Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

“ The plaintiff may be making money from its sawmill and lumber business but it no more can be compelled to spend that than it can be compelled to spend any other money to maintain a railroad for the benefit of others who do not care to pay for it. If the plaintiff be taken to have granted to the public an interest in the use of the railroad it may withdraw its grant by discontinuing the use when that use can be kept up only at a loss. ”

“ Thereafter the road was run as before, doing a small business as a common carrier but depending upon the carrying of logs and lumber to make it a profitable rather than a losing concern. In course of time the timber of the Brooks-Scanlon Company was cut and it terminated the lease to the Railway Company, which discontinued business on April 22, 1918, with the assent of the Railroad Commission, and sold its rolling stock. At that time the Commission being advised that it had no power did nothing more. ”

“ We are of opinion that the test applied was wrong under the decisions of this Court. A carrier cannot be compelled to carry on even a branch of business at a loss, much less the whole business of carriage. ”

“ But in any case it cannot be meant that the previous discussion which occupies the whole body of the opinion is superfluous and irrelevant to the result reached; nor can the words be taken literally, since the court proceeded to take jurisdiction and reinstated an injunction in favor of the defendant. ”