Barnet v. New York Cent. & H.R.R. Co.

• Decision Date: 08 January 1918
• Citation: 118 N.E. 625,222 N.Y. 195
• Parties: BARNET et al. v. NEW YORK CENT. & H. R. R. CO.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

222 N.Y. 195

118 N.E. 625

BARNET et al.

v.NEW YORK CENT. & H. R. R. CO.

Court of Appeals of New York.

Jan. 8, 1918.

Appeal from Supreme Court, Appellate Division, Third Department.

Action by William Barnet and another against the New York Central & Hudson River Railroad Company. From a judgment of the Appellate Division (167 App. Div. 738,153 N. Y. Supp. 374), affirming a judgment for plaintiffs, defendant appeals. Reversed, and new trial granted.

H. Le Roy Austin, of Albany, for appellant.

Andrew J. Nellis, of Albany, for respondents.

ANDREWS, J.

On March 26, 1913, the plaintiffs shipped a carload of goods over the defendant's road from Rensselaer, New York, to a point in Maine. On the next morning this car was carried to the defendant's freight yard at Troy, N. Y., and left there on a switch track near a car containing unslacked lime. These yards were situated on the bank of the Hudson river. On the night of the 26th the water of the river had begun to rise. This rise was rapid, amounting to a fifth of a foot an hour until noon of the 27th, at which time it must have reached the tracks. Thereafter it continued to rise at the rate of a tenth of a foot an hour, until noon of the 28th, when the flood had reached an unprecedented height. As a result it washed into the car of lime and during the afternoon of the 28th that car was set on fire, the fire spread to the car containing the plaintiff's goods, and they were destroyed. This action is brought to recover for the loss so occasioned. Under the Carmack Amendment the carrier is made liable to the shipper of interstate freight for loss, damage, or injury caused by it, and no contract may relieve it of such liability.

[1][2] This act makes uniform hitherto divergent state rules as to the effect of agreements contained in bills of lading, and state courts when considering interstate shipments are bound by it and by the interpretation put upon it by the Supreme Court of the United States. This legislation supersedes all the policies of the state upon the same subject. Adams Express Co. v. Croninger, 226 U. S. 491, 33 Sup. Ct. 148, 57 L. Ed. 314,44 L. R. A. (N. S.) 257. This amendment does not, however, go further. It does not attempt to change the common-law rule as to the effect of an act of God in excusing the carrier where loss results proximately therefrom.

[3][4] In both the state and the United States courts where proof is given that goods are damaged in the hands of the carrier, the burden is upon him to show that the damage arose from some cause for which he was not liable. They differ, however, in this: In the United States courts where the carrier shows that the loss was occasioned by the act of God he has done all that is required. If the shipper then claims that the carrier's negligence also directly contributed to the injury, he must show that fact. In New York, on the other hand, the burden is upon the carrier to show both the act of God and his own freedom from contributing negligence. Michaels v. N. Y. C. R. R. Co., 30 N. Y. 564, 86 Am. Dec. 415;Read v. Spaulding, 30 N. Y. 630, 86 Am. Dec. 426. That is the only distinction. Both jurisdictions hold that the act of God to relieve the carrier must be the immediate, direct, and efficient cause of the loss. Neither excuse him if his own negligence also directly and proximately contributes to the result. They may have differed as to when negligence did so directly contribute, as in the case of delays. Not as to the rule, only as to its application. Condict v. Grand Trunk Ry. Co., 54 N. Y. 500;Cormack v. N. Y., N. H. & H. R. R. Co., 196 N. Y. 442, 90 N. E. 56,24 L. R. A. (N. S.) 1209,17 Ann. Cas. 949;St. Louis, I. M. & So. Ry. Co. v. Commcl. Un. Ins. Co., 139 U. S. 223, 11 Sup. Ct. 554, 35 L. Ed. 154; R. R. Co. v. Reeves, 10 Wall. 176, 19 L. Ed. 909.

As to the question of proximate cause, when we have to do with interstate shipments we must follow the United States courts. If however, the rule as to the burden of proof is simply a rule as to procedure and evidence we should be guided by our own precedents. For some purposes it has been so held by us. Sackheim v. Pigueron, 215...