Carson v. Godley
| Decision Date | 01 January 1856 |
| Citation | 26 Pa. 111 |
| Parties | Carson versus Godley. |
| Court | Pennsylvania Supreme Court |
H. J. Williams and C. E. Lex, for plaintiff in error.
J. Fallon and Serrill, contrà.
In the case of Godley v. Hagerty, 8 Harris 387, we held the present defendant responsible for an injury occurring at the same time and resulting from the same causes as that of which the plaintiffs in this action complain. It was shown in that case as in this that Mr. Godley had rented his building in Granite street to the government of the United States for a public warehouse, and that the agents of the government were engaged in storing sugar when it fell down, killing two men, breaking the arm of Hagerty, and damaging the goods of the present plaintiffs. In two particulars only, this case differs from Hagerty's. The plaintiffs here were importing merchants, and the injury was to their goods. Hagerty was a common labourer in the service of the government, and his injury was personal. But these diversities make no difference in the principles of law applicable to the two cases. If, as was urged in the argument, the government was bound to provide safe storage for the plaintiffs' goods whilst they were held in bond, it was equally due to Hagerty that he should not be set to work in an unsafe storehouse, to the peril of life and limb. If, therefore, the present plaintiffs, by reason of their relations to the government, were entitled to seek redress in that quarter, so was Hagerty. As the employee of the government, his relations were quite as direct and intimate with the public authorities — his privity quite as close — as any which the plaintiffs sustained, whilst the character of his injury gave him a superior right to compensation. Nor did we decide that the government was not liable to Hagerty. We decided only that Godley was. Counsel do not therefore distinguish this case from Hagerty's when they prove that these plaintiffs might have sought redress from the government. Let it be granted that they might, does it follow that Godley is not liable to them? By no means. An injured party is often entitled to redress against more than one wrongdoer, and it is never an objection to his action that he has passed by the intermediate agents of the mischief, and charged the responsibility home upon the author of the evil.
This case, then, incapable of being distinguished in principle from Hagerty's, ought to be considered as ruled by it. All the material facts were identical in the two cases. Judge BELL, not more distinguished for his learning than for the care and ability with which he tried causes at Nisi Prius, stated the principles on which the former case rested; and his judgment, after a severe professional criticism, and full consideration in this court, received our deliberate and unanimous sanction. And in the three years that have elapsed since that decision was pronounced, we have seen no occasion to question its principles, but experience and observation have tended rather to confirm them. Such is the eagerness of capitalists for large rewards, that when they undertake to build for the profits of rents, the temptation is strong to cheapen and slight the work. The safety of life and property is lost sight of in the dazzling prospect of a large rent from a small outlay. Foundations are put down and walls run up in such haste and with such materials as to be wholly inadequate for the purposes designed; the defects all the more pernicious and unpardonable, because concealed; and now and then the community are appalled by some shocking catastrophe involving loss of lives and limbs and property. The cupidity which is at the bottom of the mischief, true to nothing but its own instinct, will of course seek to charge the consequences of its folly on the tenant, as if because he was deceived, the original guilt was cancelled. Where the tenant has been guilty of negligent or improper use of the building, he is undoubtedly liable to parties injured by its fall, and even where there has been no negligence on his part, we do not say he is exempt, for that case has not yet occurred; but where as in the case before us, it is found, on abundant proof, there was no negligence either in the tenants or the plaintiff, it is a salutary rule of law that holds the owner answerable for his gross neglect in constructing and renting an insecure building. We have no thoughts of relaxing or qualifying a rule so obviously just and politic; but if we had, we would hardly do it in a case involving the very same circumstances to which we so recently applied it.
It may be proper, however, on account of the vehemence with which the rule is assailed, to examine its foundations a little more minutely than was done in the former case, to see if it be not well grounded in accepted principles and authorities of law.
The lease, in this case, contained no express covenant or condition, that the building was of any particular capacity or quality, and none is to be implied. The government took it for what it is called in the lease, a "five story store," and the only covenant which is to be implied, is that for quiet enjoyment. There was a while that the English courts acted on the principle that it was an implied condition of every lease, that the property was reasonably fit for the purpose for which it was let. As that a dwelling-house was in such decent repair as to be fit for habitation, Salisbury v. Marshall, 4 Car. & Payne 65, 19 E. C. L. R. 275; that its walls were safe, Edwards v. Etherington, Ryan & Moody 268, 21 E. C. L. R. 435; that the premises should not become untenantable by the bursting of a privy, Cowl v. Goodwin, 9 Car. & Payne 378, 38 E. C. L. R. 162; that the house was not infested with bugs, Smith v. Marrable, 11 M. & W. 5: but they have receded from all this, and hold now, that in a demise of land, there is no implied obligation on the part of the lessor, that it shall be fit for the purpose for which it was taken, Sutton v. Temple, 12 M. & W. 52; nor in the lease of a house, that it was at the time of the demise, or should be at the commencement of the term, in a reasonably fit state and condition for habitation.
In the case of Arden v. Putten, 10 M. & W. 321, the house became uninhabitable and utterly useless to the tenant by reason of original defects in the foundations; and it was held that the tenant could not, in consequence thereof, throw up the house and refuse to pay rent. "The tenant ought," said Baron ALDERSON, "to examine the house before he takes it." If the present action rested on the ground of contract, express or implied, it could not be sustained. Counsel argued with great propriety that if an implied warranty of the quality of a house could be deduced from a lease of it for a term, it would arise, likewise, from a conveyance of the fee, and run with the land, which would restrain alienation. Some torts result from contracts; but that for which this action was brought, has no such foundation. Its root is in the malfeasance of the defendant — in the misuse of that which is his own — not in the breach of any condition, express or implied. It is apparent, therefore, that the English cases adverted to, all of which proceed on contract, do not touch the ground assumed in Hagerty's case and the present.
The underlying principle of this case is found in that great maxim of the common law, sic utere tuo ut alienum non lædas. This is a principle of universal obligation, and it attended Mr. Godley when he undertook to cover his lot in Granite street with storehouses for the use of tenants. The application of this principle is illustrated by innumerable cases in the books. Setting aside all those that relate to mere personal rights and chattel interests, I select a few to show how it applies to an owner of real estate. And here again is a large class of cases such as grow out of obstructions of private ways, diversions of watercourses, and common nuisances, that may be omitted. But there is a class of cases in which the owner of real estate has been held liable in damages for that which it was perfectly lawful for him to do on his own premises, but which, done without that skill and prudence which he was bound to employ, has worked injury to...
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