Farmer v. Atlantic Coast Line R. Co.

• Decision Date: 09 May 1913
• Citation: 205 F. 319
• Parties: FARMER v. ATLANTIC COAST LINE R. CO.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit

205 F. 319

FARMER v. ATLANTIC COAST LINE R. CO.

United States District Court, E.D. South Carolina.

May 9, 1913

J. W Ragsdale, of Florence, S.C., for plaintiff.

Willcox & Willcox, of Florence, S.C., for defendant.

SMITH District Judge.

This matter came on to be heard upon a motion on behalf of the plaintiff to be allowed to amend the complaint herein in certain particulars.

This action was originally begun on the 1st day of April, 1907, by the plaintiff, to recover from the defendant the sum of $10,000 damages alleged to have been sustained by him as the result of certain injuries suffered while in the employ of the railroad company. The complaint alleged that on August 2, 1906, while employed by the railroad company, the plaintiff was directed by J. J Brown, the railroad company's foreman in charge of the work, to chain together two cars; that while so engaged the defendant, its agents and servants, negligently, willfully and wantonly, without giving any warning to the plaintiff, caused its said engine to suddenly strike and move said cars together, thereby catching the plaintiff between the said cars, giving to him thereby grievous bodily injuries, etc. The railroad company filed an answer, setting up a general denial, and also alleging that the injuries to the plaintiff were received by him as the result of his own contributory negligence. The cause came on for trial in the Circuit Court of the United States for this district on the 5th of March, 1908, and upon the trial a verdict was rendered by the jury in favor of the plaintiff for $5,000, upon which a judgment was afterwards entered up. From this judgment a writ of error was sued out by the defendant, the railroad company, to the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, and upon the hearing in that court that court made its judgment reversing the judgment below. 176 F. 692, 100 C.C.A. 244. The mandate from the Circuit Court of Appeals to the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of South Carolina was filed in the latter court on the 2d of December, 1909. The mandate orders and directs as follows:

'It is now here ordered and adjudged by this court that the judgment of the said Circuit Court in this cause be and the same is hereby reversed, with costs, and the cause is remanded to the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of South Carolina, at Florence, with directions to set aside the verdict and grant a new trial in accordance with the opinion of this court.

'November 8, 1909.

Nathan Goff.'

In the opinion filed by the Circuit Court of Appeals it was held that the trial judge in the Circuit Court erred in not directing a verdict in favor of the defendant, on the ground that the only reasonable conclusion to be drawn from the testimony was that the plaintiff's injuries resulted from the negligence of his fellow servant, the engineer. In its opinion the Circuit Court of Appeals concurs with what it construes to be the opinion of the trial judge below, that the engineer was the fellow servant of the plaintiff. It finds, however, that the trial judge erred because it was left to the jury to say whether Brown, the foreman, was negligent in permitting the engineer to move back after Brown's directing the plaintiff to go between the cars. The court held that it appeared from the testimony in the cause that the injury inflicted upon the plaintiff was the result of the engineer moving the cars back when the plaintiff was between them; that Brown, the foreman, had directed the plaintiff to go between the cars and do the work in question, but that the foreman, having seen the engineer signaled to remain where he was, and observing there was ample space for the plaintiff to go between the cars at the time, was not shown to have been guilty of negligence, but that it appeared that the injury was due to the fact that the engineer moved the cars back improperly, and it was therefore due to the negligence of the engineer, who was a fellow servant of the plaintiff, and that the plaintiff was not entitled to recover.

'For the reasons herein stated, the judgment of the court below is reversed, and the cause remanded, with instructions to proceed in accordance with the views herein announced.'

Upon the motion for leave to amend, the defendant objected upon the following grounds: (1) That the reversal of the cause by the Circuit Court of Appeals put an end to the case. (2) The motion comes too late.

The position that the reversal of the cause by the Circuit Court of Appeals put an end to the case is rested upon the practice in the state courts of South Carolina, and rests upon the principles decided by the Supreme Court of South Carolina in Crosby v. Railroad, 83 S.C. 575, 65 S.E. 827. That case is based upon the effect of rule 27 of the Rules of the Supreme Court of the State of South Carolina (56 S.E. v), which provides that whenever an appeal to the Supreme Court is sustained on the ground that a nonsuit should have been granted, or a verdict directed because of a total failure of evidence, or because the evidence could admit of but one inference, the reversal of the judgment should have the same effect as if the nonsuit had been ordered or a verdict returned under the direction of the circuit judge.

The contention of the defendant is based upon the assumption that if this case had been a case in the state court of South Carolina, and an appeal had been taken from the refusal of the trial judge to direct a verdict (as in this case a writ of error was taken to the judgment upon that ground), and the Supreme Court of South Carolina had reversed the judgment below, that would have been an end to the case, inasmuch as under the rule of practice in that court the reversal of the judgment is to have the same effect as if a verdict had been returned under the direction of the circuit judge. This argument, however, would only apply here if the rule of practice upon such writs of error in the federal courts is the same as the rule of practice upon appeals in such cases in the state court. The Conformity Act of 1872 of the United States has no application, for according to the terms of that act as set out in section 914 of the United States Revised Statutes (U.S. comp. St. 1901, p. 684) its provisions are applicable only to causes in the Circuit and District Courts, and not to causes in the appellate courts, of the United States. The practice in such cases in the federal courts is governed by the constitutional, statutory, and common-law provisions applicable to writs of error in actions at law in appellate courts of the United States, and by the rules of those courts.

The mandate from the Circuit Court of Appeals is that the verdict be set aside and a new trial granted. The contention of the defendant in opposition to granting any amendment is that the mandate is not controlling, but that this court is to look to the opinion of the Circuit Court of Appeals. The rule of the federal courts, however, is that the mandate is the...