Louisville & N.R. Co. v. Woodford
| Decision Date | 28 March 1913 |
| Citation | 153 Ky. 185,154 S.W. 1083 |
| Parties | LOUISVILLE & N. R. CO. v. WOODFORD. |
| Court | Kentucky Court of Appeals |
On petition for rehearing. Overruled. For former opinion, see 153 S.W. 722.
We agree with counsel for appellant that the state courts must take judicial notice of acts of Congress no less than acts of the state Legislature; and that it is not essential that the federal question should have been raised in any special form in the trial court, but it is essential that the facts on which the federal question rests must be presented in the record. The defense which the defendant now relies on does not arise under the act of Congress; it arises under a written contract, and the provisions of this written contract were not pleaded. The bill of lading was not filed with the petition; it was filed in the action after the answer was filed in response to a rule, and is not a part of the pleadings.
The bill of lading contains a number of clauses limiting and restricting the defendant's liability in certain contingencies. If the defendant desired to rely upon any of these clauses limiting its liability, it was incumbent upon it to plead the clause in its answer. It was not incumbent upon the plaintiff to anticipate and negative all the exceptions set out in the separate clauses of the contract. Ætna Life Ins. Co. v. Rustin, 151 Ky. 108, 151 S.W 366. The defendant did not set out in its answer or in any pleading any of the conditions of the contract, and, not having pleaded the provisions of the contract, they were not before the trial court, and are not before this court. The provisions of the contract not having been pleaded, no federal question is presented as to the validity of the contract.
It is true that on the motion for new trial the federal question was suggested in argument, but the trial was then over. It was too late to file an amended answer (Meadows v Goff, 90 Ky. 540, 14 S.W. 535, 12 Ky. Law Rep. 495; Brown v. Van Cleave, 86 Ky. 381, 6 S.W. 25, 9 Ky. Law Rep. 593), and by section 386 of the Code it was the duty of the court to enter judgment for the party whom the pleadings entitled thereto. The defendant having failed to plead the provisions of the written contract relied on, there was nothing which the court could consider to sustain the federal question on the argument of the motion for new trial. The matter not having been presented in the circuit court in such a manner that...
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