Alabama Railway Company v. Journey/Opinion of the Court

On April 30, 1918, Smith Journey sued the Alabama & Vicksburg Railway Company in the circuit court for the second district of Hinds county, Mississippi, for an injury suffered on October 24, 1917. At the time of the accident the railroad was being operated by the company. When suit was brought the railroad was under federal control. The company pleaded in abatement that the plaintiff was not a resident of Hinds county when the alleged injury occurred, and that the alleged cause of action did not arise in the district of the county in which suit was brought. And it set up Order No. 18 of the Director General of Railroads, as amended April 18, 1918, which prohibited the institution of suits against railroads under federal control in the court for any district other than that in which the plaintiff had resided or in which the alleged cause of action arose. A demurrer to the plea was sustained; the plaintiff then recovered a verdict; and the judgment entered thereon was affirmed by the highest court of the state. 122 Miss. 742, 84 South. 706. The case was brought here by writ of error. A petition for a writ of certiorari was also filed and consideration of the latter was postponed until the hearing on the writ of error. It is now granted, and the writ of error is dismissed.

The Supreme Court of Mississippi overruled the plea in abatement on the ground that Order No. 18 exceeded the powers conferred by Congress on the President and by him on the Director General. Whether the state court erred in so holding is the only question before us. That it did err is clear from what we said in Missouri Pacific R. R. Co. v. Ault, 256 U.S. 554, 41 Sup. Ct. 593, 65 L. Ed. 1087, decided since entry of the judgment under review. Section 10 of the Federal Control Act of March 21, 1918, c. 25, 40 Stat. 451, 456 (Comp. St. 1918, Comp. St. Ann. Supp. 1919, § 3115 3/4 j), permitted enforcement of liabilities against carriers while under federal control except 'in so far as may be inconsistent * *  * with any order of the President.' It was within the powers of the Director General to prescribe the venue of suits; and the facts set forth in the order show both the occasion for it and that the venue prescribed was reasonable.

Writ of error dismissed.

Writ of certiorari granted.

Judgment reversed.