BRYAN, Circuit Judge.
The appellant railroad carriers published and filed with the Interstate Commerce Commission a rate of 23 cents per hundredweight on tin cans from New Orleans to destination points that included Houston, Tex. While that remained a published rate, appellee shippers were required to pay 70 cents per hundredweight. The shipper in two of these cases brought suit to recover the excess above 23 cents, and in the other the carrier sued to recover a refund of the difference which it had paid to the shipper. The cases were consolidated for trial, as the question in each is the same, and resulted in judgments for the shippers.
The 23-cent rate was published in the tariff schedules by mistake. The carriers intended to continue in force the pre-existing rate of 70 cents. A result of that mistake was to name a rate from New Orleans to Houston less than the rate in effect between intermediate points and Houston, in violation of the long and short haul clause of the In* terstate Commerce Act. 49 USCA § 4(1); Comp. St. § 8566(1).
Appellants -liken a published tariff rate to a contract between the carrier and the shipper in support of the argument that a mistake can be corrected so as to give effect to the intention of the parties. A shipper has no voice in the fixing of rates, but must pay the published rate, and can only make claim of reparation on account of a rate that is unjust or discriminatory. The Supreme Court has held that a published tariff rate is to be treated as though it were a statute binding upon both the carrier and the shipper. Penn. R. R. Co. v. International Coal Co., 230 U. S. 184, 33 S. Ct. 893, 57 L. Ed. 1446, Ann. Cas. 1915A, 315. Section 6 of the Interstate Commerce Aet (49 USCA § 6; Comp. St. § 8569) provides that a carrier shall not charge or receive any different compensation, whether greater or less, than that shown by the file and published schedule of rates. It is well settled by Supreme Court decisions that this provision of law must be strictly complied with because it is necessary to carry out the purpose of Congress to prevent unjust discrimination. Gulf, Colorado & Santa Fé R. R. Co. v. Hefley, 158 U. S. 98, 15 S. Ct. 802, 39 L. Ed. 910; New York, New Haven & Hartford R. Co. v. Interstate Commerce Commission, 200 U. S. 361, 26 S. Ct. 272, 50 L. Ed. 515; T. & P. R. R. Co. v. Mugg, 202 U. S. 242, 26 S. Ct. 628, 50 L. Ed. 1011; L. & N. R. R. Co. v. Mottley, 219 U. S. 467, 31 S. Ct. 265, 55 L. Ed. 297, 34 L. R. A. (N. S.) 671; Keogh v. Chicago & N. W. R. R. Co., 260 U. S. 156, 43 S. Ct. 47, 67 L. Ed. 183. In Lamb-Fish Lumber Co. v. Y. & M. V. R. R. Co., 42 I. C. C. 470, the Interstate Commerce Commission announces the rule that proof of error in the publication of rates does not justify a departure from the published rates, even though shippers have full knowledge that the rates were published by mistake, and that decision was cited with approval by the Supreme Court in Davis v. Portland Seed Co., 264 U. S. 403, 424, 44 S. Ct. 380, 68 L. Ed. 762. The carriers cannot defend by showing that published rates, if enforced, would violate the long and short haul clause* and subject them to penalties. Such a showing would only be evidence of intention indicating that a mistake was made. Because of the policy of the law, the rate must be abided by as long as it is included in published schedules of rates. The remedy of the carriers is to apply to the Interstate Commerce Commission to have the rate changed.
The judgments are affirmed.
What follows is an opinion from a United States Court of Appeals.
Intervenors who participated as parties at the courts of appeals should be counted as either appellants or respondents when it can be determined whose position they supported. For example, if there were two plaintiffs who lost in district court, appealed, and were joined by four intervenors who also asked the court of appeals to reverse the district court, the number of appellants should be coded as six.
In some cases there is some confusion over who should be listed as the appellant and who as the respondent. This confusion is primarily the result of the presence of multiple docket numbers consolidated into a single appeal that is disposed of by a single opinion. Most frequently, this occurs when there are cross appeals and/or when one litigant sued (or was sued by) multiple litigants that were originally filed in district court as separate actions. The coding rule followed in such cases should be to go strictly by the designation provided in the title of the case. The first person listed in the title as the appellant should be coded as the appellant even if they subsequently appeared in a second docket number as the respondent and regardless of who was characterized as the appellant in the opinion.
To clarify the coding conventions, consider the following hypothetical case in which the US Justice Department sues a labor union to strike down a racially discriminatory seniority system and the corporation (siding with the position of its union) simultaneously sues the government to get an injunction to block enforcement of the relevant civil rights law. From a district court decision that consolidated the two suits and declared the seniority system illegal but refused to impose financial penalties on the union, the corporation appeals and the government and union file cross appeals from the decision in the suit brought by the government. Assume the case was listed in the Federal Reporter as follows:
United States of America,
Plaintiff, Appellant
v
International Brotherhood of Widget Workers,AFL-CIO
Defendant, Appellee.
International Brotherhood of Widget Workers,AFL-CIO
Defendants, Cross-appellants
v
United States of America.
Widgets, Inc. & Susan Kuersten Sheehan, President & Chairman
of the Board
Plaintiff, Appellants,
v
United States of America,
Defendant, Appellee.
This case should be coded as follows:Appellant = United States, Respondents = International Brotherhood of Widget Workers Widgets, Inc., Total number of appellants = 1, Number of appellants that fall into the category "the federal government, its agencies, and officials" = 1, Total number of respondents = 3, Number of respondents that fall into the category "private business and its executives" = 2, Number of respondents that fall into the category "groups and associations" = 1.
Your task is to identify the state of the first listed state or local government agency that is an appellant.