Henry Billings Brown

“ The party rate ticket, as it appears in this case, is a single ticket covering the transportation of 10 or more persons, and would be much less available in the hands of a tieket broker than an ordinary single ticket, since it could only be disposed of to a person who would be willing to pay two thirds of the regular fare for that number of people. It is possible to conceive that party rate tickets may, by a reduction of the number for whom they may be issued, be made the pretext for evading the law, and for the purpose of cutting rates ”

“ Even if the same reduced rate be allowed to every one doing the same amount of business, such discrimination may, if carried too far, operate unjustly upon the smaller dealers engaged in the same business, and enable the larger ones to drive them out of the market. ”

“ The unlawfulness defined by sections 2 and 3 consists either in an 'unjust discrimination' or an 'undue or unreasonable preference or advantage,' and the object of section 22 was to settle beyond all doubt that the discrimination in favor of certain persons therein named should not be deemed unjust. It does not follow, however, that there may not be other classes of persons in whose favor a discrimination may be made without such discrimination being unjust. ”

“ Louis Railway Company has the same right to issue them that the defendant has, and may compete with it for the same traffic; but it is unsound to argue that it is unlawful to issue them because it has not seen fit to do so. Certainly its construction of the law is not binding upon this court. The evidence shows that the amount of business done by means of these party rate tickets is very large; that theatrical and operatic companies base their calculation of profits to a certain extent upon the reduced rates allowed by railroads ”

“ The same result, however, does not follow from the sale of a ticket for a number of passengers at a less rate than for a single passenger; it does not operate to the prejudice of the single passenger, who cannot be said to be injured by the fact that another is able in a particular instance to travel at a less rate than he. If it operates injuriously towards any one it is the rival road, which has not adopted corresponding rates ”

“ Indeed, many, if not all, the excepted classes named in section 22 are those which, in the absence of this section, would not necessarily be held the subjects of an unjust discrimination, if more favorable terms were extended to them than to ordinary passengers. Such, for instance, are property of the United States, state, or municipal governments; destitute and homeless persons transported free of charge by charitable societies; indigent persons transported at the expense of municipal governments ”