Hugo Black

“ I am forced by process of elimination to consider whether the decision reflects either a hostility to the policy of the Act or an unarticulated belief that it is unconstitutional, if enforced as written. ”

“ Senator Foraker of Ohio immediately objected to the broad scope of the Lodge proposal: 'I do not want to make any opposition to the Senator's amendment, but it occurs to me that the amendment ought to be further amended, so as to provide that it shall apply only to pipe lines operated for the public. I do not understand how you could compel a man who has a private pipe line of his own to become a common carrier * * *. ”

“ Champlin, a fully integrated company, produces, refines, transports and markets petroleum products. Through a wholly owned subsidiary it also buys, gathers and transports to its refinery oil produced from the wells of others. [10] Its trunk pipe line extends 516 miles across five states from its refinery at Enid, Oklahoma, to its terminal at Rock Rapids, Iowa. Although application of the Act does not depend on a pipe-line company's size, Champlin is by no means a small company ”

“ No one can be sure that under the Act as now rewritten by the Court the Commission can or should succeed in forcing any oil company-even those now complying with the Act-to carry gasoline or oil for others as a common carrier. ”

“ Like Valvoline, Champlin carries the 'oil of others' all the way from the well to the market area: over half of the oil and gasoline carried by Champlin is originally purchased as crude oil from independent producers in the field before transportation begins. ”

“ Any corporation or any person or persons engaged in the transportation of oil or other commodity, except natural gas or water for municipal purposes, by means of pipe lines, or partly by pipe lines and partly by railroad, or partly by pipe lines and partly by water, who shall be considered and held to be common carriers within the meaning and purpose of this act * * *.' Id. ”

“ Oil is one of the greatest articles of interstate commerce carried in this country, and it is now absolutely outside and beyond any Government regulation whatsoever.' Id. at 6365. Later he added: 'All pipe lines owned by any company within the United States * * * are made common carriers.' Id. at 7001. Senator Clay, speaking about the pipe-line provision, observed: 'This bill makes every corporation engaged in the transmission of oil a common carrier. Every private corporation transmitting its own oil * * * is made a common carrier by the (Lodge) amendment * * *.' Id. ”

“ See Valvoline Oil Co. v. United States, 308 U.S. 141, 147, 60 S.Ct. 160, 163, 84 L.Ed. 151.↑ Even if Champlin produced all the oil it transported, the Act would require its regulation because of the effect of exclusive pipe-line ownership on Champlin's price policy at the other end of the pipe line. For one major purpose of the Act was to insure competition in the petroleum industry by regulating pipe-line transportation so that the independent refiner, the jobber and the consumer would not be charged exorbitant prices by the integrated companies. ”