Rossman v. Ga. Ry. & Power Co

• Decision Date: 13 December 1916
• Docket Number: (No. 171.)
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court
• Parties: ROSSMAN v. GEORGIA RY. & POWER CO. et al.

91 S.E. 90

(146 Ga. 264)

ROSSMAN

v.GEORGIA RY. & POWER CO. et al.

(No. 171.)

Supreme Court of Georgia.

Dec. 13, 1916.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Error from Superior Court, De Kalb County; C. W. Smith, Judge.

Action by W. H. Rossman against the Georgia Railway & Power Company and others. There was a judgment for defendants, and plaintiff brings error. Affirmed.

Nalley & Scott, of Atlanta, for plaintiff in error.

Colquitt & Conyers, of Atlanta, for defendants in error.

EVANS, P. J. In substance the plaintiff alleged the following: The defendant operatesan interurban railway line between Atlanta and Stone Mountain. Plaintiff with 75 or 80 other persons at Stone Mountain were awaiting the arrival of the cars from Atlanta, so that they could board them on their return trip. When the cars reached Stone Mountain, the trailer car, which had been customarily operated over the defendant's line, was detached, leaving only one car to be operated on the return trip. The plaintiff, with the other passengers, boarded this car, the plaintiff intending to ride as a passenger to the city of Atlanta. He was unable to obtain a seat, and refused, after the car had gone some distance, to pay the usual and customary fare demanded of him by the conductor. Upon his refusal to pay the fare the car was stopped, and the plaintiff was ejected at a point not at a regular stopping place, in the presence of his friends and many strangers, and on this account he was "greatly humiliated in mind, body, and spirit"; he was "bruised and injured about his arms and body, caused by the manner and method in which he was ejected from the car." The circumstances attending his ejection from the car were not made to appear in the petition. His complaint is that the defendant was negligent, in that it failed to furnish him with reasonably safe and comfortable transportation from Stone Mountain to Atlanta, failed to furnish him with a seat and with a car in which he could have been seated, and ejected him from the car on which he was riding at a place not established as a regular stop for passengers to get on or off the defendant's cars, and in the manner of his ejection. His petition was dismissed on general demurrer, and he excepted.

If the passenger had provided himself with a ticket, the conductor could not have required him to surrender it until he had furnished him with a seat. But while a passenger may decline to surrender his ticket until he is furnished with a seat, he cannot insist on riding free while standing. He cannot avail himself of the benefit of the transportation offered him under his contract, and at the same time withhold from the carrier his ticket, which is the evidence of his having paid his fare. If a passenger with a ticket desires to repudiate his contract because of the carrier's failure to comply with a part of his obligation, he...