Colorado v. Johnson Iron Works, Limited

• Citation: 83 So. 381,146 La. 68
• Decision Date: 03 November 1919
• Docket Number: 23370
• Court: Louisiana Supreme Court
• Parties: COLORADO v. JOHNSON IRON WORKS, Limited

83 So. 381

146 La. 68

COLORADO v. JOHNSON IRON WORKS, Limited

No. 23370

Supreme Court of Louisiana

November 3, 1919

Rehearing Denied December 1, 1919

Appeal from Civil District Court, Parish of Orleans; Hugh C. Cage Judge.

Action by Mrs. Camilla Colorado, widow of George Creath, against the Johnson Iron Works, Limited. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiff appeals.

Affirmed.

George Sladovich, of New Orleans, for appellant.

Edward Rightor, of New Orleans, for appellee.

PROVOSTY J. MONROE, C. J., dissents.

OPINION

PROVOSTY, J.

Plaintiff 's husband was killed by an explosion while he was at work for the defendant company. Plaintiff charges that it was through the negligence of the defendant company, and claims damages under article 2315 of the Civil Code, which provides that --

"Every act whatever of man that causes damage to another obliges him by whose fault it happened to repair it."

Defendant excepted, on the ground that plaintiff's sole remedy was under the Employers' Liability Act. Act 20, p. 44, of 1914. This exception was sustained, and plaintiff's suit dismissed, with reserve of right to sue under the said act.

This act provides what shall be the liability of an employer to an employe, his widow, or his children in case of his being injured or killed in the course of his employment; and provides further, in its section 34:

"The rights and remedies herein granted * * * shall be exclusive of all other rights and remedies of such employe, his personal representatives, dependents, relations, or otherwise, on account of such injury."

Plaintiff contends that this does not have the effect of doing away with the remedy under article 2315, C. C., but that, if it does, said act cannot be understood as applying to the widow of the employe because between her and the employer there was no contractual relation, and therefore she cannot be held to have waived her right to sue under said article of the Code, and that if the said act is applicable to her case, and does supersede said article 2315, it is unconstitutional, because broader in these respects than its title, and is otherwise unconstitutional because it is a special law, and because it deprives her, without due process of law, of her right to sue under said article of the Code which right is her property.

Said act, by its plain and express terms, does make the remedy which it provides exclusive in a case like the present; it therefore does apply to this case, and does supersede article 2315 of the Code. And for so doing the title is broad enough, since it reads:

"An act prescribing the liability of an employer to make compensation for injuries received by an employe in performing services," etc.

The act does no more in its body than "prescribe the liability of an employer for injuries received by an employe in performing services" etc.

As to this law being "special," within the intendment of article 48 of the Constitution, forbidding the enactment of special or local laws, it is not such, since it applies to employers and employes in general. As to its depriving plaintiff of property without due process of law, it does nothing of the kind, for two reasons: First, because formerly the right to sue for the death of a human being, which is the right plaintiff is seeking to exercise, did not exist in this state, but was given by statute, and, of course, the Legislature may repeal a statute enacted by itself, or supersede it by another statute; second, because the regulation of what recourse one person may have against another for personal injury is a matter entirely within legislative discretion.

Plaintiff also contends that the said act...