Magna Trust Co. v. Illinois Cent. R. Co., 5-98-0792.

• Court: United States Appellate Court of Illinois
• Citation: 245 Ill.Dec. 715,313 Ill. App.3d 375,728 N.E.2d 797
• Docket Number: No. 5-98-0792.,5-98-0792.
• Parties: MAGNA TRUST COMPANY, Administrator of the Estate of James C. Jones, Deceased, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. ILLINOIS CENTRAL RAILROAD COMPANY, Defendant-Appellant.
• Decision Date: 18 April 2000

728 N.E.2d 797
313 Ill. App.3d 375
245 Ill.Dec. 715

MAGNA TRUST COMPANY, Administrator of the Estate of James C. Jones, Deceased, Plaintiff-Appellee,
v.
ILLINOIS CENTRAL RAILROAD COMPANY, Defendant-Appellant

No. 5-98-0792.

Appellate Court of Illinois, Fifth District.

April 18, 2000.

728 N.E.2d 802

Jonathan Freed, Bradley and Freed, PSC, Paducah, KY; Kurt E. Reitz, Ann C. Barron, Thompson Coburn LLP, Belleville, for Appellant

David V. Dorris, Jerome Mirza & Associates, Ltd., Bloomington; William L. Broom, III, Patricia A. Small, Barrett, Twomey, Morris, Broom & Hughes, Carbondale, for Appellee.

Justice MAAG delivered the opinion of the court:

Plaintiff, Magna Trust Company, administrator for the estate of James (Rusty) C. Jones, filed a wrongful death complaint against defendant, Illinois Central Railroad Co. (Illinois Central), alleging a violation of the Safety Appliance Act (49 U.S.C. § 20301 et. seq. (1994)). Rusty Jones, an employee of Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), suffered fatal injuries when he was crushed between two rail cars while attempting to adjust a coupler on one of the cars on November 23, 1994. The rail cars were owned by Illinois Central. In the complaint, plaintiff alleged that Illinois Central violated the Safety Appliance Act by allowing one of its freight cars to be used in interstate commerce even though the coupler was missing a coupling pin and that this violation was a proximate cause of Rusty Jones's death. The jury returned a verdict in favor of plaintiff and awarded $1.8 million in damages. Illinois Central has raised several issues on appeal. Because a number of the issues turn on the nature of the case, we begin with that issue.

I. THE NATURE OF THE CAUSE OF ACTION

A. Non-railroad Employees and the Safety Appliance Act

Illinois Central argues that plaintiff cannot maintain an independent cause of action under state law premised solely on a violation of the Safety Appliance Act. In support of its argument, Illinois Central states that the Safety Appliance Act itself provides no independent federal cause of action, and it cites Crane v. Cedar Rapids & Iowa City Ry. Co., 395 U.S. 164, 89 S.Ct. 1706, 23 L.Ed.2d 176 (1969), and then refers us to decisions from courts outside of Illinois that hold that a nonemployee cannot base a state-law claim solely on an alleged violation of the Safety Appliance Act. See Keizor v. Sand Springs Ry. Co., 861 P.2d 326 (Okla.Ct.App.1993); Moses v. Union Pacific R.R., 64 F.3d 413 (8th Cir. 1995). Illinois Central urges us to follow the Keizor decision and to find that the establishment of an independent cause of action and the imposition of absolute liability for a violation of the Safety Appliance Act is improper as a matter of law. Because

728 N.E.2d 803

this issue involves a question of law, our standard of review is de novo. See Athens v. Harris Trust & Savings Bank, 297 Ill.App.3d 1055, 1060, 232 Ill.Dec. 167, 697 N.E.2d 909, 913 (1998)

The Safety Appliance Act does not create a cause of action for either railroad employees or nonemployees who are injured as a result of a railroad's violation of the act. See Crane, 395 U.S. 164, 89 S.Ct. 1706, 23 L.Ed.2d 176. But Congress did provide a federal cause of action for railroad employees in the Federal Employers' Liability Act (FELA) (45 U.S.C. § 51 et seq. (1988)). The FELA "embraces claims of an employee based on violations of the Safety Appliance Act." Crane, 395 U.S. at 166, 89 S.Ct. at 1708, 23 L.Ed.2d 176. Because the FELA is available only to railroad employees, nonemployees who are injured as a result of violations of the Safety Appliance Act must look to a common law action in tort and file a state cause of action. See Crane, 395 U.S. at 166, 89 S.Ct. at 1708, 23 L.Ed.2d 176.

Therefore, we must look to our own state's common law to determine whether a plaintiff may file a cause of action based upon a violation of the Safety Appliance Act. The Illinois Supreme Court faced this issue in a case where a railroad passenger, injured when a coupler broke, brought an action in circuit court and alleged that the defendant railroad had violated the Safety Appliance Act and was absolutely liable for his injuries. See Boyer v. Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Ry. Co., 38 Ill.2d 31, 230 N.E.2d 173 (1967). After reviewing interpretations given to the act in numerous federal decisions, our supreme court concluded: "The Federal Safety Appliance Act is as much a part of the law and policy of the States as are their own laws enacted by the State legislatures." Boyer, 38 Ill.2d at 36, 230 N.E.2d at 177. In Boyer, the court held, "[I]t is apparent that a breach of the Safety Appliance Act does give rise to a civil cause of action which is separate from any cause of action based on negligence and that absolute liability for such breach is imposed on the violator." Boyer, 38 Ill.2d at 35-36, 230 N.E.2d at 176. To base a cause of action on a breach of the Safety Appliance Act, it must appear that the plaintiff was within the class of persons the statute was intended to protect and that the injury was the type of risk covered. See Boyer, 38 Ill.2d at 37, 230 N.E.2d at 177.

In its argument, Illinois Central urges us to follow the holding in Keizor v. Sand Springs Ry. Co., 861 P.2d 326 (Okla.Ct. App.1993). There, the Oklahoma Court of Appeals, citing the Crane decision, stated that since the Safety Appliance Act creates neither an express nor an implied cause of action for nonemployees, a nonemployee's action lies, if at all, in a common law action in negligence. Keizor, 861 P.2d at 330.

After reviewing the Keizor decision, we decline to follow it. Though the Keizor court dutifully recited the rules announced in Crane, it proceeded to ignore those rules in its analysis. The Keizor court correctly cited Crane for the proposition that any action for a violation of the Safety Appliance Act resulting in injury to a nonemployee must arise under the common law and the injured party "must look to state law * * * for remedy." (Emphasis added.) Keizor, 861 P.2d at 329. Then, in a leap of legal logic, unsupported by authority or explanation, the Keizor court said that because the United States Supreme Court, in the 1969 Crane decision, highlighted the absence of a federal cause of action under the Safety Appliance Act for nonemployees and because Congress, in its 1988 amendments to the Safety Appliance Act, remained absolutely silent about creating any private causes of action in anyone except railroad employees, "it is clear * * * that Congress intended to deny private causes of action to non[]employees of the railroad." Keizor, 861 P.2d at 330. Why? Under what rule of statutory construction? Without any discussion of this matter, the Keizor court concluded

728 N.E.2d 804

in that single clause that it could derive and declare the intentions of Congress. The statement is mere conjecture (or perhaps a statement of desire) and is devoid of legal support

We respectfully disagree with the conclusion of our colleagues on the Oklahoma Court of Appeals. Upon our review of the 1988 amendments to the Safety Appliance Act, we found no substantive changes to provisions of the Safety Appliance Act that are relevant to this discussion. In 1994, Congress revised and codified the subject matter covered by the Safety Appliance Act (formerly 45 U.S.C. § 1 et seq. (1988)) into Title 49, Transportation (49 U.S.C. § 20101 et seq. (1994)). The legislative history states that this was a codification bill, enacting revisions without making changes in substance or impairing the precedent of earlier judicial decisions. H.R.Rep. No. 103-180 (1993), reprinted in 1994 U.S.C.C.A.N. 818 ("[T]his bill makes no substantive change in the law. It is sometimes feared that mere changes in terminology and style will result in changes in substance or impair the precedent value of earlier judicial decisions and other interpretations. * * * In a codification law, however, the court upholds the contrary presumption: the law is intended to remain substantively unchanged").

Although Congress certainly could have, it declined to make substantive amendments. Since Congress is presumed to know the judicial interpretation given a statute, this decision by Congress evidences an intent to maintain the interpretation given by the United States Supreme Court in Crane. See generally Lorillard v. Pons, 434 U.S. 575, 98 S.Ct. 866, 55 L.Ed.2d 40 (1978); People v. Agnew, 105 Ill.2d 275, 279-80, 85 Ill.Dec. 514, 473 N.E.2d 1319, 1322 (1985). This is a principle of statutory construction, referred to as "legislative acquiescence" in some jurisdictions and "legislative reenactment" in others. Considering this principle of statutory construction together with the legislative history, it is clear that the Crane interpretation stands as the correct statement of law. Thus, railroad employees have a cause of action premised on violations of the Safety Appliance Act, pursuant to FELA, and non-railroad employees have a cause of action premised on violations of the Safety Appliance Act under a state's common law. See Crane, 395 U.S. at 166, 89 S.Ct. 1706, 23 L.Ed.2d 176; Boyer, 38 Ill.2d at 36, 230 N.E.2d at 177.

Illinois Central's reliance on Moses v. Union Pacific R.R., 64 F.3d 413 (8th Cir. 1995), is misplaced. In Moses, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals held that in a state common law tort action, a violation of the federal Safety Appliance Act may be offered as evidence of negligence. Moses, 64 F.3d at 417. We note that the Eighth Circuit was applying the state law of Kansas, and its holding must be considered in that context. States differ in their approaches to the breach of a criminal or safety statute. In some states, the breach constitutes "negligence per se." In others, it is "evidence of negligence" or "prima facie evidence of negligence." O'Donnell v. Elgin, Joliet & Eastern Ry. Co., 338 U.S. 384, 390, 70 S.Ct. 200, 204, 94 L.Ed. 187 (1949). Further...