FRANKFURTER, J., dissenting. 331 U.S. sistent with a proper regard for the interplay of State and national interests to assume that Congress was imposing a minimum of regulation for those who accepted federal licenses rather than to assume that by inferential sterilization of State laws Congress meant to make its optional and restricted requirements the maximum? The "power, jurisdiction, and authority" of the Secretary of Agriculture which after 1931 was to be "exclusive" are given full and fair scope if made to refer only to powers that the Secretary can effectively exercise. There is exclusion of State power as to what the Act, substantively speaking, includes, but not exclusion of a vast potential field of warehouse regulation, not within the active range of federal administration, simply because Congress dealt with a small part of it, and that only conditionally. Nor is there anything in the history of the federal Act which requires such destructive consequences to a longstanding body of State enactments. When the 1916 Act was passed, Congress emphasized the need for State regulation by subordinating federal action to such regulation. By 1931 forty States had laws regulating warehouses, laws which at least in some aspect did not conflict with the powers vested in the Secretary of Agriculture. An impressively large number of States fixed warehouse rates. The Court now finds in the legislative history of the 1931 Amendment a purpose to wipe out all these regulations as to the holders of federal licenses. That Amendment eliminated the subservience of the federal Act to the laws of the States, for such subservience really nullified the practical purposes at which Congress aimed in 1916 by a voluntary federal licensing system. The purpose was to make "the Federal act independent of State laws," and to "place the Federal act on its own bottom." While such language in a Committee Report, treated merely as words, might be interpreted as an im 218 FRANKFURTER, J., dissenting. plicit, roughshod decimation of State authority over any aspect of warehousing which the federal licensing system touched, howsoever meagerly and indirectly, it is more consonant with a due regard for federal-State relations to find that the dominating object of the legislation controls what was meant by "independent of State laws." For the dominant object was removal of those matters which were entrusted to the Secretary of Agriculture from subordination to State action. By saving the authority which it had given to the Secretary of Agriculture from being rendered futile by State laws, Congress ought not to be held to have nullified State laws whose continuing force would not hamper the Secretary of Agriculture in exercising the powers that Congress gave him. Evidence is lacking that Congress felt that the correction of the inadequacy which had revealed itself regarding the 1916 Act required withdrawal of federal license holders from the requirements of non-conflicting State regulation. So long as full scope can be given to the amendatory legislation without undermining non-conflicting State laws, nothing but the clearest expression should persuade us that the federal Act wiped out State fixation of rates and other State requirements deeply rooted in their laws. When neither the mischief at which the 1931 Amendment was directed, nor the policy, terms and structure of warehousing legislation by Congress in its entirety necessitate it, disregard of the delicate balance of Federal-State relations ought not to be attributed to Congress. If so fundamental a change were designed, it would normally be reflected in the financial provisions made by Congress, and in the reports on the administration of the Act. The appropriations for administering the United States Warehouse Act show no substantial increase as a consequence of the 1931 Amendment. For the years pre Moreover, those charged with the enforcement of the Act seem to have been unmindful of the far-reaching consequences now imputed to it. The reports of the Secretary of Agriculture, of the Chief of the Bureau of Agricultural Economics, and of the Chief of Agricultural Marketing Service, for the years after 1931, disclose administrative attitudes and practices no different from those of preceding years. No mention is made of the State laws which, the Court now holds, were superseded though not conflicting with federal administration. In citing the advantages incident to a federal license, no mention appears of so important an item as relief from existing State regulations. The history of the federal act shows that at no time has Congress deemed it desirable to introduce compulsory uniformity of warehouse regulation. By freeing federal licensees from overriding State regulation Congress was not by indirection seeking to create such a uniform system. But the effect of the interpretation now given to the 1931 Amendment is the establishment of uniformity of nonregulation, in that it introduces laissez faire outside the very narrow scope of the Secretary's powers. It is easy to exaggerate the danger of undesirable consequences flowing *The more substantial increases in appropriation after 1935 seem to be due to an increase in the volume of licensing, not to an extension of the fields of supervision. from a rejected construction. But surely one does not draw on idle fears in suggesting that as a result of today's decision the gates of escape from deeply rooted State requirements will be open, although Congress itself has not authorized federal authority to take over the regulation of such activities and though their State enforcement does not at all conflict with, but rather promotes, the limited oversight of warehouses thus far assumed by the Federal Government. The Court displaces settled and fruitful State authority though it cannot replace it with federal authority. RICE ET AL. v. BOARD OF TRADE OF THE CITY OF CHICAGO. NO. 471. CERTIORARI TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SEVENTH CIRCUIT.* Argued February 14, 1947.-Decided May 5, 1947. 1. By the Commodity Exchange Act, the United States has not so occupied and preempted the field of regulation of boards of trade designated "contract markets" as to deprive the states of authority to regulate trading in futures, except to the extent that the state regulations may conflict with the federal regulations. Pp. 250-255. 2. Until a state has adopted applicable rules on the subject, it cannot be known whether the state regulations will conflict with the federal regulations and any claim of supersedure is premature. Pp. 255–256. 156 F.2d 33, reversed. A district court dismissed complaints seeking to enjoin proceedings before the Illinois Commerce Commission in which the Chicago Board of Trade had been joined as a defendant. The Circuit Court of Appeals reversed. 156 F.2d 33. This Court granted certiorari. 329 U. S. 701. Reversed, p. 256. *Together with No. 473, Illinois Commerce Commission et al. v. Board of Trade of the City of Chicago, also on certiorari to the same Court. Opinion of the Court. 331 U.S. Lee A. Freeman argued the cause and filed a brief for petitioners in No. 471. William C. Wines, Assistant Attorney General of Illinois, argued the cause for petitioners in No. 473. With him on the brief was George F. Barrett, Attorney General, Howard Ellis argued the cause for respondent. With him on the brief was Weymouth Kirkland. Acting Solicitor General Washington, Assistant Attorney General Berge, Robert C. Barnard, W. Carroll Hunter and Lewis A. Sigler filed a brief for the United States, as amicus curiae, urging affirmance. Opinion of the Court by MR. JUSTICE DOUglas, announced by MR. JUSTICE BLACK. These are companion cases to Rice v. Santa Fe Elevator Corp. and Illinois Commerce Commission v. Santa Fe Elevator Corp., ante, p. 218, decided this day. Respondent in these cases, the Chicago Board of Trade, was joined as a defendant in the proceeding brought by Rice before the Illinois Commerce Commission. As we have noted in our opinion in the companion cases, the Rice complaint charged the defendant warehousemen with maintaining excessive, unreasonable and discriminatory rates and practices, with operating inadequate and unsafe facilities and services, and with failure to comply with other requirements of Illinois law. The Board of Trade, organized under a special Act of the Illinois legislature, operates a commercial grain exchange and has adopted rules and regulations governing transactions on the exchange. The complaint of Rice charges (1) that the rules and regulations of the Board are unreasonable and unsatisfactory in that, among other things, |