Wabash, St. Louis & Pacific Railway Co. v. Illinois

Citations

• 118 U.S. 557
• 7 S. Ct. 4
• 30 L. Ed. 244
• 1886 U.S. LEXIS 1950

Syllabus

<p>A statute of Illinois enacts that, if any railroad company shall, within that State, charge or receive for transporting passengers or freight of the same class, the same or a greater sum for any distance than it does for a longer distance, it shall be liable to a penalty for unjust discrimination. The defendant in this case made such discrimination in regard to goods transported over the same road or roads, from Peoria, in Illinois, and from Gilman, in Illinois, to New York; charging more for the same class of goods carried from Gilman than from Peoria, the former being eighty-sis miles nearer to New York than the latter, this difference being in the length of the line within the State of Illinois. Held :</p> <p>(1.) This court follows the Supreme Court of Illinois in holding that the statute of Illinois must be construed to include a transportation of goods under one contract and by one voyage from the interior of the State of Illinois to New York.</p> <p>(2.) This court holds further that such a transportation is “commerce among the States,” even as to that part of the voyage which lies within the State of Illinois, whiie it is not denied that there may be a transportation of goods which is begun and ended within its limits, and disconnected with any carriage outside of the State, which is not commerce among the States.</p> <p>(3.) The latter is subject to regulation by the State, and the statute of Illinois is valid as applied to it. But the former is national in its character, and its regulation is confided to Congress exclusively, by that clause of the Constitution which empowers it to regulate commerce among the States.</p> <p>(4.) The cases of Munn v. Illinois, 94 U. S. 113; Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad, Co. v. Iowa, 94 U. S. 155; and Peik v. Chicago & Northwestern Railway, 94 U. S. 164, examined m regard to this question, and hold, in view of other cases decided near the same time, not to establish a contrary doctrine.</p> <p>(5.) Notwithstanding