Paul v. Atl. Coast Line R. Co

• Citation: 170 N.C. 230,87 S.E. 66
• Decision Date: 01 December 1915
• Docket Number: (No. 288.)
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of North Carolina
• Parties: PAUL. v. ATLANTIC COAST LINE R. CO.

87 S.E. 66

170 N.C. 230

PAUL.

v.ATLANTIC COAST LINE R. CO.

(No. 288.)

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

Dec. 1, 1915.

Walker and Brown, JJ., dissenting.

Appeal from Superior Court, Cumberland County; Allen, Judge.

Action by Vance Paul against the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad Company. From a judgment for plaintiff, defendant appeals. Affirmed.

This is an action for the recovery of damages for personal injuries, alleged to have been caused by the negligence of the defendant.

The plaintiffs evidence tended to show— the defendant not having introduced any evidence—that the plaintiff, a white man about 35 years old, with one Hagan, drove a mule, hitched to a. buggy in which they were riding, into the town of Parkton, about 2 o'clock in the afternoon of January 26, 1914. Desiring to go on the east side of the defendant's track, they found some of the street crossings blocked by a freight train. The plaintiff got out of the buggy and walked around the train, and, after transacting certain business, came back to the buggy. They then drove to the upper northernmost crossing, and, finding that one blocked, drove down a street parallel to and 15 feet from the train for a distance of about 400 yards, with the purpose of going to a lower crossing, which was not blocked. Just as they reached the engine, the train being headed south, steam came out from unde* the engine and the wheels began to turn, scaring the mule, causing him to run away, and plaintiff was thrown out of the buggy, suffering injuries. There was no evidence that the escaping steam was unusual or extraordinary, or that the escape was permitted willfully or wantonly, and the noise and escape of steam was usual and ordinary in the starting of a train. There was in evidence an ordinance of the town of Parkton which provided a penalty for a railroad to block the street for more than five minutes, and also evidence that the streets had been blocked for a longer time than five minutes. The' defendant introduced no evidence and moved for judgment as in case of nonsuit. This motion was overruled, and defendant excepted. There was a verdict and judgment for the plaintiff and the defendant appealed.

Rose & Rose, of Fayetteville, for appellant.

Sinclair, Dye & Ray, of Fayetteville, for appellee.

ALLEN, J. [1, 2] It is established by the evidence that the defendant blocked a public crossing in the town of Parkton with a train of cars in violation of the ordinance of the town, and this is negligence; but a plaintiff cannot recover upon proof of negligence alone. He must go further, and show that the negligence complained of is the proximate cause of his injury. Ledbetter v. English, 166 N. C. 125, 81 S. E. 1060; McNeill v. R. R., 167 N. C. 390, 83 S. E. 704.

The real controversy therefore between the plaintiff and the defendant on the issue of negligence, raised by the motion for judgment of nonsuit, is whether there is any evidence that the negligence of the defendant in violating the ordinance of the town was the proximate cause of the injury. Much of thedifficulty in the application of the doctrine of proximate cause arises from the effort on the part of the courts to give legal definition to what is essentially a fact, and in most cases for the determination of a jury, but perhaps the most complete and accurate statement of the rule is to be found in the oft-quoted opinion of Mr. Justice Strong in Milwaukee R. R. v. Kellogg, 94 U. S. 469, 24 L. Ed. 256. He says:

"The true rule is that what is the proximate cause of an injury is ordinarily a question for the jury. It is not a question of science or of legal knowledge. It is to be determined as a fact, in view of the circumstances of fact attending it. The primary cause may be the proximate cause of a disaster, though it may operate through successive instruments, as an article at the end of a chain may be moved by a force applied to the other end, that force being the proximate cause of the movement, or as in the oft-cited case of the squib thrown in the market place. 2 Bl. Rep. 892. The question always is: Was there an unbroken connection between the wrongful act and the injury—a continuous operation? Did the facts constitute a continuous succession of events, so linked together as to make a natural whole, or was there some new and independent cause intervening between the wrong and the injury? * * * We do not say that even the natural and probable consequences of a wrongful act or omission are in all cases to be chargeable to the misfeasance or nonfeasance. They are not when there is a sufficient and independent cause operating between the wrong and the injury. In such a case the resort of the sufferer must be to the originator of the intermediate cause. But when there is no intermediate efficient cause, the original wrong must be considered as reaching to the effect and proximate to it. * * * In the nature of things, there is in every transaction a succession of events, more or less dependent upon those preceding, and it is the province or a jury to look at this succession of events of facts, and ascertain whether they are naturally and probably connected with each other by a continuous sequence, or are dissevered by new and independent agencies, and this must be determined in view of the circumstances existing at the time."

Again, the same judge says in JEtna Insurance Co. v. Boon, 95 U. S. 117, 24 L. Ed. 395:

"The proximate cause * * * is the dominant cause, not the one which is incidental to that cause, its mere instrument, though the latter may be nearest in time and place. * * * 'The inquiry must always be whether there was an intermediate cause disconnected from the primary fault, and self-operating, which produced the injury.'"

In Harvell v. Lumber Co., 154 N. C. 261, 70 S. E. 391, this statement of the law was approved, the court saying:

"Proximate cause means the dominant efficient cause, the cause without which the injury would not have occurred; and if the negligence of the defendant continues up to the time of the injury, and the injury would not have occurred but for such negligence, it is not made remote because some act, not within the control of the defendant, and not amounting to contributory negligence on the part of the plaintiff, concurs in causing the injury."

Another definition of the term is that given by Shearman and Redfleld on Negligence, § 26, and approved in Harton y. Telephone Co., 141 N. C. 455, 54 S. E. 299, and in Ward v. Railroad, 161 N. C. 184, 76 S. E. 717, that:

"The proximate cause of an event must be understood to be that which in natural and continuous sequence, unbroken by any new and independent cause, produces that event, and without which such event would not have occurred. Proximity in point of time and space, however, is no part of the definition."

If either of these authorities is followed, the question of proximate cause was for the jury, because the "facts constitute a continuous succession of events so linked together as to make a natural whole." The escape of steam was not "disconnected from the primary fault, " but operating with it The negligence of the defendant in violating the ordinance was "the cause without which the injury would not...