Gerry v. Am. Exp. Co.
| Decision Date | 01 December 1905 |
| Citation | 62 A. 498,100 Me. 519 |
| Parties | GERRY et al. v. AMERICAN EXP. CO. |
| Court | Maine Supreme Court |
Exceptions from Supreme Judicial Court, Penobscot County.
Action by Freeland J. Gerry and others against the American Express Company. Verdict for plaintiffs for less than the amount claimed, and they except. Exceptions overruled.
Argued before WISWELL, C. J., and EMERY, STROUT, SAVAGE, and PEABODY, JJ.
Calvin W. Brown, for plaintiffs. C. F. Woodard, for defendant.
STROUT, J. Plaintiffs shipped by defendant company 61 cans of cream from Belfast to Boston. Before delivery it became frozen and was injured, and plaintiffs claim damages therefor. Defendant admits a limited liability only, and on the 18th day of October, 1904, tendered plaintiffs $55 in full for its liability, and brought the amount into court. Plaintiffs refused to accept it and claims to recover the value of the cream, stated to be $457.50, less amount realized from the butter made therefrom, Which left a net loss of $114.18, which plaintiffs seek to recover in this action.
Plaintiffs were presented by defendant with a book of blank receipts, in which plaintiffs entered their shipments. At the top of each sheet of these receipts there was printed, "The property hereinafter described to be forwarded subject to the terms and conditions of the company's regular form of receipt printed on inside cover of this book." Below this were entered the date, amount, and destination of each shipment, and receipted by defendant's agent when the goods were taken by him. Pasted on the inside cover of the book was a notice to shippers not involved here, and at the bottom, in larger type, the following: "The liability of this company is limited to $50, at which sum the property is hereby valued, unless the just and true value is stated in this receipt." In the receipt for the shipment of this cream no value was stated. Defense claims that plaintiffs are bound by this limitation. The presiding justice ordered a verdict for plaintiffs for $52.25, that being for $50 and interest thereon from the date of shipment to the date of the tender. To this ruling exception was taken. There is also the general motion for a new trial.
It is well settled that a common carrier may "limit his responsibility for property intrusted to him by a notice containing reasonable and suitable restrictions, if brought home to the owner of goods delivered for transportation, and assented to clearly and unequivocally by him," and if it appears "that the terms on which the carrier proposed to carry the goods were adopted as the contract between the parties, according to which the service of the carrier was to be rendered." Fillebrown v. Grand Trunk Ry. Co., 55 Me. 468, 92 Am. Dec. 606. The limitation in de...
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