Johnson v. St. Paul & D. Ry. Co.

• Decision Date: 30 April 1890
• Parties: JOHNSON v ST. PAUL & D. RY. CO.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

43 Minn. 222

45 N.W. 156

JOHNSONvST. PAUL & D. RY. CO.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

April 30, 1890.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

1. Held, (following Lavallee v. Railway Co., 40 Minn. 249,41 N. W. Rep. 974,) that chapter 13, Laws 1887, applies only to employes of railway corporations exposed to the peculiar hazards connected with the use and operation of the road.

2. A crew of men, of which plaintiff was one, was engaged in repairing a bridge on defendant's road, and in performing the work it was necessary to leave the draw partly open. Through the negligence of one of the crew, the draw was left unfastened, and was blown shut by the wind, and injured the plaintiff while at work between the stationary part of the bridge and draw. Held, that defendant was not liable.

Appeal from district court, St. Louis county; STEARNS, Judge.

Draper & Davis, for appellant.

James Smith, Jr., W. H. Bliss, and White & Reynolds, for respondent.

MITCHELL, J.

The injury to plaintiff having been caused by the negligence of his fellow-servant, he cannot recover, unless under chapter 13, Laws 1887. In Lavallee v. Railway Co., 40 Minn. 249,41 N. W. Rep. 974, in which this statute was very fully considered, we held that it applied only to the peculiar hazards incident to the use and operation of railroads; that it must be construed as designed exclusively for the benefit of those who are in the course of their employment exposed to such hazards, and whose injuries are caused by them. And the more we consider the question the more are we confirmed in the opinion that it is only when construed as subject to some such limitation that the statute can be sustained as a valid law. As was said in the case referred to, to avoid the imputation of “class” legislation, the classification, in cases of special legislation, must be made upon some apparent, natural reason,-some reason suggested by necessity, by such a difference in the situation and circumstances of the subjects placed in different classes as suggests the necessity or propriety of different legislation with respect to them. If a distinction is to be made as to the liability of employers to their employes, it must be based upon a difference in the nature of the employment, and not of the employers. One rule of liability cannot be established for railway companies, merely as such, and another rule for other employers, under like circumstances and conditions, unless upon the theory suggested in Railway Co. v. Mackey, 127 U. S. 205,8 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1161, that the state may “prescribe the liabilities under which corporations created by its laws shall conduct their business in the future, where no limitation is placed upon its power in this respect by their charters,”-a proposition which, as thus broadly stated, that court, in view of its later utterances, could hardly have intended to announce. Indeed, the particular question now under consideration was not before the court, and, presumably, was not in mind. Neither would it relieve the act from the imputation of class legislation that it applies alike to all railroads. It has been sometimes loosely stated that special legislation is not class, “if all persons brought under its...