This appeal involves the applicability by the Interstate Commerce Commission of the legal criteria for the issuance of certificates of convenience and necessity for motor truck operation by a railroad which were discussed in the opinion in Interstate Commerce Commission et al. v. Parker et al., 326 U.S. 60, 65 S.Ct. 1490.
In these applications Legh R. Powell and Henry W. Anderson, Receivers of the Seaboard Air Line Railway Company, sought certificates of convenience and necessity under Sections 206(a) and 207(a), Motor Carrier Act, 1935, 49 Stat. 551, as amended by the Transportation Act of 1940, Interstate Commerce Act, part II, 54 Stat. 923, 49 U.S.C.A. §§ 306(a), 307(a), for the operation of motor trucks as auxiliary to and supplemental of the railroad operation of Seaboard. These motor routes were sought to improve the delivery of less-than-carload freight to way stations of the railroad. Fourteen applications are involved. The routes in issue paralleled the main line of the Seaboard for the greater portion of the distance between Richmond, Virginia, and Jacksonville, Florida. Other controverted routes served shorter railway lines in North Carolina, South Carolina and Florida. Still other similar motor routes are operated by the Seaboard under orders of the Commission which are not now in controversy. Well above a hundred way stations will be served by the proposed applications. Objections to the applications were made by existing motor carriers along the routes and by various trucking organizations.
The Commission set the applications for hearing before joint boards pursuant to its interpretation of Section 205(b), Motor Carrier Act of 1935, as amended, Section 20(c), Transportation Act of 1940. Diverse recommended reports and orders were issued by the joint boards. A number of the applications were consolidated for argument before the Commission; others were dealt with on the exceptions to the joint board reports or by individual hearing. As the Seaboard was the only applicant and the issues were similar, the applications were disposed of as a single proceeding. Seaboard A.L. Ry. Co. M. Operation-Gaston-Garnett, S.C., 17 M.C.C. 413; 21 M.C.C. 773; 28 M.C.C. 5; 34 M.C.C. 441.
The Commission granted the applications upon a finding that the proposed motor operations were a specialized type coordinated with rail operations. See Thomson v. United States, 321 U.S. 19, 64 S.Ct. 392, 88 L.Ed. 513. The specially constituted District Court, 56 F.Supp. 394, affirmed the order of the Commission against attack because the certificates were granted without regard to their effect on existing motor carriers-a ground considered today in Interstate Commerce Commission v. Parker, supra, and over the additional objections that the joint boards were improperly constituted, that material evidence on the effect of the proposed operations on the existing or over-the-road motor truck service was excluded by the joint boards and the Commission and that the Seaboard was exempted from the tariff provisions of Section 217 and the accounts and record provision of Section 220 and the regulations thereunder. The appellees asserted that laches barred the court proceedings to enjoin the order of the Commission. The same issues are here. Nothing more need be said as to the contentions which were discussed in the Parker case. Th district court proceedings and this appeal are authorized by 28 U.S.C. § 41(28) and §§ 43-48 and § 345, 28 U.S.C.A. §§ 41(28), 43-48, 345.
Joint Boards. From the earliest hearing, objection was made to the composition of the joint boards. Section 205(a), so far as pertinent here, provides:
'The Commission shall, when operations of motor carriers or brokers conducted or proposed to be conducted involve not more than three States, * * * refer to a joint board for appropriate proceedings thereon, any of the following matters arising in the administration of this part with respect to such operations * * *: Applications for certificates, permits, or licenses. * * * The joint board to which any such matter is referred shall be composed solely of one member from each State within which the motor-carrier or brokerage operations involved in such matter are or are proposed to be conducted * * *.'
The applications were for short routes of varying lengths up to nearly two hundred miles. Many were contiguous. Some crossed state lines. Others were wholly within a state. The Commission referred each application to a joint board composed of one member from the state or states in which the route involved in the particular application was situated.