Morgan v. City of Tuscaloosa, 6 Div. 294

• Decision Date: 15 January 1959
• Docket Number: 6 Div. 294
• Citation: 108 So.2d 342,268 Ala. 493
• Parties: Robert MORGAN, Jr. v. CITY OF TUSCALOOSA.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

Page 342

108 So.2d 342

268 Ala. 493

Robert MORGAN, Jr. v. CITY OF TUSCALOOSA.

6 Div. 294.

Supreme Court of Alabama.

Jan. 15, 1959.

LeMaistre, Clement & Gewin and H. Vann Waldrop, Tuscaloosa, for appellant.

S. H. Sprott, E. D. McDuffie and John W. Finnell, Tuscaloosa, for appellee.

STAKELY, Justice.

The question for decision is whether the alleged acts of the City of Tuscaloosa were the proximate or remote cause of the death of the minor son of Robert Morgan, Jr. Robert Morgan, Jr. (appellant) brought this action in the Circuit Court of Tuscaloosa County against the City of Tuscaloosa (appellee), claiming damages for the death of his minor son, Robert Kenneth Morgan, who was struck and killed by an automobile driven by a third party not connected with the defendant on a public street of the City of Tuscaloosa.

In all the plaintiff filed five counts in his complaint. The substance of each count is that the defendant, the City of Tuscaloosa, had negligently constructed a drainage sewer, which was too small or had negligently allowed the drainage sewer to become stopped up, causing water to back up or become impounded on a public street, that the driver of an automobile then being operated on the street ran into the water, causing the water to be splashed or sprayed on his windshield, blinding the driver or obstructing his vision and thereby causing the automobile to strike plaintiff's minor son, who was then and there a pedestrian walking in the street, and caused his death. In each count there is incorporated in the court the claim which was filed prior to the institution of the suit with the City of Tuscaloosa.

The defendant assigned twenty-one grounds of demurrer to the complaint and separately to each count thereof. Demurrers to the complaint and each count thereof were separately and severally sustained and plaintiff was granted a nonsuit with leave to appeal for and on account of the trial court's adverse ruling in sustaining the said demurrers.

As stated in Liberty National Life Insurance Co. v. Weldon, 267 Ala. 171, 100 So.2d 696, 61 A.L.R.2d 1346, a demurrer is a single entity and if any ground is good, the demurrer should be sustained.

We think we can simplify the case by coming at once to the proposition on which the appellee rests as sustaining the action of the trial court. In other words, we are assuming without further discussion that a municipal corporation in the exercise of its statutory powers to construct and maintain a system of sewers and drains acts ministerially and damages proximately resulting from negligence in the construction or maintenance of sewers creates a liability for which the city can be held liable. City of Birmingham v. Flowers, 224 Ala. 279, 140 So. 353; City of Birmingham v. Norwood, 23 Ala.App. 443, 126 So. 616, certiorari denied 220 Ala. 497, 126 So. 619.

However it is the earnest insistence of counsel for the appellee that the alleged acts of the City of Tuscaloosa in the instant case did no more than merely create the condition or give rise to the occasion of the impounded water in its street and after the condition had been created, an intervening agency produced the injury. In other words, the condition of the street was not the proximate cause of the death of the plaintiff's son but was at best a remote cause. In Liberty National Life Insurance Co. v. Weldon, 267 Ala. 171, 100 So.2d 696, 709, 61 A.L.R.2d 1346, this court said:

'Persons who perpetrate torts are, as a rule, responsible and only responsible for the proximate consequences of the wrongs they commit. In other words, unless the tort be the proximate cause of the injury complained of, there is no legal accountability. Our court has repeatedly dealt with and defined 'proximate cause.' * * * But there is very little use of reviewing our many cases where the question of proximate cause is involved. There are differences in almost every case, and oftimes the case turns on a slight difference of facts. The general principles of law in relation thereto have been frequently stated and are not so difficult as is their application to the particular circumstances of each individual case.'

It is true that the law will consider only the proximate cause and not a remote cause where there are two or more causes of injury. Garrett v. Louisville & N. R. Co., 196 Ala. 52, 71 So. 685; Williams v. Wicker, 235 Ala. 348, 179 So. 250; Western Ry. of Alabama v. Mutch, 97 Ala. 194, 11 So. 894, 21 L.R.A. 316; Lancaster v. Johnson, 34 Ala.App. 637, 42 So.2d 604; Liberty National Life Insurance Co. v. Weldon, supra. It is also true that where a prior cause merely created the condition or gives rise to the occasion and after the condition has been created an intervening agency produced the injury, the first is not the proximate cause. Morgan-Hill Paving Co. v. Fonville, 218 Ala. 566, 119 So. 610; Garrett v. Louisville & N. R. Co., 196 Ala. 52, 71 So. 685; Louisville & N. R. Co. v. Maddox, 236 Ala. 594, 183 So. 849, 118 A.L.R. 1318; Western Railway of Alabama v. Mutch, 97 Ala. 194, 11 So. 894, 21 L.R.A. 316.

When the facts are such that reasonable men must draw the same conclusion, the question of proximate cause is one of law for the courts. City of Birmingham v. Latham, 230 Ala. 601, 162 So. 675; Louisville & N. R. Co. v. Courson, 234 Ala. 273, 174 So. 474; Kilgore v. Birmingham Ry. Light & Power Co., 200 Ala. 238, 75 So. 996; Crowley v. City of West End, 149 Ala. 613, 43 So. 359, 10 L.R.A.,N.S., 801; Sloss-Sheffield Steel & Iron Co. v. Wilkes, 236 Ala. 173, 181 So. 276; Morgan Hill Paving Co. v. Fonville, 218 Ala. 566, 119 So. 610; Garrett v. Louisville & N. R. Co., 196 Ala. 52, 71 So. 685; Western Railway of Alabama v. Mutch, 97 Ala. 194, 11 So. 894, 21 L.R.A. 316.

Our cases also hold that where each count of the complaint shows on its face that some independent agency has intervened and has been the immediate cause of the injury, even though a party is guilty of negligence in the first instance, that party is not responsible and it is the duty of the trial court to sustain a demurrer to the complaint where the complaint and each count thereof shows on its face that an independent agency has intervened and has been the immediate cause of the injury. Kilgore v. Birmingham Ry. Light & Power Co., 200 Ala. 238, 75 So. 996; Smith v. Alabama Water...