ercised its authority and has provided its own scheme of regulation. ''154 A state statute which merely required a railroad company to furnish cars within a reasonable time after demand and which, as construed, left the question of what was a reasonable time to be determined in view of the requirements of interstate commerce, is not a direct burden thereof and is valid. This statute is nothing but a statement of the carrier's common-law duty to furnish the necessary equipment enabling it to perform its undertaking of public transportation.155 § 27. Same Subject-Rule Established. Where a state statute or regulation conflicts with a federal regulation affecting interstate commerce, the state law is void. In the absence of a federal statute, the states may not make regulations directly burdening interstate commerce. Congress has taken possession of the field of regulation as to the receipt and delivery of freight moving in interstate commerce and no direct control with reference thereto can be exercised by state authority. Any regulation by a state of an interstate carrier affects to some extent interstate commerce, and it is clearly intimated by Mr. Justice Hughes in the Minnesota Rate cases, ante, that Congress might so extend the scope of federal regulation as to exclude even this remote effect of state legislation. But, in the same cases, it was shown that Congress has not as yet exercised the full power that it might under the Constitution of the United States and that the proviso exempting intrastate commerce from the Acts to Regulate Commerce leaves a field for state action.156 The Commerce Acts amendatory and supplementary are not so inclusive nor so exclusive as are the laws relating to the rights and protection of employees,157 and the decision under the Employees Protec 154 Barrett v. New York, 232 U. S. 14, 58 L. Ed. 483, 34 Sup. Ct. 203, reversing same styled case, 183 Fed. 793, 189 Fed. 268. 155 Ill. C. R. Co. v. Mulberry Hill Coal Co., 238 U. S. 275, 59 L. Ed. 1306, 35 Sup. Ct. 760. 156 For proviso, see Sec. 401, post. 157 Employers' Liability Acts, Sec. 395, post. On this subject, the Su preme Court, in Kinzell v. C. M. & St. P. R. Co., 250 U. S. 130, 63 L. Ed. 893, 39 Sup. Ct. 412, held that an employee working on the construction of an embankment preparatory to erecting a new trestle on an interstate railroad was engaged in interstate commerce within the meaning of Act of April 22, 1908 (35 Stat. 65, c. 149) tive Acts go further than they do under the commerce regulating acts. The decision relating to furnishing cars and holding state statutes on the subject illegal do not go so far as to hold that a state may not legislate as to the furnishing and the delivery of cars used in the shipment of freight between points in the state. But, while there is left to the states a power of regulation as to intrastate transportation, such power must not be exercised in a way that would burden interstate transportation. A state may not require that cars be furnished for intrastate commerce when the requirement would, if obeyed, prevent a carrier from furnishing cars for interstate commerce in like proportion. The state regulation must not discriminate in favor of intrastate commerce or against interstate commerce. These principles were illustrated by the decision of the Supreme Court in Hampton v. St. Louis I. M. & S. Ry. Co.,158 where a law of Arkansas requiring an interstate carrier to furnish cars on demand was involved, the section of the law making the requirement concluding with the proviso: "Interstate railroads shall furnish cars on application for interstate shipments the same in all respects as other cars to be furnished by intrastate railroads under the provisions of this Act." The Supreme Court of the state said:15 "The failure to furnish cars under the terms of the act under investigation will establish prima facie a breach of duty on the part of the railroad companies. This will not preclude their right to set up such defense as will excuse or justify the failure. That a fair division of cars with interstate business made it impossible to answer all demands made for cars for intrastate business would apparently be within the limit of proper defenses in cases of demands too unusual to be foreseen; and, viewed in this way, the act is relieved of the imputation of burdening interstate commerce." 158 Hampton v. St. L. I. M. & S. Ry. Co., 227 U. S. 456, 57 L. Ed. 596, 33 Sup. Ct. 263, reversing St. L. I. M. & S. Ry. Co. v. Hampton, 162 Fed. 693. 159 Oliver v. Chicago, R. I. & P. Ry. Co., 89 Ark. 466, 470, 117 S. W. 238. See also Proctor & Gamble v. United States, 225 U. S. 282, 286, 56 L. Ed. 1091, 32 Sup. Ct. 761. Mr. Justice Lurton, speaking for the Supreme Court of the United States, said that the proviso probably meant no more than that there should be "no discrimination against demands for cars for interstate shipments," but should the Act be construed "as extending the act so as to regulate the furnishing of cars for interstate shipments, it would be invalid by reason of the provisions of the Hepburn Amendment to the Act to Regulate Commerce of June 29, 1906." Construing the Act as applying only to intrastate commerce and as permitting the defenses stated by the court of the state, the Supreme Court held that, under the pleadings, the agreement of the parties and the ruling of the court below, there was no showing by the railroad "that in the operation of the act interstate commerce has been illegally restrained or burdened, or that any defense which it may have for the neglect to comply with the provisions of the act as to furnishing cars has been or will be denied by virtue of its obligation as an interstate railroad," and that the Act should not have been enjoined.160 Bills of lading are but contracts for carriage, and when they refer to interstate transportation the federal government may make regulations with reference thereto, and when the transportation is intrastate the regulations are within the power of the states.161 § 28. Requirements as to Accounting and Reports. The Interstate Commerce Commission has the statutory power to require carriers within its jurisdiction to keep such accounts as may be prescribed and make reports to the Commission upon certain prescribed forms.162 These statutory requirements are valid.163 As all, or at least practically all, carriers within the jurisdiction of the Interstate Commerce 160 See Mulberry Hill Coal Co. case, Sec. 26, ante. 161 Bills of Lading, 29 I. C. C. 417; Bills of Lading, 52 I. C. C. 671; United States v. Ferger, 250 U. S. 199, 63 L. Ed. 936, 39 Sup. Ct. 445. 162 Sec. 551, post; Separation of Operating Expenses, 30 I. C. C. 676. 163 Kansas C. S. Ry. Co. v. United States, 231 U. S. 423, 58 L. Ed. 296, 34 Sup. Ct. 125; Interstate Com. Com. v. Goodrich Transit Co., 224 U. S. 194, 211, 56 L. Ed. 729, 32 Sup. Ct. 436. See the Commission's discussion of the question in the Twenty-seventh Annual Report of the Interstate Commerce Commission, pp. 37, 38. Commission are at the same time engaged in both interstate and intrastate commerce, these accounts and reports must of necessity include matter relating to each kind of commerce. It is frequently necessary to consider the cost of both interstate and intrastate commerce in order to determine what is a fair rate on either. The United States Supreme Court has stated the reasons for the federal statute as follows:164 "It is true that the accounts required to be kept are general in their nature and embrace business other than such as is necessary to the discharge of the duties required in carrying passengers and freight in interstate commerce by joint arrangement between the railroad and the water carrier, but the Commission is charged under the law with the supervision of such rates as to their reasonableness and with the general duty of making reports to Congress which might require a knowledge of the business of the carrier beyond that which is strictly of the character mentioned. If the Commission is to successfully perform its duties in respect to reasonable rates, undue discriminations and favoritism, it must be informed as to the business of the carriers by a system of accounting which will not permit the possible concealment of forbidden practices in accounts which it is not permitted to see and concerning which it can require no information. is a mistake to suppose that the requiring of information concerning the business methods of such corporations, as shown in their accounts, is a regulation of business not within the jurisdiction of the Commission, as seems to be argued for the complainants. The object of requiring such accounts to be kept in a uniform way and to be open to the inspection of the Commission is not to enable it to regulate the affairs of the corporations not within its jurisdiction, but to be informed concerning the business methods of the corporations subject to the act that it may properly regulate such matters as are really within its jurisdiction. Further, the requiring of information concerning a business is not regulation of that business." It 164 Interstate Com. Com. v. Goodrich Transit Co., cited in the next preceding note. Consistent with this holding is the decision of the Court of Civil Appeals of Texas, that the state may require that carriers, as to intrastate commerce, shall keep accounts supplementary to those required by the Interstate Commerce Commission.165 § 29. Transmission and Delivery of Telegraph and Telephone Messages. That companies engaged in the telegraph and telephone business are, where their lines extend from one state to another, engaged in interstate commerce is undisputed,166 and Congress has legislated expressly including such within the Acts relating to commerce.1 Prior to the Act of 1910 enlarging the scope of the Act to Regulate Commerce, state statutes regulating the delivery of telegraph messages had been before the Supreme Court. The Indiana statute regulating interstate messages sent from as well as into the state was held void because the state law could "not extend to the delivery of messages in other The Georgia statute providing a penalty for failure to receive and deliver in the state telegraph messages was held valid, although applicable to interstate messages.169 A Michigan statute which prevented the telegraph company from contracting to relieve itself from its common-law liability merely gave sanction to an inherent duty, and the statute was 165 R. R. Com. of Texas v. Texas & P. Ry. (Tex. Civ. App.), 140 S. W. 829. To the same effect, see R. R. Com. of Miss. v. Gulf & S. I. R. Co., 8 Miss. 750, 29 So. 789; People v. Joline, 65 Misc. Rep. 394, 121 N. Y. Supp. 857. But without statutory authority a commission may not require reports by telegraph, State v. Louisville & N. R. Co., 57 Fla. 526, 49 So. 39. 166 Sec. 2, Note 2, ante; Western Union Tel. Co. v. Crovo, 220 U. S. 364, 55 L. Ed. 498, 31 Sup. Ct. 399; Western Union Tel. Co. v. Pendleton, 122 U. S. 347, 30 L. Ed. 1187, 7 Sup. Ct. 1126; Western Union Tel. Co. v. James, 162 U. S. 650, 40 L. Ed. 1105, 16 Sup. Ct. 934; Western Union Tel. Co. v. Commercial Milling Co., 218 U. S. 403, 416, 54 L. Ed. 1088, 31 Sup. Ct. 59; Postal Tel.-Cable Co. v. City of Mobile, 179 Fed. 955, and cases cited at page 960. 167 Act 1910, Secs. 401, 406, post; Shoemaker v. Chesapeake & P. Telephone Co., 20 I. C. C. 614. 168 Western Union Tel. Co. V. Union Tel. Co. V. |