The Lotta
| Decision Date | 31 January 1907 |
| Citation | 150 F. 219 |
| Parties | THE LOTTA. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit |
W Turner Logan, for the motion.
Mitchell & Smith, for the Lotta.
The question for decision is whether this court will enjoin the prosecution in the state court of a suit there pending brought by Vose, as administrator, against the owner of the steamboat Lotta for the recovery of damages for the death of his son. The Lotta is a small steamboat owned in Charleston and is engaged in the transportation of passengers in and about the harbor and the adjacent waters, on which the intestate was a passenger May 6, 1906 and the complaint in the state court alleges such fault and negligence as renders the owner liable for damages for his death. Section 2851 of the Civil Code of South Carolina provides as follows:
'Whenever the death of a person shall be caused by the wrongful act, neglect or default of another, and the act, neglect or default is such as would, if death had not ensued, have entitled the party injured to maintain an action and recover damages in respect thereof, then and in every such case the person or corporation who would have been liable of death had not ensued shall be liable to an action for damages, notwithstanding the death of the person injured, although the death shall have been caused under such circumstances as make the killing in law a felony.'
Subsequent sections provide for the manner and time in which such suits shall be brought. It was held in The Harrisburg, 119 U.S. 199, 7 Sup.Ct. 140, 30 L.Ed. 358, that, in the absence of an act of Congress or a state statute giving a right of action therefor, a suit in admiralty could not be maintained to recover damages for the death of a human being caused by negligence; and subsequently, in The Corsair, 145 U.S. 347, 12 Sup.Ct. 949, 36 L.Ed. 727, it was said that the courts of admiralty will look to the local law for the right to take cognizance of this class of cases.
The Circuit Court of Appeals of this circuit, in The Glendale, 81 F. 633, 26 C.C.A. 500, said that the Virginia statute, which expressly gave to the party injured a right to maintain an action or to proceed in rem against a ship or vessel, gave jurisdiction to the court of admiralty; but, as there is no such right given by the South Carolina statute, it seems that this court would be without jurisdiction in rem, as no such jurisdiction exists under the general maritime law. The action in the state court is in personam, and the owner of the Lotta, after the commencement of such suit, filed her petition in this court for a limitation of liability under the act of 1851 (Act March 3, 1851, c. 43, 9 Stat. 635), and by an ex parte proceeding has had the Lotta appraised, and has paid the appraised value thereof into the registry of the court and obtained an order of injunction restraining the prosecution of the suit in the state court. This was without notice to the plaintiff in the state court, who now moves to dissolve that injunction. The judiciary act (section 563, subd. 8, Rev. St. (U.S. Comp. St. 1901, p. 457)) remedy where the common law is competent to give it. As the right of action here was created by a state statute enacted subsequent to the passage of the judiciary act, it might be contended that the saving clause above cited should be limited to such causes of action as were known to the common law at that time; but, although not directly decided, it seems to be fairly inferable from Steamboat Company v. Chase, 16 Wall. (U.S.) 532, 21 L.Ed. 369, that this saving clause is applicable in all cases where the action in the state court is in form a common-law action against the person, without any of the ingredients of a proceeding in rem to enforce a maritime lien.
If this conclusion is correct, then it follows that the plaintiff in the state court has the right to pursue his remedy in the forum selected, unless the act of 1851 providing for a limitation of liability clearly deprives him of it. This act is now contained in sections 4282-4289 of the Revised Statutes (U.S. Comp. St. 1901, pp. 2943-2945). The great object of this law, as set forth by Justice Bradley in Norwich & N.Y. Transportation Company v. Wright, 13 Wall. (U.S.) 104, 20 L.Ed. 585, was to encourage shipbuilding and to induce capitalists to invest money in this branch of industry. They would not be likely to do so if, in addition to exposing their property to the hazards of the sea and to the management of seafaring men, they were to be made liable beyond the value of their vessels to losses and damages to an indefinite amount. To subserve that object the statute should be liberally interpreted, and the owners of ships should not be subjected to the payment of any damages beyond the value of their property; but a liberal interpretation does not demand such a construction as would enable parties invoking it to serve another and different purpose to that for which it was intended. The plaintiff in the state court is within his rights in asking to be allowed to pursue the remedy which the statute gives him to have his case tried by a jury, as is usual in common-law proceedings; and unless the statute for the limitation of liability, by its terms or by necessary implication, is intended to or does take away that right, the law which gives to this court its jurisdiction in 'all civil causes of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction' expressly reserves to all suitors the rights of the common-law remedy.
Section 4283 of the Revised Statutes (U.S. Comp. St. 1901, p. 2943) provides:
'The liability of the owner of any vessel for any embezzlement, loss or destruction, by any person, of any property, goods or merchandise, shipped by him on board of such vessel, or for any loss, damage or injury by collision, or for any act, matter or thing lost, damage or forfeiture done, occasioned or incurred, without the privity or knowledge of such owner or owners, shall in no case exceed the amount or value of the interest of such owner, and of such vessel and her freight then pending.'
This is the section declaring the limitation of liability.
Section 4284 (U.S. Comp. St. 1901, p. 2943) provides:
'Where any such embezzlement, loss or destruction is suffered by several freighters or owners and the whole value of the vessel, etc., is not sufficient to make compensation to each of them they shall receive compensation in proportion to their respective losses, and for that purpose the freighters and owners...
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