Atchison, Topeka Santa Fe Railway Company v. Samuel Calhoun

• Decision Date: 23 February 1909
• Docket Number: No. 71,71
• Parties: ATCHISON, TOPEKA, & SANTA FE RAILWAY COMPANY, Plff. in Err. and Appt., v. SAMUEL CALHOUN, by Anna Calhoun, His Next Friend
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

213 U.S. 1

29 S.Ct. 321

53 L.Ed. 671

ATCHISON, TOPEKA, & SANTA FE RAILWAY COMPANY, Plff. in Err. and Appt.,

v SAMUEL CALHOUN, by Anna Calhoun, His Next Friend.

No. 71.

Argued and submitted January 12, 13, 1909.

Decided February 23, 1909.

Messrs. Robert Dunlap, Henry E. Asp, Charles H. Woods, and George M. Green for plaintiff in error and appellant.

Messrs. Selwyn Douglas and Henry H. Howard for defendant in error and appellee.

[Argument of Counsels from Pages 2-3 intentionally omitted] Mr. Justice Moody delivered the opinion of the court:

The defendant in error, hereafter called the plaintiff, brought an action in a district court of the territory of Oklahoma against the plaintiff in error, hereafter called the defendant, to recover damages suffered by him on account of an injury alleged to have resulted from the negligence of the defendant. He had judgment, which was affirmed by the supreme court of the territory, and the case is now here upon a writ of error directed to that court. The trial was by a jury, and, as one question of law before us is whether a verdict for the plaintiff was warranted, the evidence is reported in full. In returning a general verdict for the plaintiff, the jury also made special findings in response to 57 questions submitted to it, in accordance with the practice permitted in the territory. The only question of law which it is deemed necessary to determine is whether all the evidence, with the inferences which might properly be drawn from it, sustained the verdict for the plaintiff, upon the issue submitted to the jury. Instead of setting forth fully the material parts of the evidence, it seems better, with the aid of the special findings, to state the facts which it tended to prove. In hardly need be said that wherever there is a fair doubt, that aspect of the evidence most favorable to the plaintiff has been accepted.

Mrs. Calhoun and her son, the plaintiff, a boy a little less than three years of age, were passengers upon a southbound train of the defendant railroad. Their destination was Edmond in the territory of Oklahoma. The train, somewhat late, arrived at Edmond about 11:30 o'clock in the evening. Mrs. Calhoun had never traveled over the route before, the station was not called out by any of the trainmen, nor was she told by any of them that it was Edmond. In answer to a question, she was informed by other passengers that the train had arrived at Edmond, and she hastened to alight, leading the boy with her. When she reached the platform of the car the train had started up again, after, as the jury found, a stop of one minute, and she handed the boy to Mr. Robertson, another passenger on the train, who had left it momentarily, intending to return and resume his journey. Mr. Robertson was then standing upon the station platform. He took the child, handed him to his son, whom he had met at the station, returned to the steps of the car, and told Mrs. Calhoun not to jump off, as the car was running too rapidly. The station platform was dimly lighted, and no employee of the defendant rendered Mrs. Calhoun or her boy any assistance in leaving the train, nor gave them any warning.

The plaintiff was landed without injury on the station platform and put in the charge of Mr. Robertson's son by his father, who said: 'Keep the child and the train will stop and let the lady off.' Just then a young man or boy by the name of Carl Jones, supposed by Mr. Robertson's son to be a railroad official, though he was not, took up the child in his arms, ran along by the car, which was moving all the time with increasing rapidity, and attempted, without success, to return the child to its mother, who was standing on the platform of the car. Jones ran 75 to 100 feet to the end of the wooden station platform and then stumbled over a baggage truck, which had been used in unloading the baggage from the train, and had been left at the very end of the platform and partly on it, within a few feet of the rails. When Jones stumbled he lost his hold of the child, who fell under the car and was injured. The train consisted of the engine, followed by a mail car, baggage car, express car, smoking car, day coach, in which the plaintiff had been traveling, chair car, and a sleeper, in the order named. The baggage car, therefore, was some distance ahead of any passenger car, and the truck was used at the baggage car and left at or near the point where it had been used. Mrs. Calhoun started to leave the car at its south end, nearest the baggage car, and there was, therefore, between that point and the north end of the baggage car, the length of the express and smoking cars. Jones was not called as a witness by either party. None of the trainmen knew that Jones was attempting to put the plaintiff back on the train until after the injury.

The jury was instructed by the presiding judge that, as the plaintiff had been safely taken from the train and committed to the care of a young man on the station platform, there could only be a recovery by reason of what happened after that time. But the jury was instructed that the plaintiff might recover if it found that 'the company was guilty of negligence in leaving the truck in a dangerous position, and in not having the depot platform properly lighted, and that such condition directly and approximately contributed to the injury.' There was another ground of recovery submitted to the jury, but it was negatived by the findings and need not be considered further.

It is clear enough, upon this statement of facts, that the railroad did not exercise proper care to afford the plaintiff and his mother a reasonable opportunity to leave the car with safety. The train was late. The attention of the trainmen was fixed upon quick starting, and diverted from the care of the passengers, and the stop at the station was very brief. Taking these circumstances into account, with the failure to inform Mrs. Calhoun that she had arrived at her place of destination, there is no difficulty in concluding that the defendant was negligent. If Mrs. Calhoun and her son, as they were about to step upon the station platform, had been injured by the premature starting of the car, the defendant unquestionably would have been liable. But the injury did not occur in that way. Mrs. Calhoun handed the child to Mr. Robertson to take off the train, and she herself testified that 'the child was safely off the train; In saw it in the arms of the gentleman.'

The defendant contends that the jury was permitted to find for the plaintiff on...