Philadelphia Co v. Smith

• Decision Date: 19 May 1919
• Docket Number: No. 472,472
• Citation: 39 S.Ct. 396,250 U.S. 101,63 L.Ed. 869
• Parties: PHILADELPHIA, B. & W. R. CO. v. SMITH
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

250 U.S. 101

39 S.Ct. 396

63 L.Ed. 869

PHILADELPHIA, B. & W. R. CO.

v SMITH.

No. 472.

Argued April 15, 1919.

Decided May 19, 1919.

Messrs. Frederic D. McKenney and John Spalding Flannery, both of Washington, D. C., for petitioner.

Mr. T. Alan Goldsborough, of Denton, Md., for respondent.

Mr. Justice PITNEY delivered the opinion of the Court.

Respondent brought his action in a state court of Maryland under the provisions of the federal Employers' Liability Act of April 22, 1908, as amended April 5, 1910 (35 Stat. 65, c. 149 [Comp. St. §§ 8657-8665]; 36 Stat. 291, c. 143), to recover damages for personal injuries sustained by him upon one of petitioner's lines of railroad in the state of Maryland over which petitioner was engaged in transporting interstate as well as intrastate commerce.

Plaintiff was employed by defendant in connection with a gang of bridge carpenters, who were employed by defendant in the repair of the bridges and bridge abutments upon said line of railway. The gang, including plaintiff, worked over the entire line, and were moved from point to point as the repair work required in what was called a 'camp car,' furnished and moved by defendant, in which they ate, slept, and lived. Plaintiff's principal duties were to take care of this car, keep it clean, attend to the beds, and prepare and cook the meals for himself and the other members of the gang. On December 23, 1915, the bridge carpenters were engaged in repairing a bridge abutment on defendant's line near Easton, Maryland, and the camp car was on defendant's side track at Easton; and while plaintiff was in the car, engaged in cooking a meal for the bridge carpenters and himself, the engineer of one of defendant's trains, without warning, ran the engine upon the side track and against a car to which the camp car was coupled with such force that plaintiff received injuries, to recover for which his action was brought.

A judgment in plaintiff's favor was affirmed by the Maryland Court of Appeals (132 Md. 345, 103 Atl. 945), and the case comes here on a writ of certiorari.

The only question we have to consider is whether plaintiff at the time he was injured was engaged in interstate commerce within the meaning of the statute. Petitioner, citing Illinois Central R. R. v. Behrens, 233 U. S. 473, 478, 34 Sup. Ct. 646, 58 L. Ed. 1051, Ann. Cas. 1914C, 163, and Erie R. R. Co. v. Welsh, 242 U. S. 303, 37 Sup. Ct. 116, 61 L. Ed. 319, as conclusive to the effect that the true test is the nature of the work being done by the employe at the time of the injury, and that what he had been doing before and expected to do afterwards is of no consequence, argues that since plaintiff at the time of the injury and for some weeks prior thereto was and had been working as mess cook and camp cleaner or attendant for a gang of bridge carpenters who were quartered 'for their own...