Indianapolis Bloomington v. Flanigan

• Decision Date: 31 January 1875
• Citation: 77 Ill. 365,1875 WL 8325
• Parties: INDIANAPOLIS BLOOMINGTON AND WESTERN R. R. CO.v.MICHAEL J. FLANIGAN.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

77 Ill. 365

1875 WL 8325 (Ill.)

INDIANAPOLIS BLOOMINGTON AND WESTERN R. R. CO.

v.MICHAEL J. FLANIGAN.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

January Term, 1875.

APPEAL from the Circuit Court of Tazewell county; the Hon. JOHN BURNS, Judge, presiding. This was an action on the case, by Michael J. Flanigan, against the Indianapolis, Bloomington and Western Railroad Company. The opinion of the court states the nature and facts of the case with sufficient fullness. The plaintiff recovered judgment in the circuit court, for the sum of $6000, from which the defendant appealed.

Mr. JOHN B. COHRS, for the appellant.

Messrs. WHITNEY & FOSTER, and Messrs. ROBERTS & GREEN, for the appellee.

Mr. JUSTICE SCOTT delivered the opinion of the Court:

Plaintiff in this suit was a freight conductor on defendant's railroad. While in that service, it was a part of his duty, when occasion required it, to couple cars. He had been directed to leave at Mansfield station four empty freight cars belonging to the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company. It was about midnight when he arrived at the station, and, in setting off the cars, he found it would be necessary, in order to clear the crossing, to couple one of them with a White Line car that had previously been standing on the side-track. Both cars had attached what are called “double buffers,” the use of which is well understood by railroad men. The draw-bars in use on these cars have two apartments, to facilitate coupling with other cars of different height. Plaintiff first undertook, in his effort to make a coupling, to remove the pin in the draw-bar of the stationary car, but finding he would be unable to get it out, owing to some unexplained difficulty, before the approaching car would be upon him, he attempted, in his haste, to place the link in the lower apartment. By some most unfortunate movement, his arm was caught between the dead-wood attached to the cars, and so badly crushed that it had to be amputated.

Counsel assert two propositions on which it is sought to maintain the judgment in favor of plaintiff--

*367 First--Had the draw-bar on the still car been properly constructed, or in proper repair, so that the pin could have been drawn and the link changed to the upper apartment of the draw-bar, plaintiff would not have been injured in making, or attempting to make, the coupling.

Second--Had the car to be coupled, or either of them, not been equipped with double buffers, plaintiff would not have been injured.

Barring the objection it is not averred in the declaration plaintiff was injured by reason the draw-bar was improperly constructed, or that it was at the time out of repair, we do not think the evidence shows the railroad company was guilty of negligence in either particular assumed in the first proposition. There is absolutely no testimony that tends to show the draw-bar was not constructed after the most approved pattern. No witness ventures an opinion it was not well adapted to the purpose for which it was intended. Whether it was because it was out of repair plaintiff could not remove the pin readily, and if so, was it recent, the evidence fails to show. Had it suddenly become out of order, it can hardly be insisted defendant would be liable, unless attention had been called to the defect, or the company, by the exercise of a high degree of care, could have discovered it, and opportunity afforded in which to make the needed repairs. A contrary doctrine would impose a liability so strict as would make railroad companies insurers against all accidents and injuries to their employees. The law has laid upon them no such obligation.

But the case seems to have been tried in the court below on the theory assumed in the second proposition, viz: that it was negligence in defendant to permit cars to be used and operated on its road equipped with “double buffers.”

The cars alleged to have produced the injury to plaintiff were cars belonging to other companies--one to the White Line and the other to the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company. They had been received from connecting lines, and are that class of cars used almost exclusively in carrying through freights, and but seldom in local business. The custom is to distribute such cars empty at the several stations, and when loaded, send them to the sea-board or any distant points. Cars of this peculiar pattern and construction, for the transportation of through freights, are to be found in greater or less numbers upon all railroads in this State, and indeed upon all connecting lines in the whole country, of the same guage. Many of the most important and best conducted railroad companies in the United States have their cars for carrying through freights constructed with “double buffers.” The proof shows they give greater strength to the cars, by distributing more evenly the shock when they come together, as they often do, with great violence, affording better protection, not only to the car itself, but to the contents. Other advantages are claimed for them over cars constructed with single buffers, in turning short curves, and when it becomes necessary to push them, in ascending steep grades, with an engine in the rear.

Defendant's own cars used for its local business are constructed with the single dead-wood, directly above the draw-bar. Most, if not all the railroads in the State, use cars constructed in the same way for the local transportation; but upon the great and leading railroads of the State are to be found in constant use these foreign cars equipped with double dead-wood. It is the general custom to receive these cars from all connecting lines, and run them upon their own roads, only taking care that they are in good repair. Foreign cars are interchangeably used on all the principal railroads in the United States, and no company could do any considerable amount of freighting business that did not conform to this general usage.

No discrimination has ever been made, so far as the evidence in this record shows, against cars constructed with double...