Indus. Comm'n of Ohio v. Weigandt

CourtUnited States State Supreme Court of Ohio
Citation130 N.E. 38,102 Ohio St. 1
Docket NumberNo. 16545.,16545.
PartiesINDUSTRIAL COMMISSION OF OHIO v. WEIGANDT.
Decision Date18 January 1921

102 Ohio St. 1
130 N.E. 38

INDUSTRIAL COMMISSION OF OHIO
v.
WEIGANDT.

No. 16545.

Supreme Court of Ohio.

Jan. 18, 1921.


Error to Court of Appeals, Shelby County.

Proceedings under the Workmen's Compensation Act by Ernest Weigandt, employé, against the Sidney Tool Company, employer, to recover for personal injuries. The claim was rejected by the Industrial Commission, and on appeal to the Court of Common Pleas judgment for the employé was rendered, which judgment was affirmed by the Court of Appeals, and the Industrial Commission brings error. Affirmed.

The defendant in error, Ernest Weigandt, was an employé of the Sidney Tool Company. On October 13, 1917, he arrived at the plant of the company a short time before work commenced, had punched the time clock, and was proceeding toward the machine where his duties were performed. Two other employés had gotten into a friendly scuffle with reference to a file which one of them held in his hand. While this scuffle was in progress Weigandt passed near by, and the file in question flew from the handle in which it was and struck him in the left eye, destroying its sight. Defendant in error within time filed his claim for compensation with the plaintiff in error commission. The commission thereafter rejected the claim on the ground that the injury was not sustained while in the course of claimant's employment. The defendant in error filed his appeal in the court of common pleas. In his petition the facts were alleged substantially as above. Plaintiff in error interposed a demurrer, which was overruled by the court, and thereafter issues of fact were made up and the case tried before a jury. There was a verdict in favor of the defendant in error, and the judgment entered on this verdict was affirmed by the Court of Appeals. This proceeding is brought to reverse that judgment.



Syllabus by the Court

While an employé in compliance with his duty was in the factory where he was employed, going to his machine, he was struck in the eye and injured by a file, which flew from its handle during a friendly scuffle for it by two other employés. Held, the injury was one occasioned in the course of the workman's employment within the Workmen's Compensation Law.

The test of right to award from the insurance fund under the Workmen's Compensation Law, for injury in the course of employment is not whether there was any fault or neglect on the part of the employer, or his employés, but whether the employment had some causal connection with the injury, either through its activities, its conditions, or its environments.

The provisions of the law do not cover an injury which had its cause outside of and disconnected with the business in which an injured workman was employed. Fassig v. State ex rel., 95 Ohio St. 232, 116 N. E. 104, approved and followed.

The statute was intended to provide a speedy and inexpensive remedy as a substitute for previous unsatisfactory methods and should be liberally construed in favor of employés.


[Ohio St. 3]John G. Price, Atty. Gen, R. R. Zurmehly, of Columbus, and Robert E. Marshall, of Sidney, for plaintiff in error.

Chas. C. Hall and H. K. Forsyth, both of Sidney, for defendant in error.


JOHNSON, J.

The decisive question is whether the facts, which are substantially undisputed, bring the case within the Workmen's Compensation Law. Was the defendant in error injured ‘in the course of his employment,’ within its meaning?

There has been divergence of judicial decision concerning the scope of the quoted phrase and its application to different circumstances. $The Ohio law was passed pursuant to section 35, article 2 of the Constitution adopted in September, 1912, pertinent parts of which are as follows:

‘For the purpose of providing compensation to workmen * * * for * * * injuries * * * occasioned in the course of such workmen's employment, laws may be passed establishing a state fund to be created by compulsory contribution thereto by employers * * *. Laws may be passed establishing a board which may be empowered to classify all occupations, according to their degree of hazard, to fix rates of contribution to such fund according to such classification.’

[Ohio St. 4]The act now in force, under which defendant in error claims (103 O. L. 72-92), was passed pursuant to the grant of power contained in the above provision of the Constitution, and provides (section 1465-68, General Code) for compensation to ‘every employé * * * who is injured * * * in the course of employment.’

The act was in effect an amendment of the act of May 31, 1911 (102 O. L. 524-548), which provided for the establishment of a state insurance fund from premiums paid by employers

[130 N.E. 39]

and employés in the manner prescribed in the act. The validity of the earlier statute was upheld by this court, and the general scheme of the law, with the provisions for the establishment and disbursement of the insurance fund, was sustained as a valid exercise of the police power by the Legislature. It was pointed out in the decision that the act was not compulsory. State ex rel. Yaple v. Creamer, Treas....

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