Smiley v. Arrow Spring Bed Co.

• Decision Date: 19 March 1941
• Docket Number: 28216.
• Citation: 33 N.E.2d 3,138 Ohio St. 81
• Parties: SMILEY v. ARROW SPRING BED CO.
• Court: Ohio Supreme Court

33 N.E.2d 3

138 Ohio St. 81

SMILEY v. ARROW SPRING BED CO.

No. 28216.

Supreme Court of Ohio

March 19, 1941

Syllabus by the Court.

1. Section 12603, General Code, is a safety measure which, to accomplish its purpose, must be applied according to its clear and unambiguous language.

2. To comply with the assured clear distance ahead provision of Section 12603, General Code, the driver of a motor vehicle must not operate it at a greater speed than will permit him to bring it to a stop within the distance between his motor vehicle and a discernible object obstructing his path or line of travel, unless such assured clear distance ahead is without his fault, suddenly cut down or lessened by the entrance, within such clear distance ahead and into his path or line of travel, of some obstruction which renders him unable, in the exercise of ordinary care, to avoid colliding therewith.

Appeal from Court of Appeals, Cuyahoga County.

After dark on December 3, 1936, the defendant's truck, being operated in a westerly direction on highway route No. 422 near Parkman, Ohio, became disabled and was parked without lights on the north side of the highway. While the truck was thus located, plaintiff operating his automobile in the same direction behind the truck collided with it, demolishing the automobile and injurying the plaintiff, for which damages and injuries he seeks recovery.

Plaintiff brought this action in the Municipal Court of Cleveland charging the defendant with negligence in parking the truck on the highway in violation of Sections 12614-3 and 6310-1 General Code. There was some dispute as to the exact location of the truck on the highway at the time of the accident, but this is unimportant in the application of the law to this case. On the other hand, the defendant charged the plaintiff with contributory negligence as a matter of law in operating his automobile at a speed of from 30 to 35 miles per hour and in violating the assured clear distance statute, Section 12603, General Code, as a result of which his automobile collided with defendant's truck. The plaintiff sought to avoid the operation of this statute by claiming that defendant's truck was parked 30 feet beyond the crest of a hill where it was not visible to the plaintiff until his automobile had passed over the hill and that he was partially blinded by the lights of another vehicle approaching from the opposite direction, which vehicle, at the moment of the collision, was passing defendant's truck.

The jury returned a verdict in favor of the plaintiff in the sum of $1,000. The defendant filed a motion for judgment upon special findings of fact, a motion for judgment in its favor notwithstanding the verdict, and a motion for new trial. All of these motions were overruled and judgment was entered for plaintiff, whereupon defendant prosecuted an appeal to the Court of Appeals where the judgment of the Municipal Court was affirmed by a divided court. The case is now in this court for review by reason of the allowance of a motion to certify the record.

William M. Byrnes, William A. Kane, and Frank J. Kus, all of Cleveland, for appellant.

S. J. Zablotny and Joseph S. Kay, both of Cleveland, for appellee.

HART Judge.

The important question in this case is: Did the plaintiff in operating his automobile at the time of collision with the defendant's truck violate Section 12603, General Code, which provides that 'no person shall drive any motor vehicle in and upon any public road or highway at a greater speed than will permit him to bring it to a stop within the assured clear distance ahead'? If he did violate this statute, his contributory negligence in that respect precludes his recovery in this action.

In 1928, Before the adoption of the assured clear distance ahead statute in this state, this court in the case of Tresise v. Ashdown, Adm'r, 118 Ohio St. 307, 160 N.E. 898, 58 A.L.R. 1476, held that: 'In an action to recover damages for injuries claimed to have been sustained by the driver of a motor vehicle resulting from a collision with another motor vehicle parked at the right side of the highway at night with no light in the rear or other warning thereof, an instruction to the jury that operation of such motor vehicle at such a rate of speed that the driver cannot stop within the distance that an obstruction in the highway could be seen by his own headlights, constitutes 'negligence per se,' is erroneous.'

At the next session of the Legislature in the spring of 1929, the 'assured clear distance ahead' requirement was for the first time incorporated in the laws of this state by the amendment of Section 12603, General Code, effective July 22, 1929. 113 Ohio Laws, 283. The first case to reach this court calling for the application of this statutory requirement was that of Skinner v. Pennsylvania R. Co., 127 Ohio St. 69, 186 N.E. 722, wherein this court affirmed the judgment of the Court of Appeals, in reversing the judgment of the trial court for refusal to direct a verdict against the plaintiff where the automobile in which he was riding was driven in the nighttime into a freight train standing across the highway. In the later cases of Gumley, Adm'r v. Cowman, 129 Ohio St. 36, 193 N.E. 627, decided in 1934, and Kormos v. Cleveland Retail Credit Men's Co., 131 Ohio St. 471, 3 N.E.2d 427, decided in 1936, wherein the drivers of automobiles in the nighttime had crashed into motor vehicles on the highway ahead of them, this court held that each automobile driver had violated the statute in operating his automobile at a speed greater than would permit him to bring it to a stop within the distance at which he could see a discernible object obstructing his path. This court in those cases also held that the assured clear distance ahead provision of the statute is a specific requirement of law, a violation of which constitutes negligence per se.

The 'assured clear distance ahead,' as used in the statute, must be distance or space between the motor vehicle of the motorist and any discernible obstruction or any limit of vision ahead of him on the highway. For example, if a train of cars is standing across the highway immediately ahead of the motorist, the distance between himself and the train of cars is the assured clear distance ahead. If his view is cut off by darkness, by a curve in the highway, or by the crest of a hill, the distance between him and the point where his vision ends or is cut off is the assured clear distance ahead. The requirement of the statute is that the motor vehicle be so operated that, at any instant, it can be stopped within such assured clear distance ahead.

Before the enactment of the statute a question of fact was presented as to whether a motorist who collided with a truck or other obstruction at rest on the highway was guilty of negligence proximately causing his injury. The statute was amended to remove the uncertainty attendant upon the appraisal of the conduct of the motorist in this regard, and to place upon him the burden of doing a specific thing, namely, to drive his car at such speed as will enable him to stop and avoid a collision with discernible objects within the distance ahead assured to him by the range of his vision. The purpose of the amendment to the statute was undoubtedly to prevent accidents on the highways, and it is just as important to prevent them at night, in foggy or rainy weather, and on hills or around curves, as it is to prevent them in daylight and on level roads. To permit courts and juries in each particular case to interpret differently the meaning of the plain term 'assured clear distance ahead,' is in effect to abolish the statute and its requirement by judicial amendment, and to place automobile drivers in the same position they were in before the statute was amended to its present form. Clearly, Section 12603, General Code, is a safety measure which to accomplish its purpose must be applied according to its clear and unambiguous language.

The states of Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Iowa each have assured clear distance statutes which are identical in terms and language. The construction of this statute becomes important to motorists of Ohio not only because they are affected by the law in this state, but because they are subject to the same rule when operating motor vehicles, as they do, to the extent of thousands of miles annually in the contiguous states of Michigan and Pennsylvania. Furthermore, it is highly desirable that the statute be given a similar interpretation by the courts of the several states wherein it is in force.

The Supreme Court of Iowa in the case of Lindquist v. Thierman, 216 Iowa 170, 248 N.W. 504, 507, 87 A.L.R. 893, defines and explains the statute of that state as follows:

'Reading the Iowa statute under consideration in the light of the modern trend of legislation relating to automobiles * * * the phrase 'within the assured clear distance ahead' may be defined readily. * * * It is evident that the words 'within the assured clear distance ahead,' as used in the statute, signify that the operator of the automobile when driving at night as well as in the day, shall at all times be able to stop his car within the distance that discernible objects may be seen ahead of it. To illustrate, a driver of an automobile at night, as well as in the day, in order to stop within the assured clear distance ahead, must be able to timely discern a man, a horse, a cow, or another vehicle; whereas such driver of the automobile might or might not discern a thin wire or a small stake in time to stop within the assured clear distance ahead. If, then, the driver of an automobile, because of the defective lights, cannot see more than 10 feet ahead of his car, he must so control...