CONSTITUTIONAL LAW - DUE PROCESS - REGULATION OF THE BUSINESS OF THE CONTRACT MOTOR CARRIER

Authors

Abstract

Much of the doubt and uncertainty concerning the power of the States to regulate the contract motor carrier has been dispelled by the recent decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Stephenson et al. v. Binford et al. A Texas statute specifically defined the two categories of common and contract carriers for hire and undertook to regulate the business of each through the agency of the State Railroad Commission; the statute required contract carriers to secure "permits" which were to be granted by the commission only after a hearing and not if the commission were of the opinion "that the proposed operation of any such contract carrier would impair the efficient public service of any authorized common carrier or common carriers then adequately serving the same territory"; the statute authorized the commission to prescribe rules and regulations governing the operation of contract carriers in competition with common carriers over the highways, and to prescribe minimum rates for such contract carriers which should not be less than the rates prescribed for common carriers for substantially the same service. Plaintiff Stephenson, a private contract carrier, brought suit to enjoin enforcement of the act on the ground that it denied him due process and equal protection of the laws contrary to the guarantee of the Fourteenth Amendment. A three-judge court denied the plaintiff an injunction, and the Supreme Court on appeal affirmed that decision.

Recommended Citation

CONSTITUTIONAL LAW - DUE PROCESS - REGULATION OF THE BUSINESS OF THE CONTRACT MOTOR CARRIER, 31 Mich. L. Rev. 395 (1933).
Available at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mlr/vol31/iss3/9