.

(c) That it is not averred in the indictment that the question whether the defendant should file tariffs for the barge line rates has been submitted to and passed upon by the Interstate Commerce Commission.

[1, 2] The question is whether the pleader has set out in the indictment, with certainty and particularity, all of the essential facts which it would be necessary to prove in order to convict. In testing the sufficiency, certainty, and particularity with which it is undertaken to charge an offense, the pleader cannot be helped by implication or in-tendment.

It is alleged that during the period in question the defendant war engaged in the transportation of anthracite coal partly by rail and partly by water in interstate commerce under a common control, management, and arrangement for continuous carriage and shipment of coal waybilled and transported from St. Clair to Port Richmond Piers by rail, and thence transported to East Cambridge through the instrumentality and by means of the barge line, and so had established through routes for such transportation.

The fact that the defendant was a carrier in interstate commerce over through routes part rail and part water is not sufficient to establish the fact that the certain carloads involved in this indictment were carried in interstate commerce. If, for instance, a shipment were made over the defendant’s road from the coal regions in Pennsylvania to a point in New Jersey to a certain consignee, and that consignee, after delivery, reshipped from the point in New Jersey to another point in New Jersey under a new consignment to a different consignee, the interstate through rate from the coal regions in Pennsylvania to the second point in New Jersey would not apply, but the intrastate rate would apply from the first to the second point in New Jersey. Gulf Colorado & Santa Fé Ry. Co. v. Texas, 204 U. S. 403, 27 Sup. Ct. 360, 51 L. Ed. 540; Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Ry. Co. v. Iowa, 233 U. S. 334, 34 Sup. Ct. 592, 58 L. Ed. 988; Pennsylvania R. Co. v. Mitchell Coal & Coke Co., 238 U. S. 251, 35 Sup. Ct. 787, 59 L. Ed. 1293.

The facts and circumstances set out applying to the specific shipments under each count must be examined to determine whether an interstate shipment is sufficiently stated.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

State v. Louisville & Nashville Railroad
398 So. 2d 291 (Supreme Court of Alabama, 1981)
Ex Parte Louisville & NR Co.
398 So. 2d 291 (Supreme Court of Alabama, 1981)
Kearns Coal Co. v. City of Knoxville
191 S.W.2d 183 (Tennessee Supreme Court, 1945)
Southern Pacific Co. v. State
165 P. 303 (Arizona Supreme Court, 1917)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
232 F. 946, 1916 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1705, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-philadelphia-r-ry-co-paed-1916.