  The uniqueness of the hypercharge assignments in the three fermion families
leptoquark-bilepton $SU(3)_C \times SU(4)_L \times U(1)_N$ model is
established. Although the gauge group contains an explicit U(1) factor, freedom
from triangle anomalies combined with the requirement of nonvanishing charged
fermion masses uniquely fix the electric charges of all fermions independently
of the neutrinos being massless or not. The electric-charge quantization,
family replication, and the existence of three colors are interwoven.
