Edward Steele v. A. A. Fuller

• Decision Date: 04 February 1932
• Parties: EDWARD STEELE v. A. A. FULLER
• Court: Vermont Supreme Court

158 A. 666

104 Vt. 303

EDWARD STEELE v. A. A. FULLER

Supreme Court of Vermont

February 4, 1932

Special Term at Rutland, November, 1932.

Contributory Negligence---When Question for Jury and When Question for Court---Automobiles---Negligence---Burden of Proof---Application of Rule That One May Assume Other Motorists Will Exercise Due Care---Reciprocal Rights of Motorists---Rules of Diligence Applicable---Duty of Operator To Maintain Lookout for Others on Highway---Knowledge with Which Motorist Chargeable---Relation of Speed to Ability To Stop within Range of Headlights---Acts 1925, No. 70 71---Headlights---Violation of Statute as Prima Facie Negligence---Rebuttable Presumption---Duty of Autoist When Blinded by Lights of Approaching Car---Sufficiency of Evidence To Show Contributory Negligence as Matter of Law.

1. Contributory negligence is ordinarily question of fact for jury, where law has settled no rule of diligence, but, when material facts are undisputed, and are so conclusive that but one reasonable deduction can be drawn therefrom, question is one of law for court.

2. In ACTION OF TORT for negligence, burden is on plaintiff to show that he was free from negligence that contributed in least decree to accident.

3. Rule that automobile operator may assume that other motorists would not obstruct highway unlawfully, and would show statutory lights if they stopped, applies only in favor of one whose own conduct measures up to that of prudent and careful man in like circumstances.

4. Motorists on public highways have equal and reciprocal rights to use thereof, standard of care being unvarying and alike at all times, that is, that of prudent man under all circumstances.

5. Rules of diligence adopted by courts and enacted by Legislature, which are intended to standardize rights and duties of users of highways, are additional factors to be considered in given situation by which negligence may be measured and determined between conflicting claimants exercising common right.

6. Operator of motor vehicle has duty at all times to maintain lookout for persons and property on highway, and to use reasonable care to avoid inflicting injuries on such persons or property.

7. Operator of motor vehicle is chargeable with knowledge of objects in highway which are in plain view.

8. One who drives automobile along public highway in dark must drive at such speed that automobile can be stopped within range of its headlights.

9. One driving automobile on public highway at night, lights of which would not show substantial object on road more than fifty feet ahead, violated Acts of 1925, No. 70, 71.

10. Where headlights of plaintiff's automobile would not show substantial object on highway more than fifty feet ahead, in violation of Acts of 1925, No. 70, 71, and, if lights had been according to requirements of such statute, he would have seen defendant's car standing on highway for at least ninety feet before he was blinded by lights of approaching car, which occurred when he was fifty feet from defendant's car, and could have avoided collision, held that under such circumstances violation of such statute made prima facie case of contributory negligence.

11. In action of tort for negligence, presumption of contributory negligence occasioned by plaintiff's violation of Acts of 1925, No. 70, 71, respecting headlights on his automobile held not conclusive, but rebuttable, and one which might be overcome by proof of attendant circumstances, burden being on plaintiff to meet or overcome prima facie case.

12. When operator of motor vehicle, driving in nighttime, is temporarily blinded by lights of approaching car, it is his duty either to stop until his vision is restored, or reduce his speed and have his car under such control that he can stop immediately if necessary; and failure to do so justifies charge of negligence.

13. Autoist driving automobile with defective headlights in violation of Acts of 1925, No. 70, 71, who upon being temporarily blinded by lights of approaching car failed to stop or reduce speed of his car, and when his vision was restored was so close to defendant's car standing in highway that he could not avoid running into it, held guilty of contributory negligence as matter of law.

ACTION OF TORT for negligence. Plea, general issue. Trial by jury at the March Term, 1931, Rutland County, Sturtevant, J presiding. Verdict and judgment for the plaintiff. The defendant excepted. The opinion states the case.

Judgment reversed, and judgment for the defendant to recover his costs.

Jones & Jones for the defendant.

Bert H. Stickney for the plaintiff.

Present: POWERS, C. J., SLACK, MOULTON, THOMPSON, and GRAHAM, JJ.

OPINION

THOMPSON

The plaintiff seeks to recover damages for personal injuries and damage to his automobile received in an automobile collision. There was a trial by jury, and a verdict and judgment thereon for the plaintiff. The defendant excepted. At the close of the evidence, the defendant moved for a directed verdict. The motion was denied. The only ground of the motion that we consider is that the plaintiff was guilty of contributory negligence as matter of law. The collision occurred on July 13, 1929, about nine o'clock p.m. At that time it was rather dark and cloudy. The defendant driving a Cadillac car, was traveling south on the main highway from Brandon to Rutland. He had a flat tire and stopped to change tires. The highway had a tarvia surface nineteen feet wide where the defendant stopped. About 250 or 300 feet south from that place is the brow of a hill which descends to the south. The defendant stopped his car on his right of the center of the highway with his right wheel about eighteen inches from the edge of the tarvia. For thirty or forty rods north of his car, and south to the brow of the hill, the highway is straight and nearly level; but with a slight upgrade to the south. The highway is of sufficient width so that another car could have passed defendant's car on either its left or right.

While the defendant was changing tires, the plaintiff who had driven automobiles fourteen years, approached from the north. He was driving a 1928 Chrysler sedan, model "52." His car was equipped with four-wheel hydraulic brakes and the headlights that came on that model of car. The plaintiff was traveling about twenty miles an hour as he approached defendant's car. A car traveling from the south passed the plaintiff about fifty feet north of defendant's car. The plaintiff was blinded by its headlights, and he did not see defendant's car until he was about twenty feet from it. He applied the emergency brake immediately when he saw he was going to run into it, but he was too close to stop and he collided with its rear while he was traveling about twenty miles an hour. He did not apply the foot brake. After the plaintiff saw defendant's car he did not attempt to pass it on its left. He testified as follows as to this matter: "Q. Did you turn your car to the left at all? A. No. Q. Was there any reason why you couldn't? A. No, sir. Q. Was there any obstruction in your way to prevent your driving your car to the left to pass the Fuller car? A. No. Q. You saw it twenty feet away? A. About twenty feet. Q. You already passed this other car going in the opposite direction. A. Ayeah. Q. So there was no obstruction as far as you could see, Mr. Steele, after you saw the Fuller car why you couldn't turn to the left? A. I was too close to it. Q. That was twenty feet, you were too close? A. Mh-hmh, the brakes didn't hold to stop me. Q. Did they slow you up at all? A. I don't remember. Q. You don't remember that? A. No."

The plaintiff also testified that when he was one hundred feet, and when he was sixty feet, from defendant's car he was not blinded by the headlights of the car approaching from the south, but he did not see defendant's car from either of those distances. He first testified that the headlights of his car would show objects in the road about thirty feet ahead; that the brakes were in good condition, and that the emergency brake would stop the car when traveling twenty miles an hour in about thirty feet. The following questions were then asked him and answers given: "Q. So you think you could stop your car exactly within the vision of your headlights? A. No, couldn't, slow it down some, couldn't exactly stop. Q. What, you couldn't exactly stop? A. No, just emergency brake, probably forty feet, stop still, slow down. Q. So you would have to go forty feet before you could stop your car? A. Mh-hmh. Q. With the application of emergency brake? A. Yes."

The plaintiff's son testified that the lights of the Chrysler car were tested about a month before the accident; that the lights were twenty-one candle power; that he drove the car in the night during the week of the accident with the same lights as of the night of the accident, and that they would show an object in the road fifty feet ahead.

It appears from the uncontradicted evidence of Robert Keith, a state inspector of motor vehicles, who had driven a Chrysler "52" equipped with twenty-one candlepower lights, in the nighttime, that if the brakes were in good mechanical condition they would stop such a car traveling twenty miles an hour in less than twenty-two feet, and if the lights were properly focused and adjusted they would show a substantial object in the road one hundred and fifty feet ahead of the car.

The negligent act of the defendant on which the plaintiff bases his right to recover is that the defendant did not have a lighted tail-lamp as required by the provisions of section 71, No. 70, Acts of 1925, and because of the absence of such light he ran into the defendant's car. While the evidence is conflicting, the jury, by...