Natchez & S.R. Co. v. Crawford

• Decision Date: 19 June 1911
• Docket Number: 15,244
• Citation: 55 So. 596,99 Miss. 697
• Parties: NATCHEZ & SOUTHERN R. R. CO. v. JOHN E. CRAWFORD
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

55 So. 596

99 Miss. 697

NATCHEZ & SOUTHERN R. R. CO. v. JOHN E. CRAWFORD

No. 15,244

Supreme Court of Mississippi

June 19, 1911

APPEAL from the circuit court of Adams county, HON. M. H. WILKINSON Judge.

Suits by John E. Crawford against the Natchez & Southern Railroad Company. From a judgment for plaintiff, defendant appeals.

The facts are fully stated in the opinion of the court.

Affirmed.

Ratcliff & Truly, for appellant.

We contend, first, that this statute is violative of the fourteenth amendment of the Constitution of the United States for two reasons:

(a) That it deprives a citizen of his property without due process of law.

(b) It denies the defendants in damage suits for personal injuries or death from personal injuries the equal protection of the law.

In terms it makes the defendant liable in damages whether guilty of any negligence or not. And this, too, without regard to how reckless the plaintiff may have been, and absolutely authorizes a jury to return a verdict in damages against a defendant without regard to whether the defendant has been guilty of negligence or not; and thereby authorizes the taking of the property of defendant without the process of law. It denies to the defendant the equal protection of the law as given to the plaintiff, and discriminates against the defendant in favor of the plaintiff, in that, it authorizes the jury to punish defendant by an award of damages for any kind of negligence, even slight, and rewards the plaintiff by a verdict for damages in his favor when he is guilty of the same thing, or of much worse, even gross negligence.

Under this statute the defendant may be guilty of only the slightest negligence and the plaintiff may be guilty of the grossest recklessness. Yet the jury are required to punish the defendant by a verdict for damages against it for its slight negligence, and to reward the plaintiff by a verdict for damages in his favor for his gross negligence. As said by this honorable court in the case of the Yazoo &amp Mississippi Valley Railroad Company v. Wallace, 90 Miss 609:

"It is a statute for the benefit of plaintiffs" and "it works only against the defendant litigant."

The statute undertakes to abolish all difference in degrees of negligence; and it is well recognized principle of law that there are three degrees of negligence: Slight, ordinary and gross. And while the defendant is held liable by said statute for the slightest negligence, the plaintiff is authorized to recover even though guilty of the grossest negligence.

We will illustrate this proposition by reference to the recent case of Railroad Company v. Ruff, 95 Miss. 165. In this case the plaintiff was on a straight stretch of railroad track, meeting a train, and notwithstanding the signals of the train's approach had been given within the range of his hearing, he failed to look ahead until the head light of the engine was seen by its reflection on the track, and then he needlessly remained on the ends of the cross-ties until he was struck by the locomotive. The train was running through an incorporated village at an unlawful rate of speed. In this the company was negligent and acting in violation of a statute. If that case had been tried under this statute, and if the statute is valid, the plaintiff would undoubtedly, by virtue of this statute, have been entitled to a verdict notwithstanding the gross recklessness of his own conduct. There the defendant was only slightly negligent and the plaintiff was guilty of the grossest recklessness. But the court held in that case that as a matter of law the plaintiff could not recover; but under the statute now under discussion the jury would necessarily have been instructed by the judge in such case that his negligence would not debar him from recovery, but that on account of the slight negligence of the defendant in running its trains at a too rapid rate of speed through a municipality, that they should find for the plaintiff a verdict in damages diminished by what they might think the proportionate amount of negligence should be attributed to him.

It compels the judge to instruct the jury in all cases where there is the slightest negligence in evidence on the part of the defendant or even where there is none to give a verdict against the defendant without regard to the conduct of the plaintiff, however reckless it may have been. And in this it plainly invades both the constitutional power of the judiciary and the constitutional rights of citizens; and it is also an invasion of the right of trial by jury.

The question of contributory negligence of the plaintiff is frequently purely a matter of law, as was held in the Ruff case above cited. But this statute now under consideration denies the power of the judge to state to the jury what is the law. But on the other hand compels him to instruct the jury that in such case they must find a verdict for the plaintiff, but may diminish it, etc. It invades the right of trial by jury because it prohibits the jury from returning a verdict for the defendant without regard to what they may think of plaintiff's conduct, and although they may believe that the plaintiff was grossly negligent and was the proximate cause of his own hurt. It may happen that it is the unanimous opinion of the jury that the plaintiff's recklessness was the cause of his own injury and that in truth and in fact by reason of his conduct he is not entitled to recover, yet they are met by the positive instruction of the court, which he is compelled by this statute to give, that such conduct does not bar a recovery, and that they must find a verdict against the defendant, only to be diminished, etc.

In the case of Oakes v. State, So. Rep., p. 79, vol. 54, advance sheet No. 2, which was a libel case, the court construed that part of section 13 of the constitution, which provides that in the trial of a libel case the jury should determine the law and facts under the direction of the court as not to interfere with the inherent power of the court to direct the jury as to the law and points out the utter confusion which would follow if juries were left to determine the law. The act in question clearly attempts to deprive the judge of this right and compels him to submit questions of law to the determination of the jury and thereby invades and modifies or annuls the inherent and constitutional power of the judge.

Section 1 of the act seeks to establish liability in all cases of the character mentioned therein, and particularly requires a jury to award damages against all defendants in such cases. There are no qualifying words in this statute to the effect that these damages should be diminished only in cases when a verdict would be returned by the jury on their finding on the facts that the defendant was guilty of negligence, or that plaintiff had a right of action, or in "proper cases." No reference whatever is made to the primary proposition that in order to recover the plaintiff must show and the jury must believe that the defendant was guilty of negligence or some wrongful act of commission or omission.

Second, it violates sections 14 and 31 of the Constitution of the state of Mississippi for reasons above given.

It also violates section 193 of the Constitution of the state of Mississippi, because it is universal in character. It confers the exceptional rights upon all plaintiffs, without exception, in suits for damages for personal injuries or death arising therefrom, and burdens all defendants in such suits with its discriminations against them. It makes no exception as to conductors or engineers in charge of dangerous and unsafe cars or engines voluntarily operated by them, as provided in section 193 of the Constitution, and section 4056, Code, 1906; and if this statute is not unconstitutional, a conductor or engineer in charge of dangerous and unsafe cars or engines voluntarily operated by them, may recover under it, and it abolishes the constitutional defense provided in section 193 and Code section 4056 to actions brought by conductors or engineers, that they were voluntarily operating dangerous and unsafe cars or engines.

To illustrate this point, we will take the case of Yazoo & Mississippi Valley Railroad Company v. Woodruff, decided last November and reported in 53 So. Rep., page 687, which was tried before the enactment of the statute now under consideration. In that case Woodruff was an engineer voluntarily operating an engine with knowledge of its defects; and it was held in that case that he was barred of recovery by reason of the exception in section 193 of the Constitution. We understand that section of the Constitution provides that knowledge by an employee of the defective or unsafe character or condition of any machinery, ways. or appliances shall be no defense to an action for an injury caused thereby, but that as to conductors and engineers the voluntary operation of such unsafe cars or engines by them is a defense to suits brought by them. So that, if the Woodruff case, above cited, had been tried under this statute now under consideration, he could have recovered, because this statute abolishes the constitutional defense above referred to.

Third, this statute is absolutely contradictory in its terms.

The first section thereof provides that in all cases hereafter brought for personal injuries, etc., contributory negligence shall not be a bar to recovery and its provisions are mandatory and peremptory.

And yet section 2 of the act provides that all questions of negligence and contributory negligence shall be for the jury to determine. Then, if the jury should determine that the contributory negligence of the plaintiff was the proximate cause of the injury they should find in such case a verdict for...