Edward Douglass White

“ We first dispose of a motion to dismiss. It is based on the proposition that since the court instructed the jury that there was a presumption, which might be rebutted, that the damage to the cattle, if any, occurred on the line of the delivering carrier, that is, the defendant company, the jury might have found for the plaintiff wholly irrespective of the statute, and therefore the judgment rests upon an independent state ground broad enough to sustain it. ”

“ But the want of foundation for the proposition is manifest when it is considered that evidence offered by the defendant which would have a tendency to show that no damage and no delay occurred on its line, and hence tended to rebut the presumption, was excluded from the consideration of the jury by the ruling of the court that the statute imposed upon the defendant the duty to respond to the plaintiff for the negligence of the Southern Railway. ”

“ In that case the constitutionality of the act of Congress known as the Carmack amendment to the act to regulate commerce was considered, the question presented being whether Congress, under its power to regulate commerce, could make an initial carrier liable to the holder of a bill of lading issued by it for a through interstate shipment of property over its own and connecting lines for a loss occurring after the property had been delivered by it to a connecting carrier, and while in the control of such carrier. ”