Richmond & D. R. Co v. Mitchell

• Decision Date: 15 May 1893
• Citation: 92 Ga. 77,18 S.E. 290
• Parties: RICHMOND & D. R. CO. v. MITCHELL.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

18 S.E. 290

92 Ga. 77

RICHMOND & D. R. CO.

v.MITCHELL.

Supreme Court of Georgia.

May 15, 1893.

Injuries to Employe—Law op Forum—Degree of Care—Assumption of Risk—Rules of Master—Instructions.

1. in the trial of an action for a tort committed in another state, the rules of evidence applicable to a tort of like class, committed in this state, are to be administered, whether the rules of evidence in the other state be the same as in this or not.

2. So far as appears, the degree of diligence due respectively between employer and employe under the laws of Alabama is not more than ordinary diligence. Ordinary diligence is that care which every prudent man exercises under the same or similar circumstances.

3. Inasmuch as the plaintiff below, when he undertook to make the coupling, knew that the supply of hands ordinarily requisite to the occasion was deficient, and nevertheless consented without objection to make the coupling, and inasmuch as the mode of making it, and the care and diligence to be exercised, would in no way, after the plaintiff engaged in the work, be affected by the want of more hands, the deficiency was irrelevant to the issue on trial, and it was error to give in charge to the jury anything whatever on that subject.

4. A written or printed rule, carefully prepared, which prohibits brakemen "from coupling or uncoupling cars except with a stick, " and declares that "brakemen or others must not go between the cars under any circumstances for the purpose of coupling or uncoupling, or adjusting pins, etc., when an engine is attached to such cars or train, " does not apply to a case in which the engine was not attached to any car or train, and in which the brakeman stationed himself, in the way usually practiced by employes, upon the footboard of the pilot on the tender, and while there attempted to withdraw with his hand, without using a stick, a pin and link from the coupling apparatus of the engine, the engine and tender moving backwards at the time towards a standing car in the rear, for the purpose of being coupled thereto.

5. it is error for the court to assume that there is a conflict in the evidence, when there is none, and to charge the jury on that subject, even though such charge be connected with relevant and correct propositions of law applicable to the case. This ruling applies to the eighth ground of the motion for a new trial.

6. in view of the evidence and the true law applicable thereto, there was no error in refusing any of the requests to charge the jury, made by counsel for the company.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Error from city court of Atlanta; T. P. Westmoreland, Judge.

Action for personal injuries by W. J. Mitchell against the Richmond & Danville Railroad Company. Plaintiff was employed by defendant as a brakeman, and was injured while coupling cars in the state of Alabama. There was judgment for plaintiff, and from an order denying a new trial defendant brings error. Reversed.

Jackson, Leftwich & Black and E. Womack, for plaintiff in error.

Glenn & Slator, for defendant in error.

BLECKLEY, C. J. 1. Touching the evidence requisite to make a prima facie case in behalf of the plaintiff below, the court gave in charge to the jury the rule of law applicable in this state between the parties where the action is against a railroad company for a personal injury sustained by one of its employes in consequence of the negligence of the company or of a coemploye. This was correct, although the injury sued for was sustained in the state of Alabama. The quantity or degree of evidence requisite to sustain an action or to change the burden of proof is determined by the law of the forum, and not by the law of the place where the cause of action arose. it belongs not to the law of rights, but to the law of remedy. it is matter of procedure and practice, or of the law of evidence in its relations thereto. What evidence, and how much, will suffice for verifying in the courts of this state a right to recover in a given action or class of actions, is determined by the laws of this state, and them alone. These courts often have to look elsewhere for the law of rights, but they never look elsewhere for the law of remedies, or for any part of the same. A tort committed in Alabama is proved here just as the same class of torts, when committed here, are proved. The same presumptions prevail, and the same...