Smyth v. Ames

Smyth v. Ames
Supreme Court of the United States
Submitted May 9, 1898 Decided May 31, 1898
Full case name	Smyth, Attorney General, et al. v. Ames, et al.; Smyth, Attorney General, et al. v. Smith, et al.; Smyth, Attorney General, et al. v. Higginson, et al.
Citations	171 U.S. 361 (more) 18 S. Ct. 888; 43 L. Ed. 197; 1898 U.S. LEXIS 1608
Holding
Voided Nebraska railroad tariffs and defined the constitutional limits of governmental power to set railroad and utility rates.
Court membership
Chief Justice Melville Fuller Associate Justices John M. Harlan · Horace Gray David J. Brewer · Henry B. Brown George Shiras Jr. · Edward D. White Rufus W. Peckham · Joseph McKenna
Case opinion
Majority	Harlan
Laws applied
Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, Contract Clause
Overruled by
Federal Power Commission v. Hope Natural Gas Co., 320 U.S. 591 (1944)

Smyth v. Ames, 171 U.S. 361 (1898), also called The Maximum Freight Case, was an 1898 United States Supreme Court case.^[1] The Supreme Court voided a Nebraska railroad tariff law, declaring that it violated the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in that it takes property without the due process of law.^[2] The Court defined the constitutional limits of governmental power to set railroad and utility rates by stating that regulated industries have the right to a "fair return". The ruling was later overturned in Federal Power Commission v. Hope Natural Gas Company (1944).^[3][4]

The decision in Smyth v. Ames was unanimous and Justice John M. Harlan delivered the opinion of the Court in writing.^[5]