Railroad companies have the right to sell nontransferable
reduced rate excursion tickets,
Mosher v. Railroad Co.,
127 U. S. 390, and
the nontransferability and forfeiture embodied in such ticket is
not only binding upon the original purchaser and anyone
subsequently acquiring them, but, under the provisions of § 22
of the Act to Regulate Commerce, 24 Stat. 387, 25 Stat. 862, it is
the duty of the railroad company to prevent the wrongful use of
such tickets and the obtaining of a preference thereby by anyone
other than the original purchaser.
An actionable wrong is committed by one who maliciously
interferes in a contract between two parties and induces one of
them to break that contract to the injury of the other,
Angle
v. Chicago & St. Paul Railway Co., 151 U. S.
1, and this principle applies to carrying on the
business of purchasing and selling nontransferable reduced rate
railroad tickets for profit, to the injury of the railroad company
issuing them, and this even though the ingredient of actual malice,
in the sense of personal ill will, does not exist.
When, as in this case, the dealing of a class of speculators in
nontransferable
Page 207 U. S. 206
tickets have assumed great magnitude, involving large cost and
risk to the railroad company in preventing the wrongful use of such
tickets, and the parties so dealing in them have expressly declared
their intention of continuing so to do, a court of equity has power
to grant relief by injunction.
Every injunction contemplates the enforcement, as against the
party enjoined, of a rule of conduct for the future as to the
wrongs to which the injunction relates, and a court of equity may
extend an injunction so as to restrain the defendants from dealing
not only in nontransferable tickets already issued by complainant,
but also in all tickets of a similar nature which shall be issued
in the future, and the issuing of such an injunction does not
amount to an exercise of legislative, as distinct from judicial,
power and a denial of due process of law.
Whether the jurisdictional amount is involved is to be
determined not by the mere pecuniary damage resulting from the acts
complained of, but also by the value of the business to be
protected and the rights of property which complainants seek to
have recognized and enforced.
Hunt v. New York Cotton
Exchange, 205 U. S. 322.
Where defendants do not formally plead to the jurisdiction, it
is not incumbent upon complainant to offer proof in support of the
averment that the amount involved exceeds the jurisdictional amount
as to each defendant.
No adequate remedy at law exists to redress the wrong done to a
railroad company by wrongfully dealing in vast numbers of its
nontransferable reduced rate excursion tickets which will deprive
the company of its right to resort to equity to restrain such wrong
dealings.
An action against a number of defendants is not open to the
objections of multifariousness and of misjoinder of parties if the
defendants' acts are of a like character, the operation and effect
whereof upon the rights of complainants are identical and in which
the same relief is sought against all defendants, and the defenses
to be interposed are necessarily common to all defendants and
involve the same legal questions.
Hale v. Allinson,
188 U. S. 56,
188 U. S.
77.
144 F. 34 affirmed.
Upon a bill filed on behalf of the Louisville & Nashville
Railroad Company, the Circuit Court of the United States for the
Eastern District of Louisiana entered a decree perpetually
enjoining the petitioners herein and four other ticket brokers,
engaged in business in the City of New Orleans, from dealing in
nontransferable round-trip tickets issued at reduced rates for
passage over the lines of railway of the complainant on account of
the United Confederate Veterans' Reunion and the Mardi-Gras
celebration held in the City of New Orleans in the
Page 207 U. S. 207
years 1903 and 1904, respectively. On an appeal prosecuted by
the railroad company complaining of the limited relief awarded, the
circuit court of appeals held that the defendants should also be
enjoined generally from dealing in nontransferable round-trip
reduced-rate tickets whenever issued by the complainant, and
ordered the cause to be remanded to the circuit court with
directions to enter a decree in accordance with the views expressed
in the opinion. 144 F. 34. A writ of certiorari was thereupon
allowed.
We summarize the averments of the complaint and answer. It was
averred in the bill that complainant was a Kentucky corporation,
operating about 3,000 miles of railway for the carriage of
passengers, baggage, mail, express, and freight, its lines of road
extending from New Orleans through various states, and making
connections by which it reached all railroad stations in the United
States, Canada, and Mexico. The seven persons named as defendants
were averred to be citizens and residents of Louisiana, each
engaged in the City of New Orleans as a ticket broker or scalper in
the business of buying and selling the unused return portions of
railroad passenger tickets, especially excursion or special rate
tickets issued on occasions of fairs, expositions, conventions, and
the like. It was further averred that the defendants were joined in
the bill
"because their business and transactions complained of are in
act, purpose, and effect identical, and in order to prevent a
multiplicity of suits, the same relief being sought as to each and
all of them."
Six articles or paragraphs of the bill related to an approaching
reunion of United Confederate Veterans to be held in the City of
New Orleans, which it was expected would necessitate the
transportation by the railroads entering New Orleans of 100,000
visitors, one-fourth of which number would pass over the lines of
railway of the complainant. A necessity was alleged to exist for
special reduced rates of fare to secure a large attendance at such
reunion, and it was averred that a rate of one cent a mile,
one-third the regular rate, had
Page 207 U. S. 208
been agreed upon for nontransferable round-trip, reduced-rate
tickets which were to be issued for the occasion, and it was
stated
"that, among the conditions on the face of said ticket, which
ticket contract is signed by the original purchaser and the
company, is one that said ticket is nontransferable, and, if
presented by any other than the original purchaser, who is required
to sign the same at date of purchase, it will not be honored, but
will be forfeited, and any agent or conductor of any of the lines
over which it reads shall have the right to take up and cancel the
entire ticket."
And, for various alleged reasons, based mainly upon the large
number of expected purchasers, it was averred that the return
portion of each ticket was not required to be signed by the
original purchaser or presented to an agent of the complainant in
the City of New Orleans for the purpose of the identifications of
the holder as the purchaser of the ticket.
It was averred that each defendant was accustomed to buy and
sell the return coupons of nontransferable tickets for the express
purpose, and no other, of putting them in the hands of purchasers,
to be fraudulently used for passage on the trains of complainant,
and it was further averred that the defendants intended in like
manner to fraudulently deal in the return portion of the tickets
about to be issued for the reunion in question, and that
complainant would sustain irreparable injury, for which it would
have no adequate remedy at law, unless it was protected from such
wrongful acts. It was further averred that, unless relief was
given, the complainant would be compelled to abandon the making of
reduced rates for conventions or other assemblies to be held in the
City of New Orleans. Averments were also made as to the additional
burden which would be cast upon complainant's conductors and train
collectors by reason of the practice complained of, the danger
which would arise of a multiplicity of suits for damages by reason
of errors of such employees in endeavoring to prevent the
fraudulent use of such tickets, and it was averred that it would be
impossible, in many instances,
Page 207 U. S. 209
to discover the persons who were wrongfully traveling upon the
tickets and who were bound to pay the lawful and reasonable one-way
rate for their transportation. The impossibility of securing
evidence establishing the facts as to said fraud, the necessity, if
such evidence could be obtained, of bringing a multiplicity of
suits if a remedy at law was availed of, and the impracticability
of estimating in dollars and cents the injury to its business, was
set forth as making the remedy at law inadequate, and in addition
it was charged that the defendants were financially irresponsible.
The existence was also averred of various ticket brokers'
associations, the members of which acted in concert. It was averred
that a large part of the stock in trade of all ticket brokers and
scalpers was the disposal of nontransferable railroad tickets, and
it was further averred that ticket brokers and scalpers usually
sought to avoid injunctions prohibiting the dealing in such tickets
by assigning their business to some other ticket broker not named
in the order, and it was averred that, in order to afford complete
and effective relief,
"the restraining injunctive orders should be broad enough to
include all who knowingly do what the order of court prohibits
defendants from doing, or who aid or abet defendants in violating
the injunction or in defeating the objects and purposes
thereof."
Finally, it was alleged that the amount involved in the
controversy exceeded, exclusive of interest and costs, the sum of
$5,000, and that the value of the business which was sought to be
protected, and the rights which the complainant asked to have
recognized and enforced, exceeded, in the case of each defendant,
the sum of $5,000, exclusive of interest and costs.
In addition to asking a temporary restraining order, the bill
prayed that defendants, their agents, etc.,
"and all other persons whomsoever, though not named herein, from
and after the time when they severally have knowledge of the entry
of the restraining order and the existence of the injunction
herein,"
should be perpetually enjoined
"from buying, selling, dealing
Page 207 U. S. 210
in, or soliciting the purchase or sale of, any ticket or tickets
or the return coupons or unused portions thereof issued by orator
or by any other railroad company for use over orator's lines of
railway or any part of them, which, by the terms thereof, are
nontransferable, or from soliciting, advertising, encouraging, or
procuring any person other than the original purchaser of such
tickets, to use or attempt to use said tickets for passage on any
train or trains of orator, especially including the nontransferable
round-trip tickets issued for use on the occasion of the United
Confederate Veterans' Reunion at New Orleans in May, 1903."
Of the seven persons made defendants, three only appeared and
answered,
viz., Marcus K. Bitterman, Julius Mehlig, and
Charles T. Kelsko, the petitioners in this Court, on whose behalf a
joint and several answer was filed.
The averments of the bill in respect to the citizenship of the
complainant and the character and extent of its railway business
was admitted. It was also admitted that the answering defendants
were citizens and residents of Louisiana, but it was averred that
they were each separately engaged in the ticket brokerage business,
duly licensed to conduct such business by the State of Louisiana
and the City of New Orleans, and it was expressly denied that the
business operations and transactions of all the defendants named in
the bill were in act, purpose, and effect identical. So also the
answer admitted the averments of the bill in respect to the
proposed reunion, the large attendance expected, the issue of
reduced-rate, nontransferable tickets, and the necessity therefor,
and the impracticability of requiring the signing of the return
portion of each ticket by the purchaser.
It was admitted in the answer that the tickets usually issued by
complainant and its connections when making reduced rates as to
excursion tickets purported to be nontransferable and upon
condition that, if presented by other than the original purchaser,
who was supposed to sign the same at the date of purchase, it would
not be honored, but would be forfeited, and
Page 207 U. S. 211
that any agent or conductor should have the right to take up and
cancel such ticket if presented for passage. In various paragraphs,
these restrictions or conditions were assailed as impracticable,
unenforceable, and unlawful, and without consideration, and it was
averred that the conditions were never enforced, and that the
tickets were issued and bought with that understanding, and that no
damage was caused to complainant by a person other than the
original purchaser of a nontransferable reduced-rate ticket,
traveling upon the return portion of such ticket, and that no loss
or damage could be caused complainant by reason of the expected
dealing by defendants in the reunion tickets referred to in the
bill.
It was not only admitted in the answer that the answering
defendants had in the past dealt in nontransferable railroad
tickets issued by the complainant, but it was expressly declared to
be their intention to continue the practice, particularly in
respect to the tickets issued on account of the approaching
reunion, and coupled with such averment, it was asserted that no
fraud would be committed or was intended in respect to the dealing
in such tickets. We insert in the margin
* portions of the
answer relating to such admissions.
Page 207 U. S. 212
It was denied that the answering defendants were insolvent, but,
on the contrary, it was averred that each was able to pay any
judgment for damages which might be recovered against him. Denial
was made of the allegation of the bill that the
Page 207 U. S. 213
willingness or ability of the complainant to continue issuing
special-rate tickets would be affected by the failure to obtain the
relief sought by the bill, and, in the main, the averments of the
article of the bill relating to various ticket brokers'
associations were also denied.
As a distinct ground for denying the relief prayed, it was
alleged in various forms that the issue of the proposed
nontransferable tickets was the result of an unlawful confederation
or combination between the various railroads whose roads entered
into the City of New Orleans.
Upon the bill and answer a preliminary injunction was issued,
restraining the dealing in nontransferable tickets issued for the
approaching United Confederate Veterans' Reunion. Replication was
duly filed to the answer. Subsequently, upon depositions taken in
the cause, and upon affidavits showing the character of
nontransferable tickets proposed to be issued
Page 207 U. S. 214
for an approaching Mardi Gras festival, a further injunction
pendente lite was granted as to dealings in the
nontransferable reduced-rate, round-trip tickets issued for use on
the occasion of the aforesaid Mardi Gras festival.
Thereafter a demurrer was filed to the bill for want of equity
and because the case made by the bill was a moot, and not a real,
controversy, and it was overruled. Then an application was made for
leave to file a plea to the jurisdiction, which was refused.
At the hearing, the complaint introduced the depositions of two
witnesses and no evidence was given on behalf of the defendants. As
before stated, the circuit court entered a final decree perpetually
enjoining the dealing in nontransferable reduced-rate, round-trip
tickets issued for the United Confederate Veterans' Reunion and the
Mardi Gras festivals, and denying relief as to future issues of
tickets of a like character.
On appeal and cross-appeal, the circuit court of appeals held
that the complainant was entitled to the full relief prayed in the
bill, and consequently to an injunction restraining the dealing by
the defendants not only in the tickets issued for the United
Confederate Veterans' Reunion and the past Mardi Gras festival, but
from carrying on the business of like dealing in nontransferable
reduced-rate tickets which might be issued in the future by the
complainant, and the circuit court was directed to decree
accordingly.
Page 207 U. S. 219
MR. JUSTICE WHITE, after making the foregoing statement,
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The points urged at bar on behalf of the petitioners as
establishing that the decrees below should be reversed and the bill
of complaint dismissed, and, in any event, the injunction be
modified and restricted, are the following:
"1. The bill of complaint does not state a cause of action,
either at law or in equity, against any of the defendants, even
though the tickets in which they dealt are in form nontransferable,
when the original purchasers disposed of them in breach of their
contract with the complainant."
"2. The complainant has shown no sufficient ground for equitable
intervention, since, assuming, but not admitting, that the acts
charged against the defendants are wrongful, tortious, or even
fraudulent, it has a plain, adequate, and complete remedy at law to
redress such wrongs. "
Page 207 U. S. 220
"3. There was an improper joinder of defendants and of
independent causes of action. The bill is multifarious and the case
does not fall within the rule concerning the avoidance of a
multiplicity of suits."
"4. The circuit court was without jurisdiction, notwithstanding
the colorable averments contained in the bill that the injury
sustained in consequence of the defendants' act exceeded $2,000,
there being no foundation in fact in support of such averment."
"5. The decree of injunction awarded by the circuit court of
appeals, so far as it relates to nontransferable tickets that may
be hereafter issued, is in effect the exercise of legislative, as
distinct from judicial, power, since it undertakes to promulgate a
rule applicable to conditions and circumstances which have not yet
arisen, and to prohibit the petitioners from dealing in tickets not
in esse, and not even in contemplation, and is therefore violative
of the most fundamental principle of our government."
Stated in logical sequence and reduced to their essence, these
propositions assert:
First, want of jurisdiction from the insufficiency of the amount
involved, want of power in a court of equity to grant relief
because, on the face of the bill, relief at law was adequate, and
because equitable relief was improper on account of misjoinder of
parties and causes of action.
Second, because the case as made did not entitle to relief,
since it did not show the commission of any legal wrong by the
defendants.
Third, because, conceding the right to relief, the remedy by
injunction which the court accorded was so broad as, in effect, to
amount to the exertion of legislative, as distinct from judicial,
power, and hence was equivalent to the denial of due process of
law.
As, for reasons hereafter to be stated, we think the contentions
embodied in the first proposition as to want of jurisdiction, etc.,
are without merit, we come at once to the fundamental
Page 207 U. S. 221
question involved in the second proposition -- that is, the
absence of averment or proof as to the commission of a legal wrong
by the defendants.
That the complainant had the lawful right to sell
nontransferable tickets of the character alleged in the bill at
reduced rates we think is not open to controversy, and that the
condition of nontransferability and forfeiture embodied in such
tickets was not only binding upon the original purchaser, but upon
anyone who acquired such a ticket and attempted to use the same in
violation of its terms, is also settled.
Mosher v. Railroad
Co., 127 U. S. 390.
See also Boylan v. Hot Springs Co., 132 U.
S. 146.
True, these cases were decided before the passage of the act to
regulate commerce, but the power of carriers engaged in interstate
commerce to issue nontransferable reduced-rate excursion tickets
was expressly recognized by that act, and the operation and binding
effect of the nontransferable clause in such tickets upon all third
persons acquiring the same and attempting to use them, and the duty
of the carrier in such case to use due diligence to enforce a
forfeiture, results from the context of the act. Thus, by § 22
(24 Stat. 387, c. 104), it was provided "that nothing in this act
shall apply to . . . the issuance of mileage, excursion, or
commutation passenger tickets." And it is to be observed that,
despite the frequent changes in the act, including the
comprehensive amendments embodied in the Act of June 29, 1906 (34
Stat. 584), the provision in question remains in force, although
the Interstate Commerce Commission, charged with the administrative
enforcement of the act, has directed the attention of Congress to
the importance of defining the scope of such tickets in view of the
abuses which might arise from the exercise of the right to issue
them. 2 I.C.C. 340. And, when the restrictions embodied in the act
concerning equality of rates and the prohibitions against
preferences are borne in mind, the conclusion cannot be escaped
that the right to issue tickets of the class referred to carried
with it the duty on the
Page 207 U. S. 222
carrier of exercising due diligence to prevent the use of such
tickets by other than the original purchasers, and therefore caused
the nontransferable clause to be operative and effective against
anyone who wrongfully might attempt to use such tickets. Any other
view would cause the act to destroy itself, since it would
necessarily imply that the recognition of the power to issue
reduced-rate excursion tickets conveyed with it the right to
disregard the prohibitions against preferences which it was one of
the great purposes of the act to render efficacious. This must
follow since, if the return portion of the round-trip ticket be
used by one not entitled to the ticket, and who otherwise would
have had to pay the full one-way fare, the person so successfully
traveling on the ticket would not only defraud the carrier, but
effectually enjoy a preference over similar one-way travelers who
had paid their full fare, and who were unwilling to be participants
in a fraud upon the railroad company.
Any third person acquiring a nontransferable reduced-rate
railroad ticket from the original purchaser, being therefore bound
by the clause forbidding transfer, and the ticket in the hands of
all such persons being subject to forfeiture on an attempt being
made to use the same for passage, it may well be questioned whether
the purchaser of such ticket acquired anything more than a limited
and qualified ownership thereof, and whether the carrier did not,
for the purpose of enforcing the forfeiture, retain a subordinate
interest in the ticket, amounting to a right of property therein,
which a court of equity would protect.
Board of Trade v.
Christie Grain & Stock Co., 198 U.
S. 236, and authorities there cited.
See also Sperry
& Hutchinson Co. v. Mechanics' Clothing Co., 128 F. 800.
We pass this question, however, because the want of merit in the
contention that the case as made did not disclose the commission of
a legal wrong conclusively results from a previous decision of this
Court. The case is
Angle v. Chicago, St. P.M. &c. R.
Co., 151 U. S. 1, where
it was held that an actionable wrong is committed by one "who
maliciously
Page 207 U. S. 223
interferes in a contract between two parties and induces one of
them to break that contract to the injury of the other." That this
principle embraces a case like the present -- that is, the carrying
on of the business of purchasing and selling nontransferable
reduced-rate railroad tickets for profit, to the injury of the
railroad company issuing such tickets -- is, we think, clear. It is
not necessary that the ingredient of actual malice, in the sense of
personal ill will, should exist to bring this controversy within
the doctrine of the
Angle case. The wanton disregard of
the rights of a carrier, causing injury to it, which the business
of purchasing and selling nontransferable reduced-rate tickets of
necessity involved, constitute legal malice within the doctrine of
the
Angle case. We deem it unnecessary to restate the
grounds upon which the ruling in the
Angle case was
rested, or to trace the evolution of the principle in that case
announced, because of the consideration given to the subject in the
Angle case and the full reference to the authorities which
was made in the opinion in that case.
Certain is it that the doctrine of the
Angle case has
been frequently applied in cases which involved the identical
question here at issue -- that is, whether a legal wrong was
committed by the dealing in nontransferable reduced-rate railroad
excursion ticket.
Pennsylvania Railroad Co. v. Beekman, 30
Wash.L.Rep. 715;
Ill. Central R. Co. v. Caffrey, 128 F.
770;
Delaware, Lack & West. R. Co. v. Frank, 110 F.
689;
Nashville, C. & St.L. Ry. Co. v. McConnell, 82 F.
65.
Indeed, it is shown by decisions of various state courts of last
resort that the wrong occasioned by the dealing in nontransferable
reduced-rate railroad tickets has been deemed to be so serious as
to call for express legislative prohibition correcting the evil.
Kinner v. Lake Shore & Mich. Southern Ry. Co., 69 Ohio
St. 339;
Schubach v. McDonald, 179 Mo. 163, and cases
cited;
Samuelson v. State, 116 Tenn. 470. In the case last
referred to, where the subject is elaborately reviewed, the Supreme
Court of Tennessee, in holding that the
Page 207 U. S. 224
prohibitive statute was not unconstitutional as forbidding a
lawful business, and in affirming a criminal conviction for
violating the statute, observed:
"That the sale as well as the purchase of nontransferable
passage tickets is a fraud upon the carrier and the public, the
tendency of which is the demoralization of rates, has been settled
by the general concensus of opinion among the courts."
Concluding, as we do, that the commission of a legal wrong by
the defendants was disclosed by the case as made, we are brought to
consider the several contentions concerning the jurisdiction of the
court and its right to afford relief. The bill contained an express
averment that the amount involved in the controversy exceeded,
exclusive of interest and costs, the sum of $5,000 as to each
defendant. The defendants not having formally pleaded to the
jurisdiction, it was not incumbent upon the complainant to offer
proof in support of the averment. Nevertheless, the complainant
introduced testimony tending to show that, on the New Orleans
division of its road, a loss of from fifteen to eighteen thousand
dollars a year was sustained through the practice by dealers of
wrongfully purchasing and selling nontransferable tickets. That
hundreds of the tickets annually issued for the Mardi Gras
festivals in New Orleans were wrongfully bought and sold; that
other nontransferable reduced-rate tickets were, in a like manner,
illegally trafficked in to the great damage of the corporation, and
that the defendants were the persons principally engaged in
conducting such wrongful dealings. But, even if this proof be put
out of view, we think the contention that a consideration of the
whole bill establishes that the jurisdictional amount alleged was
merely colorable and fictitious is without merit. We say this
because the averments of the bill as to the number of such tickets
issued, the recurring occasions for their issue, the magnitude of
the wrongful dealings in the nontransferable tickets by the
defendants, the cost and the risk incurred by the steps necessary
to prevent their wrongful use, the injurious effect upon the
revenue of the complainant, the
Page 207 U. S. 225
operation of the illegal dealing in such tickets upon the right
of the complainant to issue them in the future, coupled with the
admissions of the answer, sustain the express averment as to the
requisite jurisdictional amount. Besides, the substantial character
of the jurisdictional averment in the bill is to be tested, not by
the mere immediate pecuniary damage resulting from the acts
complained of, but by the value of the business to be protected and
the rights of property which the complainant sought to have
recognized and enforced.
Hunt v. New York Cotton Exchange,
205 U. S. 322,
205 U. S.
336.
The contention that, though it be admitted, for the sake of the
argument, that the acts charged against the defendant "were
wrongful, tortious, or even fraudulent," there was no right to
resort to equity, because there was a complete and adequate remedy
at law to redress the threatened wrongs when committed, is, we
think, also devoid of merit. From the nature and character of the
nontransferable tickets, the number of people to whom they were
issued, the dealings of the defendants therein and their avowed
purpose to continue such dealings in the future, the risk to result
from mistakes in enforcing the forfeiture provision, and the
multiplicity of suits necessarily to be engendered if redress was
sought at law -- all establish the inadequacy of a legal remedy and
the necessity for the intervention of equity. Indeed, the want of
foundation for the contention to the contrary is shown by the
opinions in the cases which we have previously cited in considering
whether a legal wrong resulted from acts of the character
complained of, since, in those cases, it was expressly held that
the consequences of the legal wrong flowing from the dealing in
nontransferable tickets were of such a character as to entitle an
injured complainant to redress in a court of equity.
There is an opinion of the Supreme Court of New York (not the
court of last resort) which would seem to express contrary views,
New York Central & H. R. Co. v. Reeves, 85 N.Y.Supp.
28, but the reasoning there relied on, in our opinion, is
inconclusive.
Page 207 U. S. 226
The proposition that the bill was multifarious because of the
misjoinder of parties and causes of action was not assigned as
error in the circuit court of appeals, and therefore might well be
held not to be open. But, passing that view, we hold the objection
to be untenable. The acts complained of as to each defendant were
of a like character, their operation and effect upon the rights of
the complainant were identical, the relief sought against each
defendant was the same, and the defenses which might be interposed
were common to each defendant and involved like legal questions.
Under these conditions, the case is brought within the principle
laid down in
Hale v. Allinson, 188 U. S.
56,
188 U. S.
77.
As we have stated, the circuit court granted a preliminary
injunction, restraining the defendants from illegally dealing in
tickets issued on account of the United Confederate Veterans'
Reunion, and, before final hearing, granted a second injunction,
restraining such dealing in like tickets issued for the approaching
Mardi Gras festival. By the final decree, these injunctions were
perpetuated, the court declining to grant the relief sought by the
complainant in relation to nontransferable tickets to be issued for
the future, without prejudice, however, to the right of the
complainant to seek relief by independent proceedings on each
occasion when it might issue such nontransferable tickets. The
circuit court of appeals decided that error had been committed in
refusing to grant an injunction against dealing in nontransferable
tickets to be issued in the future, and directed that the decree
below be enlarged in that particular. It is insisted that the
circuit court of appeals erred in awarding an injunction as to
dealings "in nontransferable tickets that may be hereafter issued .
. . since it thereby undertook to promulgate" a rule applicable to
conditions and circumstances which have not yet arisen, and to
prohibit "the petitioners from dealing in tickets not
in
esse . . . and is therefore violative of the most fundamental
principles of our government." But when the broad nature of this
proposition is considered, it but denies that there is power in
Page 207 U. S. 227
a court of equity in any case to afford effective relief by
injunction. Certain is it that every injunction, in the nature of
things, contemplates the enforcement, as against the party
enjoined, of a rule of conduct for the future as to the wrong to
which the injunction relates. Take the case of trespasses upon land
where the elements entitling to equitable relief exist.
See
Slater v. Gunn, 170 Mass. 509, and cases cited. It may not be
doubted that the authority of a court would extend, not only to
restraining a particular imminent trespass, but also to prohibiting
like acts for all future time. The power exerted by the court below
which is complained of was in no wise different. The bill averred
the custom of the complainant at frequently occurring periods to
issue reduced-rate, nontransferable tickets for fairs, conventions,
etc., charged a course of illegal dealing in such nontransferable
tickets by the defendants, and sought to protect its right to issue
such tickets by preventing unlawful dealings in them. The
defendants in effect not only admitted the unlawful course of
dealing as to particular tickets then outstanding, but expressly
avowed that they possessed the right, and that it was their
intention to carry on the business as to all future issues of a
similar character of tickets. The action of the circuit court of
appeals therefore in causing the injunction to apply not only to
the illegal dealings as to the then outstanding tickets, but to
like dealings as to similar tickets which might be issued in the
future, was but the exertion by the court of its power to restrain
the continued commission against the rights of the complainant in
the future of a definite character of acts adjudged to be wrongful.
Indeed, in view of the state of the record, the inadequacy of the
relief afforded by the decree as entered in the circuit court is,
we think, manifest on its face. The necessary predicate of the
decree was the illegal nature of the dealings by the defendants in
the outstanding tickets, and the fact that such dealings, if
allowed, would seriously impair the right of the complainant in the
future to issue the tickets. Doubtless, for this reason the decree
was made without
Page 207 U. S. 228
prejudice to the right of the complainant to apply for relief as
to future issues of tickets by independent proceedings whenever, on
other occasions, it was determined to issue nontransferable
tickets. But this was to deny adequate relief, since it subjected
the complainant to the necessity, as a preliminary to the exercise
of the right to issue tickets, to begin a new suit with the object
of restraining the defendants from the commission in the future of
acts identical with those which the court had already adjudged to
be wrongful and violative of the rights of the complainant.
In
Scott v. Donald, 165 U. S. 107, on
holding a particular seizure of liquor under the South Carolina
dispensary law to be invalid, an injunction was sustained, not only
addressed to the seizure in controversy, but which also operated to
restrain like seizures of liquors in the future, and the exertion
of the same character of power by a court of equity was upheld in
the cases of
Donovan v. Pennsylvania Co., 199 U.
S. 279, and
Swift & Co. v. United States,
196 U. S. 375.
Nor is there merit in the contention that the decision in
New Haven Railroad v. Interstate Commerce Commission,
200 U. S. 404,
supports the view here relied upon as to the limited authority of a
court of equity to enjoin the continued commission of the same
character of acts as those adjudged to be wrongful. On the
contrary, the ruling in that case directly refutes the claim based
on it. There, certain acts of the carrier were held to have
violated the Act to Regulate Commerce. The contention of the
government was that, because wrongful acts of a particular
character had been committed, therefore an injunction should be
awarded against any and all violations in the future of the Act to
Regulate Commerce. Whilst this broad request was denied, it was
carefully pointed out that the power existed to enjoin the future
commission of like acts to those found to be illegal, and the
injunction was so awarded. The whole argument here made results
from a failure to distinguish between an injunction generally
restraining the commission of illegal acts in the
Page 207 U. S. 229
future and one which simply restrains for the future the
commission of acts identical in character with those which have
been the subject of controversy, and which have been adjudged to be
illegal.
Affirmed.
*
"
IX
"
"Respondents further admit that, in accordance with the general
custom of the trade, they separately buy and sell the return
coupons of railway tickets, whether the same are stamped
'nontransferable' or not, for the reason that the term
'nontransferable' does not import any practical or legal meaning in
the business, according to the common understanding of the railways
themselves, the ticket brokers, and the traveling public to whom
said tickets are issued, who freely sell them to brokers, who, in
turn, sell them to other persons desiring to use said tickets for
transportation, when genuine and
bona fide."
"
* * * *"
"Respondents do not deny that the complainant, on occasions of
Mardi Gras festivals in the City of New Orleans, have joined in the
issuing of reduced rates and the putting out of said so-called
'nontransferable' tickets, but, as above set out, the general
traveling public, the railways, and the ticket brokers, by common
consent, by usage, and by understanding, have all treated said
tickets as articles of property, and as negotiable and transferable
to any person desiring to purchase and travel on the same when
genuine and
bona fide, and respondents deny that these
respondents have ever fraudulently dealt in the return coupons of
such tickets, or that complainant has ever been damaged in respect
thereto, by any act of respondents."
"
X
"
"Respondents admit that it is their hope and expectation to buy
and sell the return portions of said U.C.V. Reunion tickets, but
they deny that they will solicit, induce, or persuade the holders
thereof to sell such return portions to respondents upon any false
or fraudulent pretense or representation upon the part of
respondents."
"Respondents admit that they, in common with the general public,
have some knowledge of the character and terms of the proposed
tickets; that they are informed and believe that such tickets will
be issued at low rates, to induce and enable the traveling public
to attend said reunion in large numbers; that respondents expect to
offer the same for sale, if they shall acquire any of said tickets,
and will sell such tickets to persons other than the original
purchasers, for such price as they are willing to pay, and that it
is no concern of complainant or its connections, or other railways,
whether respondents make a profit or a loss in the proposed dealing
in said U.C.V. reunion tickets."
"
* * * *"
"
XIV
"
Respondents admit that it is the custom and usage of complainant
and its connections to issue railroad tickets at reduced rates to
the traveling public on various occasions, such as expositions,
conventions, Mardi Gras, reunions, or other public gatherings, and
that the tickets which are usually issued by complainant purport by
their terms to be nontransferable and to constitute a so-called
"special contract" in express terms between complainant, the lines
issuing the same, all other lines over which the same entitle the
holders to travel, and the original purchasers of said tickets,
whereby the said original purchasers are forced to agree that said
ticket shall not be transferred by them to any other persons, but
respondents show that said tickets, when issued by complainant and
its connecting lines and other railways, on such occasions as
expositions, reunions, conventions, Mardi Gras, and the like, are,
in practice and general consent and common understanding of the
traveling public, the railways, and the ticket brokers, when
bona fide and genuine tickets, good for the return passage
over the lines of said complainant and its connections and other
railways, in the hands of the holders thereof, whether such holders
be the original purchasers or not; that such practice and such
understanding are common and general all over the United States;
that such tickets are sold and dealt in as legitimate business in
every large city, to the knowledge of the complainant, and such
tickets are and have been for many years sold by complainant with
full knowledge of the fact that they are, in practice and general
understanding of the traveling public, good in the hands of any
holder.
"
XV
"
Respondents jointly and severally admit that each of them are,
and have been for some time, separately engaged in the lawful
business of buying, selling, and dealing in such tickets, and in
soliciting and inducing the original purchasers thereof to sell and
transfer the same to respondents, with the intent and purpose that
such tickets shall be used by the second purchaser thereof, but
respondents deny that such use is a violation in law or in fact of
the terms thereof. And respondents deny any knowledge that such use
of said tickets by persons other than the original holders is any
fraud upon complainant or the railways issuing such tickets when
the same are genuine and
bona fide, and respondents again
aver that it is a matter of no concern or interest to the
complainant or the railways issuing such tickets whether the
original purchasers are the holders and presenters of the same, or
whether the holder has purchased said ticket from the original
purchaser, or whether such holder has purchased the same from a
ticket broker, or whether, as frequently happens, one of such
tickets is accidentally or otherwise exchanged for another of the
same class and form.
