Illinois Cent. R. Co. v. Southern Seating & Cabinet Co.

• Decision Date: 21 May 1900
• Citation: 58 S.W. 303,104 Tenn. 568
• Parties: ILLINOIS CENT. R. CO. v. SOUTHERN SEATING & CABINET CO.
• Court: Tennessee Supreme Court

58 S.W. 303

104 Tenn. 568

ILLINOIS CENT. R. CO. v. SOUTHERN SEATING & CABINET CO.

Supreme Court of Tennessee.

May 21, 1900

Appeal from circuit court, Madison county; Levi S. Woods, Judge.

Action by the Southern Seating & Cabinet Company against the Illinois Central Railroad Company for damages caused by defendant's delay in shipping goods. From a judgment in favor of plaintiff, defendant appeals. Affirmed.

C. G Bond, for appellant.

Hays & Biggs, for appellee.

CALDWELL J.

This is an action of damages by a shipper against a common carrier. On the 26th of February, 1898, the Southern Seating & Cabinet Company, of Jackson, Tenn., entered into a contract with W A. R. Goodwin, rector, to manufacture and put up certain pews in St. John's Episcopal Church, at Petersburg, Va., for the sum of $524. The contract contained a provision that the company "shall forfeit $10.00 per day for every day it fails to have pews in place after May 6th, 1898," but that provision was subsequently so changed as to waive the forfeiture if the pews should arrive at Petersburg by the 3d day of the month. The pews were manufactured, and by the contracting company delivered to the Illinois Central Railroad Company, at Jackson, Tenn., on the 20th of April 1898, for shipment to the purchaser, at Petersburg, Va. The representative of the manufacturing and selling company at the time of delivering the pews for transportation said to the railway agent: "I wish you would forward this car as quick as you can. This is a penalty contract." The railway agent expressed assent to the request, and promptly executed a bill of lading, properly stating the name of the consignee and the destination of the pews. Nevertheless the car remained in Jackson two days after the issuance of the bill of lading, and, when it left, the waybill, through some inexcusable mistake of the railway agent, called for Parkersburg, W. Va., as the destination of the pews. The car reached the latter point on the 27th of April, and there remained until the 13th of May, when by direction of the defaulting carrier it was started to Petersburg, Va., its true destination, where it arrived on the 21st of May,--24 days later than it would probably have arrived but for the misdirection in the waybill, and 18 days after the contract limit for arrival of the pews had expired. The purchaser accepted the pews, but in doing so required a deduction of $180 from the contract price, and paid only the balance of $344. He says he deducted that sum not upon the mere ground that he had the right to do so under the forfeiture clause of the contract, but because he considered it "just compensation" for the inconvenience and expense resulting from the delay, and for the damage done to the pews "in the transportation, and that he would not have received the pews in their damaged condition, and after he had suffered the inconvenience and expense of the delay, without that deduction from the contract price. In December, 1898, the Southern Seating & Cabinet Company commenced this action against the Illinois Central Railroad Company before a justice of the peace, whose warrant stated the nature and ground of suit as follows: "For damages caused by the delay in shipping and delivering certain goods consigned by the plaintiff to W. A. R. Goodwin, Petersburg, Va., April 20, 1898, on account of which delay the said goods were damaged, and the plaintiff damaged in the sum of $180, forfeited by it under its contract for the delivery of said goods, of which the defendant had notice." The justice of the peace pronounced judgment in favor of the plaintiff, and the defendant appealed to the circuit court, where verdict and judgment were rendered for the plaintiff for $180, with interest. From the latter judgment the railway company has appealed in error to this court, and here assigned several objections to the proceedings below, on account of which a reversal and new trial are sought.

In the course of his charge, the trial judge instructed the jury as follows: "If the goods were shipped, and it was the fault of the railroad company in making a misdirection or misshipment that caused the delay after the 3d day of May 1898, and if the plaintiff in this case, through its agents and representatives, notified Mr. Reavvis or Col. Dinkins, or both of them, and they were representatives of the railroad company in receiving and shipping the goods, that it was a forfeit contract,--that it was a penalty contract,--and they received it with the knowledge that there was a penalty attached to the contract, then it would have been the duty of the railroad company to have shipped the goods; and if it accepted them that way, and was guilty of negligence in not getting them to Petersburg in the time stated in the contract, and it had ample time to have done so, then it would be liable for the damages the plaintiff has sustained because of the penalty contained in the contract. Now, the burden of proof is upon the plaintiff to show that the railroad employés did receive the goods for the purpose of shipping them, had notice of the penalty, and it was a penalty contract. If it did have notice of the penalty contract, and the goods were accepted by it to be shipped, and it was the fault of the railroad company that they were not delivered by that date, to wit, the 3d day of May, 1898, the railroad company would be responsible for the penalty of the contract, for the time the goods were not delivered, if the delay was caused by the fault of the railroad company." The first assignment of error is directed against that instruction; the point of objection being that it makes the loss sustained by the plaintiff under the penalty clause of its contract with Goodwin, and not the actual injury and depreciation of the pews by the delay, the measure of the defendant's liability. Compensation is the primary principle underlying the law of damages; and, where one of two contracting parties breaches his obligation, he is ordinarily liable to the other party, according to the nature and purpose of the contract, for all loss suffered by him as the natural consequence of the breach. In the case of Hadley v. Baxendale, 9 Exch. 341, where a carrier was sued in damages for negligent delay in the transportation of a mill shaft, the court, referring to the rule for the admeasurement of damages, said: "Where two parties have made a contract, which one of them has broken, the damages which the other party ought to receive in respect of such breach should be either such as may fairly and reasonably be considered as arising naturally (i. e. according to the usual course of things) from such breach of contract itself, or such as may reasonably be supposed to have been in contemplation of both parties, at the time they made the contract, as the probable result of the breach of it. Now, if the special circumstances under which the contract was actually made were communicated by the plaintiff to the defendant, and thus known to both parties, the damages resulting from the breach of such a contract, which they would reasonably contemplate, would be the amount of injury which would ordinarily follow from a breach of contract under the special circumstances so known and communicated. But, on the other hand, if these special circumstances were wholly...