Railroad Company v. Varnell

• Decision Date: 01 October 1878
• Citation: 25 L.Ed. 233,98 U.S. 479
• Parties: RAILROAD COMPANY v. VARNELL
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

98 U.S. 479

25 L.Ed. 233

RAILROAD COMPANY v. VARNELL.

October Term, 1878

ERROR to the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia.

The facts are stated in the opinion of the court.

Mr. Enoch Totten for the plaintiff in error.

Mr. Thomas T. Crittenden and Mr. Glen W. Cooper, contra.

MR. JUSTICE CLIFFORD delivered the opinion of the court.

Owners of vessels engaged in carrying passengers assume obligations somewhat different from those whose vehicles or vessels are employed as common carriers of merchandise. Obligations of the kind in the former case are in some respect less extensive and more qualified than in the latter, as the owners of the vehicle or vessel carrying passengers are not insurers of the lives of their passengers, nor even of their safety; but in most other respects the obligations assumed are equally comprehensive, and perhaps even more stringent.

Common carriers of merchandise, in the absence of any legislative regulation prescribing a different rule, are insurers of the goods and are liable at all events and for every loss or damage, unless it happened by the act of God or the public enemy, or the fault of the shipper, or by some other cause or accident expressly excepted in the bill of lading, and without fault or negligence on the part of the carrier. Propeller Niagara v. Cordes et al., 21 How. 23.

Carriers of passengers even in street-cars are bound to a higher degree of care, skill, and vigilance in the preparation and management of their vehicles of conveyance than were required of the owners of the stage-coaches, as well on account of the greater number transported at the same time as the constant ingress and egress of the persons entering or leaving the car. Travellers must take the risk necessarily incident to the mode of travel which they select; but those risks in the legal sense are only such as the utmost care, skill, and caution of the carrier in the preparation and management of the vehicle of conveyance is unable to avert. Pendleton v. Kinsley, 3 Cliff. 420.

Prepayment of the usual fare having been made by the plaintiff, he entered the car of the defendants, as he alleges, for a passage from Washington to Georgetown, and on arriving at the depot of the latter place, and when being in the act of getting off from the car, was thrown from the same upon the ground by the carelessness and negligence of the defendants, and was thereby greatly injured, so that he could not perform the usual duties of his employment; that in consequence of the injuries so received he was compelled to employ a physician at great expense, and was confined to the house for a long time, during which he suffered great pain and anguish. Suitable indemnity being refused, the plaintiff instituted the present suit to recover compensation for the alleged injuries and the consequent expenses. Service was made, and the defendants appeared and pleaded the general issue, which was subsequently joined by the plaintiff. The preliminary proceedings being closed, the parties went to trial, and the verdict and judgment were for the plaintiff in the sum of $4,000, with costs of suit. Exceptions were filed by the defendants, and they sued out the present writ of error, and removed the cause into this court for re-examination.

Since the case was entered here, the defendants have assigned for error the following causes, for which they claim that the judgment should be reversed: 1. That the instructions of the court set forth in the first three exceptions are erroneous as to the supposed contributory negligence of the plaintiff. 2. That the court erred in the instruction given to the jury as to the measure of damages. 3. That the court erred in refusing the two prayers for instruction presented by the defendants, and in the instructions given in lieu of those prayers. 4. That the instructions given by the court to the jury were incoherent, contradictory, and incomprehensible, and must necessarily have confused and misled the jury to the disadvantage of the defendants.

Evidence was introduced by the plaintiff tending to show that he, on the day and at the place alleged in the declaration, entered one of the cars of the defendants, and that he, having first paid his fare to the conductor, rode in the car to the terminus of the route in Georgetown, at the intersection of High and Bridge Streets; that the car was then stopped at the usual place for passengers to leave and pass out; that several passengers had got off from the car, and that plaintiff started for that purpose, and having passed out of the rear end had stepped on the lower step of the car and was about stepping to the ground when the car was suddenly started with a jerk, which threw him to the ground, his left hip striking the paved street, and that the thigh bone of his hip at the socket was dislocated and fractured by the fall; that the plaintiff was carried to his home, where he was confined to his bed for several weeks, and that he has ever since been compelled to walk with a cane, and has been unable to perform any labor, and that the injured leg is considerably shorter than the other; that he was sixty-four years of age at the time of the accident, and that up to that time he had always been healthy.

Witnesses were examined by the defendants, and they gave evidence tending to show that the plaintiff, just before the accident, was standing upon the rear platform of the car, and that he jumped from the car before it stopped, and that in jumping from the car he fell and was injured; that at...