Szabo v. Pa. R. Co.

• Citation: 132 N.J.L. 331,40 A.2d 562
• Decision Date: 04 January 1945
• Docket Number: No. 18.,18.
• Parties: SZABO v. PENNSYLVANIA R. CO.
• Court: United States State Supreme Court (New Jersey)

132 N.J.L. 331

40 A.2d 562

SZABO

v.PENNSYLVANIA R. CO.

No. 18.

Court of Errors and Appeals of New Jersey.

Jan. 4, 1945.

Appeal from Supreme Court.

Action under the Federal Employers' Liability Act by Sara Szabo, administratrix ad prosequendum of the estate of Charles Szabo, deceased, against the Pennsylvania Railroad Company to recover damages for death of plaintiff's husband. A judgment for plaintiff was reversed by the Supreme Court, 131 N.J.L. 238, 36 A.2d 8, and plaintiff appeals.

Reversed.

While in the absence of a contract or statute there rests no duty upon an employer to provide medical service or other means of cure to an injured employee even though it results from the negligence of the master there is an exception to the rule and that exception is-That where one engaged in the work of his master receives injuries, whether or not due to the negligence of the master, rendering him helpless to provide for his own care, dictates of humanity, duty and fair dealing, require that the master put in the reach of such stricken employee such medical care and other assistance as the emergency, thus created, may in reason require, so that the stricken employee may have his life saved or may avoid further bodily harm. This duty arises out of strict necessity and urgent exigency. It arises with the emergency and expires with it.

CASE, J., dissenting.

Philip Blacher, of New Brunswick (Herman D. Ringle, of New Brunswick, of counsel), for appellant.

John A. Hartpence, of Jersey City (James R. Laird, Jr., of Asbury Park, of counsel), for respondent.

THE CHANCELLOR.

This cause was tried at the Middlesex Common Pleas resulting in a verdict in favor of the plaintiff-appellant.

The complaint originally consisted of five counts but all were eliminated except the first two and the cause was submitted as an action under the Federal Employer's Liability Act, 45 U.S.C.A. § 51 et seq., seeking recovery of damages for the death of plaintiff-appellant's husband, who was employed as a laborer by the defendant-respondent and was a member of a track maintenance crew.

The first count charges that appellant's intestate, while engaged as a track maintenance laborer, was prostrated by the heat and by reason thereof became powerless to help and care for himself and because thereof it became the duty of the respondent to give him immediate attention and first aid and, if his emergent necessities so required, medical care and assistance, which it failed to do and by reason thereof appellant's intestate died.

The second count charges that the defendant-respondent undertook to care for its stricken employee and failed to discharge this duty with reasonable prudence and due care.

The defendant-respondent has and now does insist and urge that under the facts and circumstances of this case no legal duty rested upon it and that any action upon the part of its foreman or other members of decedent's gang or crew was beyond the scope of their employment and not binding upon it.

Respondent appealed from appellant's judgment in the Common Pleas to the Supreme Court and that Court reversed the judgment and the plaintiff below now appeals to this Court.

It is conceded that in this and other jurisdictions the law is, that in the absence of a contract or a statute, there rests no duty upon an employer to provide medical service or other means of cure to an ill, diseased or injured employee, even though it result from the negligence of the master, Koviacs v. Edison Portland Cement Company, 128 A. 542, 3 N.J.Misc. 368; 39 C.J. 240, § 348.

In our judgment there is a sound and wise exception to this rule, founded upon humane instincts.

That exception is, that where one engaged in the work of his master receives injuries, whether or not due to the negligence of the master, rendering him helpless to provide for his own care, dictates of humanity, duty and fair dealing require that the master put in the reach of such stricken employee such medical care and other assistance as the emergency, thus created, may in reason require, so that the stricken employee may have his life saved or may avoid further bodily harm. This duty arises out of strict necessity and urgent exigency. It arises with the emergency and expires with it.

This precept probably had its inception in the code of moral conduct, but, like many others, such as furnishing the employee with a safe place in which to work, and proper tools with which to labor, has become a legal duty incorporated in every contract of hiring, by legal inference, notwithstanding a lack of specific provision or statutory requirement. Carey v. Davis, 190 Iowa 720, 180 N.W. 889, 12 A.L.R. 904, 909 et seq., and the cases cited there; Ohio & M. Ry. Co. v. Early, 141 Ind. 73, 91, 40 N.E. 257, 28 L.R.A. 546; Shaw v. Chicago M. & St. P. R. Co., 103 Minn. 8, 114 N.W. 85; Raasch v. Elite Laundry Co., 98 Minn. 357, 108 N.W. 477, 7 L.R.A.,N.S., 940; Hunicke v. Meramec Quarry Co., 262 Mo. 560, 172 S.W. 43, L.R.A.1915C 789, Ann.Cas.1915D, 493; Terre Haute & I. R. Co. v. McMurray, 98 Ind. 358, 49 Am.Rep. 752; Depue v. Flatau, 100 Minn. 299, 111 N.W. 1, 8 L.R.A.,N.S., 485. Now this emergency must arise...