Missouri Pacific Railway Company v. Ozro Castle
| Decision Date | 13 May 1912 |
| Docket Number | No. 344,344 |
| Parties | MISSOURI PACIFIC RAILWAY COMPANY, Plff. in Err., v. OZRO CASTLE |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Mr. Balie P. Waggener for plaintiff in error.
Messrs. T. J. Mahoney and J. A. C. Kennedy for defendant in orror.
Alleging himself to be a citizen of Nebraska, and averring that the railway company was a citizen of Missouri, Castle sued the railway company to recover for injuries received by him while in the service of the railway company as a brakeman upon a freight train operating in the state of Nebraska, the injury having been occasioned through the negligence of a coemployee. The right to recover under such circumstances was based upon a Nebraska statute adopted in 1907, consisting of two sections which are now §§ 3 and 4 of chapter 21 of the Compiled Statutes of Nebraska. The 1st section made every railway company liable to its employees who, at the time of the injury were engaged in construction or repair works, or in the use and operation of any engine, car, or train for said company, for all damages which may result from the negligence of its officers, agents, or employees, or by reason of any defects or insufficiency due to its negligence in its cars, engines, appliances, machinery, track, roadbed, ways, or work. The 2d section provided that contributory negligence shall not be a bar to recovery where the negligence of the injured employee was slight and that of the employer was gross in comparison, but that damages shall be diminished in proportion to the amount of negligence attributable to the injured employee. In its answer the railway company admitted that it was then, and was at all of the times mentioned in the petition, 'a railroad corporation organized and existing under and by virtue of the laws of the state of Missouri,' and set up that the injury to the plaintiff was caused by the negligence of a fellow servant or coemployee, and was also the result of the contributory negligence of the plaintiff. The validity of the 2d section of the statute was challenged because it deprived 'of the defense of contributory negligence accorded to all other litigants, persons or corporations, within the state of Nebraska,' and because the statute established and enforced against railroads a rule of damages not applicable to any other litigant in similar cases, whereby the privileges and immunities of the company as a citizen of the United States within the jurisdiction of the state of Nebraska were abridged, and it was denied the equal protection of the laws, in violation of the 14th Amendment. The repugnancy of the statute to the commerce clause of the Constitution was also averred, on the ground that 'the plaintiff, at the time he received the injuries complained of, and engaged as an employee of an interstate railroad engaged in commerce between the states of Missouri, Kansas, and Nebraska,' and the statute of Nebraska 'attempts to regulate and control as well as create a cause of action and remedy, imposing upon the defendant company a liability inconsistent with and repugnant to the action of the Congress of the United States on said subject.'
At the trial the company excepted to the refusal of the court to give instructions embodying its contentions respecting the invalidity of the statute, and also excepted to the giving of certain instructions which were antagonistic to those contentions. From a judgment entered upon a verdict of a jury in favor of the plaintiff, this direct writ of error was sued out.
Defendant in error moves to affirm the judgment under subdivision 5 of rule 6. The motion, we think, should prevail, since the questions urged upon our attention as a basis for a reversal of the judgment have been so plainly foreclosed by decisions of this court as to make further argument unnecessary.
This court has repeatedly upheld the power of a state to impose upon a railway company liability to an employee engaged in train service for an injury inflicted through the negligence of another employee in the same service. Missouri P. R. Co. v. Mackey, 127 U. S. 205, 32 L. ed. 107, 8 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1161; Minneapolis & St. L. R. Co. v. Herrick, 127 U. S. 210, 32 L. ed. 109, 8 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1176; Tullis v. Lake Erie & W. R. Co. 175 U. S. 348, 44 L. ed. 192, 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 136; Chicago, K. & W. R. Co. v. Pontius, 157...
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