237 U.S. 648 (1915), 776, St. Louis, Iron Mountain & Southern

• Citation: 237 U.S. 648, 35 S.Ct. 704, 59 L.Ed. 1160
• Party Name: St. Louis, Iron Mountain & Southern
• Case Date: June 01, 1915
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

Page 648

237 U.S. 648 (1915)

35 S.Ct. 704, 59 L.Ed. 1160

St. Louis, Iron Mountain & Southern

No. 776

United States Supreme Court

June 1, 1915

Railway Company v. Craft

Argued May 12, 1915

ERROR TO THE SUPREME COURT

OF THE STATE OF ARKANSAS

Syllabus

In this case, as there was uncontradicted evidence that decedent survived his injuries, although only for something more than half an hour, and that the injuries were such as to cause extreme pain if he remained conscious, and there was conflicting evidence as to whether he did remain conscious, those questions were properly submitted to the jury, and the question for this Court is not which way the evidence preponderated, but whether there was evidence from which the jury could reasonably find that decedent did endure conscious pain during the period between his injury and death.

While, in this case, there was evidence to go to the jury on those questions, generally such pain and suffering as are substantially contemporaneous with death, or mere incidents to it, afford no estimation or award of damages under such statutes as the Employers' Liability Act.

By the common law, the death of a human being, although wrongfully caused, affords no basis for a recovery of damages, and a right of action for personal injuries dies with the person injured; in cases under the Employers' Liability Act, the right of recovery depends entirely upon that statute, the state statutes being superseded thereby. Under the Employers' Liability Act, as originally enacted in 1908,

Page 649

there was no provision for the survival of the right given to the injured person, and the right as at common law died with him, but under the act as amended in 1910 that right of action survives to the personal representatives of the decedent for the benefit of the widow, husband, children, parents or dependent next of kin, as specified in § 9 of the act as amended.

A provision brought into a federal statute by way of amendment, expressing the deliberate will of Congress, must be given effect, and, construing §§ 1 and 9 of the Employers' Liability Act, as amended, together, the personal representative of a deceased employee is to recover, on the part of the designated beneficiaries, not only such damages as will compensate them for their own pecuniary loss, but also such damages as will be reasonably compensatory for the loss and suffering of decedent while he lived.

Such a recovery is not a double recovery for a single wrong, but a single recovery for a double wrong.

Quaere whether, under the final clause of § 9 of the Employers' Liability Act, as amended in 1910, providing that there shall be only one recovery for one injury, the personal representative of a deceased employee can recover where there has been a recovery by decedent in his lifetime.

The provisions in § 9 of the Employers' Liability Act, as amended in 1910, that there shall be only one recovery for one injury does not restrict the personal representative of a decedent who suffered pain after the injury and before death to one basis of recovery to the exclusion of tho other, or require him to make a choice between them; it does, however, limit him to one recovery of damages for both, and thus avoid needless litigation in separate actions.

While reports of Committees of the different Houses of Congress in regard to bills in their charge cannot be taken as giving to the act as passed a meaning not fairly within its words, they may be persuasive as showing that its words should not be wrongly construed.

The amount of a verdict for damages for suffering, although apparently large, in this case $5,000 for pain endured during a period of thirty minutes, involves only questions of fact, and is not reviewable here under § 237, Judicial Code. The power, and with it the duty and responsibility, of dealing with such questions rests upon the courts below.

171 S.W. 1185 affirmed.

The facts, which involve the construction and application of the Employers' Liability Act of 1908 and the

Page 650

Amendment of 1910 and the right of the administrator of an employee killed by negligence of the employer to recover not only for the death of, but also for the pain and suffering endured by, decedent, are stated in the opinion.

Page 653

VANDEVANTER, J., lead opinion

MR. JUSTICE VAN DEVANTER delivered the opinion of the Court.

This was an action under the Employers' Liability Act of April 22, 1908, 35 Stat. 65, c. 149, and the amendment of April 5, 1910, 36 Stat. 291, c. 143, by an administrator to recover for injuries to and the death of his intestate. The action was for the benefit of the father, there being no surviving widow, child, or mother, and the damages sought were for (a) pecuniary loss to the father by reason

Page 654

of the death and (b) conscious pain and suffering of the decedent before the injuries proved fatal. In the trial court, the plaintiff had a verdict and judgment awarding $1,000 for the pecuniary loss to the father and $11,000 for the pain and suffering of the decedent, and the supreme court of the state, after reducing the latter sum to $5,000, affirmed the judgment. 171 S.W. 1185.

Without questioning that the evidence justified an assessment of damages for the father's pecuniary loss, the defendant insists, as it did in both state courts, that the recovery could not include anything for [35 S.Ct. 705] pain and suffering of the decedent, first because there was no evidence that he endured any conscious pain or suffering, and second because the statute requires that the recovery in such cases be restricted to either the pecuniary loss to the designated beneficiaries or the damage sustained by the injured person while he lived, and does not permit a recovery for both.

The first objection must, as we think, be overruled. The record discloses that the decedent survived his injuries more than a half hour, and that they were such as were calculated to cause him extreme pain and suffering, if he remained conscious. A car passed partly over his body, breaking some of the bones, lacerating the flesh and opening the abdomen, and then held him fast under the wheels with a brake rod pressing his face to the ground. It took fifteen minutes to lift the car and release his body, and fifteen minutes more to start him to the hospital in an ambulance. It was after this that he died, the time not being more definitely stated. As to whether he was conscious and capable of suffering pain, the evidence was conflicting. Some of the witnesses testified that he was "groaning every once in a while," and that, when they were endeavoring to pull him from under the car "he would raise his arm" and "try to pull himself," while others testified that they did not notice these indications

Page 655

of consciousness, and that he seemed to be unconscious from the beginning. The jury found that he was conscious, and both state courts accepted that solution of the dispute. Of course, the question here is not which way the evidence preponderated, but whether there was evidence from which the jury reasonably could find that, while he lived, he endured conscious pain and suffering as a result of his injuries. That question, we are persuaded, must be answered in the affirmative. But, to avoid any misapprehension, it is well to observe that the case is close to the borderline, for such pain and suffering as are substantially contemporaneous with death or mere incidents to it, as also the short periods of insensibility which sometimes intervene between fatal injuries and death, afford no basis for a separate estimation or award of damages under statutes like that which is controlling here. The Corsair, 145 U.S. 335, 348; Kearney v. Boston & Worcester R. Co., 9 Cush. 108; Kennedy v. Standard Sugar Refinery, 125 Mass. 90; Tully v. Fitchburg R. Co., 134 Mass. 499, 504; Mulchahey v. Washburn Car Wheel Co. 145 Mass. 281; St. Louis &c. Ry. v. Dawson, 68 Ark. 1; Burch v. St....