Collins v. Spielman
| Decision Date | 25 May 1942 |
| Docket Number | 36574. |
| Citation | 200 La. 586,8 So.2d 608 |
| Court | Louisiana Supreme Court |
| Parties | COLLINS v. SPIELMAN. |
Shapiro & Shapiro, of Alexandria, for applicant.
T A. Carter and J. M. Shevnin, both of Alexandria, for respondents.
This is a suit to recover compensation for the loss of an eye, suffered while the plaintiff was performing his duties arising out of and incidental to his employment, and is before us on a writ of certiorari for a review of the judgment of the Court of Appeal for the Second Circuit, 8 So.2d 606, reversing the judgment of the lower court awarding the plaintiff compensation for 100 weeks at $2.79 a week.
The record shows that the plaintiff was employed by the defendant as a general farm hand from 1935 until January 18, 1940, fourteen days after the occurrence of the accident, at which time he was discharged. He was required to do any and all kind of work about the place when directed so to do by his employer. For this he was paid a daily wage of $1.05, and, in addition was furnished with a two-room house as living quarters, as well as all of his water and wood. When the plaintiff was required to do nothing but milk and feed the cows, he was paid at the rate of 40� a day. While it is not clear whether this 40� was in addition to the $1.05 a day, we gather from the testimony as a whole that if he worked by the day, he did the milking and all other work required of him for the stipulated price of $1.05. During the farming season the plaintiff was required to operate a tractor. He was also required to deliver the milk three times a week by truck. He was permitted to farm approximately two acres of land for himself, on which he raised an average of two bales of cotton a year, or some corn, half of the proceeds of the sale of these commidities being paid to his employer, the defendant.
The injury which gave rise to this suit resulted when a stick which plaintiff was using to drive the defendant's cows into the dairy barn for milking broke off, hitting him in the eye.
The question that is presented for our consideration is whether or not the defendant was engaged in a hazardous business within the meaning and contemplation of sub-section (a) paragraph 2, of Section 1 of Act No. 20 of 1914, as amended.
This court has held that farming is not a hazardous occupation per se. Shipp v. Bordelon, 152 La. 795, 94 So. 399; Robichaux v. Realty Operators, Inc., 195 La. 70, 196 So. 23, and Robinson v. Atkinson, 198 La. 238, 3 So.2d 604. Nor is the operation of a dairy so classified. Rayburn v. De Moss, 194 La. 175, 193 So. 579. But this court, as well as the courts of appeal of this state, have held that while the main business or occupation of the employer is neither hazardous per se nor so declared to be by the act, an employee may be considered to come under the act if in connection with the principal business or occupation, or incidental thereto, the employer conducts a subsidiary line of business that is hazardous, or when there is used in connection with such business machinery or other hazardous appliances or equipment. Byas v. Hotel Bentley, Inc., 157 La. 1030, 103 So. 303; Rayburn v. De Moss, supra; Stockstill v. Sears-Roebuck & Co., La.App., 151 So. 822, and Staples v. Henderson Jersey Farms, Inc., La.App., 181 So. 48.
In the Staples case, the Court of Appeal for the Second Circuit, relying on the Byas case, held, as a well-settled point of law, that when an employee is required to perform services in both hazardous and nonhazardous departments of branches of a business, he may recover compensation even though at the time he is injured he was performing services in the nonhazardous branch thereof. See, also, Youngblood v. Colfax Motor Co., Inc., 12 La.App. 415, 125 So. 883.
In the instant case the Court of Appeal recognized the existence of the authorities just referred to and admitted its inability to distinguish them from the case at bar, but it declined to follow this line of jurisprudence, being of the opinion that it had never been the intention of the legislature to extend the provisions of the compensation act to all classes of employment, particularly 'the small farmer or small merchant.'
We are unable to agree with the appellate court for, as pointed out in this opinion, the plaintiff here was required to operate a tractor during the farming season and to drive a truck in delivering the milk from the dairy. Both of these vehicles are motor driven and, under the doctrine laid down in the case of Haddad v. Commercial Motor Truck Co., 146 La. 897, 84 So. 197, 9 A.L.R. 1380, are classified as hazardous. Consequently, the plaintiff was entitled to compensation for the loss of his right eye under Section 8 of Act No. 20 of 1914, as amended by Act No. 242 of 1928, in the...
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Edwards v. Louisiana Forestry Com'n
...we find from the testimony amounted to $50 a month, must be added to the plaintiff's salary in determining his base pay. Collins v. Spielman, 200 La. 586, 8 So.2d 608. It makes no difference whether all towermen were furnished living quarters, for the record affirmatively shows that this ho......
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Finn v. Employers' Liability Assur. Corp., General Acc., Fire & Life Assur. Corp., Intervenor
...occupations been held to be hazardous within the intent of the statute. Fontenot v. Fontenot, 234 La. 480, 100 So.2d 477; Collins v. Spielman, 200 La. 586, 8 So.2d 608; Troquille v. Lacaze's Estate, La.App.2d Cir., 1952, 59 So.2d 505. However, the operation of machine shops, thrashing and h......
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Allen v. Travelers Ins. Co.
...an automobile in the delivery of milk and of a tractor in farming operations, a farm-dairy becomes a hazardous business, Collins v. Spielman, 200 La. 586, 8 So.2d 608; and that the insurance business can be characterized as hazardous if it entails the operation of automobiles as a necessary......
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Fontenot v. J. Weingarten, Inc.
...injured while working in a nonhazardous phase of his employment. Byas v. Hotel Bentley, Inc., 157 La. 1030, 103 So. 303; Collins v. Spielman, 200 La. 586, 8 So.2d 608; Luce v. New Hotel Monteleone, 234 La. 1075, 102 So.2d 461; and Richard v. United States Fidelity & Guaranty Co., 247 La. 94......