Keyley v. Cent. R. Co. of N.J.

• Decision Date: 05 March 1900
• Citation: 45 A. 811,64 N.J.L. 355
• Parties: KEYLEY v. CENTRAL R. CO. OF NEW JERSEY.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

45 A. 811

64 N.J.L. 355

KEYLEY

v. CENTRAL R. CO. OF NEW JERSEY.

Court of Errors and Appeals of New Jersey.

March 5, 1900.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Error to circuit court, Union county.

Action by Thomas Keyley against the Central Railroad Company of New Jersey. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiff brings error. Affirmed.

Samuel Kalisch, for plaintiff in error.

R. V. Lindabury, for defendant in error.

VREDENBURGH, J. It seems to me that the proper determination of the questions raised by the writ of error in this case does not justify an extended opinion. To do so would but burden our Law Reports with repetition of principles already fully and carefully laid down by this court. The plaintiff in error was properly nonsuited in the court below for his contributory negligence. That negligence consisted in his attempting to cross the railroad tracks with undue speed, and without stopping, at a dangerous surface crossing on First street, in the city of Elizabeth, near the works of the Singer Sewing-Machine Company. That crossing was made especially dangerous by the large number of railroad tracks (the evidence says between 15 and 20) at that point, and by the fact that coal and box cars were standing on the second track, so as to prevent the plaintiff from seeing a coal car slowly moving on the third track he was about to cross. The counsel of the plaintiff in error urges in his brief that the present case should be distinguished from the case of Railroad Co. v. Smalley, 61 N. J. Law, 277, 39 Atl. 695, which is said to have controlled the ruling of the circuit court below, in that "the obstructions which prevented the plaintiff from seeing were created by the railroad company." While this fact furnishes some reason why the company may be indictable for maintaining a public nuisance on First street, it affords no excuse for the folly of the plaintiff in error in blindly trotting his horse over two railroad tracks, and into a place of danger, where he could not see nor hear the moving car until, to use his own words, it was "right on top" of him. In the case just cited, this court declared that "the plaintiff went forward into a danger which permanent obstructions made it impossible to see, and which a passing noise made it difficult to hear. The permanence of the obstruction to sight made hearing his best reliance. A few minutes' delay would have given him the full benefit of it. In advancing at once, while circumstances interfered with its efficient...