Vause v. Vause Farm Equipment Co.

• Citation: 233 N.C. 88,63 S.E.2d 173
• Decision Date: 02 February 1951
• Docket Number: No. 668,668
• Parties: VAUSE, v. VAUSE FARM EQUIPMENT Co., Inc., et al.
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of North Carolina

Page 173

63 S.E.2d 173

233 N.C. 88

VAUSE, v. VAUSE FARM EQUIPMENT Co., Inc., et al.

No. 668

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

Feb. 2, 1951

Nance & Barrington, Fayetteville, for plaintiff, appellee.

H. L. Anderson, Fayetteville, and Smith, Leach & Anderson, Raleigh, for defendants, appellants.

JOHNSON, Justice.

The decisive question presented here is: Was there any evidence before the Industrial Commission upon which it could make a finding of fact that plaintiff was injured by an accident arising out of his employment? A careful study of the record impels a negative answer. All of the evidence below points to the plaintiff's epileptic seizure as the sole cause of his injury.

The Workmen's Compensation Act expressly provides that a 'personal injury' entitling an employee to an award of compensation 'shall mean only injury by accident arising out of and in the course of the employment, and shall not include a disease in any form, except where it results naturally and unavoidably from the accident.' G.S. § 97-2(f); and G.S. § 97-3. The words 'out of' refer to the origin or cause of the accident, and the words 'in the course of' to the time, place, and circumstances under which it occurred. Withers v. Black, 230 N.C. 428, 53 S.E.2d 668; Taylor v. Town of Wake Forest, 228 N.C. 346, 45 S.E.2d 387; Plemmons v. White's Service, Inc., 213 N.C. 148, 195 S.E. 370; Ridout v. Rose's Stores, Inc., 205 N.C. 423, 171 S.E. 642; Harden v. Thomasville Furniture Co., 199 N.C. 733, 155 S.E. 728.

An injury arises 'out of' the employment when it occurs in the course of the employment and is a natural and probable consequence or incident of it, so that there is some causal relation between the accident and the performance of some service of the employment. Rewis v. New York Life Insurance Co., 226 N.C. 325, 38 S.E.2d 97. The term 'arising out of', says Chief Justice Stacy in Bolling v. Belk-White Co., 228 N.C. 749, 46 S.E.2d 838, 839, has been defined to mean as 'coming from the work the employee is to do, or out of the services he is to perform, and as a natural result of one of the risks of the employment. The injury must spring from the employment or have its origin therein * * * There must be some causal connection between the employment and the injury.'

In the enactment of the Workmen's Compensation Act in 1929, our Legislature recognized that the common law remedies for injuries arising out of industry, based on negligence, were cumbersome, inadequate, and unjust. Therefore, a substitute was provided which broadened the base and liberalized the scope of compensation benefits for industrial injuries. The Act contains elements of mutual concessions between the employer and the employee by which the question of negligence is eliminated. 'Both had suffered under the old system; the employer by heavy judgments, * * * the workmen though the old defenses or exhaustion in wasteful litigation. Both wanted peace. The master, in exchange for limited liability, was willing to pay on some claims in the future, where in the past there had been no liability at all. The servant was willing not only to give up trial by jury, but to accept far less than he had often won in court; provided he was sure to get the small sum without having to fight for it.' Conrad v. Cook-Lewis Foundry Co., 198 N.C. 723, 153 S.E. 266, 268, quoting from Stertz v. Industrial Ins. Commission, 91 Wash. 588, 158 P. 256.

The philosophy which supports the Workmen's Compensation Act is 'that the wear and tear of human beings in modern industry should be charged to the industry just as the wear and tear of machinery has always been charged. And while such compensation is primarily chargeable to the industry, and consequently to the employer or owner of the industry, eventually it becomes a part of the fair money cost of the industrial product, and to be paid for by the general public patronizing such product.' Cox v. Kansas City Refining Co., 108 Kan. 320, 195 P. 863, 865, 19 A.L.R., 90. However, it must be borne in mind that the Act was never intended to provide the equivalent of general accident or health insurance.

Hence, the fundamental fairness and logic of the requirement that to be compensable an injury must arise 'out of' the employment, i. e., it must in some reasonable sense spring from and be traceable to the employment. Accordingly, 'Where an injury cannot fairly be traced to the employment as a contributing proximate cause * * * it does not arise out of the employment.' Bryan v. T. A. Loving Co. & Associates, 222 N.C. 724, 24 S.E.2d 751, 754, and cases cited.

The hazards of employment do not have to set in motion the sole causative force of an injury in order to make it compensable. By the weight of authority it is held that where a workman by reason of constitutional infirmities is predisposed to sustain injuries while engaged in labor, nevertheless the leniency and humanity of the law permit him to recover compensation if the physical aspects of the employment contribute in some reasonable degree to bring about or intensify the condition which renders him susceptible to such accident and consequent injury. But in such case 'the employment must have some definite, discernible relation to the accident.' Cox v. Kansas City Refining Co., supra. See also 58 Am.Jur., Workmen's Compensation, Section 247.

Similarly, it is generally held that where an employee is seized with an epileptic fit or dizziness and falls due to such or like causes, even so compensation will be awarded if a particular hazard inherent in the working conditions also contributes to the fall and consequent injury. See Annotations and cases reported therewith: Cox v. Kansas City Refining Co., 108 Kan. 320, 195 P. 863, 19 A.L.R. 95; Gilcrest Lumber Co. v. Rengler, 109 Neb. 246, 190 N.W. 578, 28 A.L.R. 204; and Valeri v. Village of Hibbing, 169 Minn. 241, 211 N.W. 8, 60 A.L.R. 1299.

In Schneider's Workmen's Compensation, 3d. Ed. (1946) Text Vol. 5, Section 1376, p. 61 et seq., is found an exhaustive treatise on 'Falls Due to Dizziness, Vertigo, Epilepsy and Like Causes.' The text is grounded on an analysis and collation of what appears to be substantially all of the decided cases on the subject. It appears therefrom that the better considered decisions adhere to the rule that where the accident and resultant injury arise out of both the idiopathic condition of the workman and hazards incident to the employment, the employer is liable. But not so where the idiopathic condition is the sole cause of the injury.

While there must be some causal connection between the employment and the injury, nevertheless it is sufficient if the injury is one which, after the event, may be seen to have had its origin in the employment, and it need not be shown that it is one which should have been foreseen or expected. Conrad v. Cook-Lewis Foundry Co., supra.

A finding of fact of the Industrial Commission is conclusive on appeal if supported by the evidence. This is so, notwithstanding the evidence upon the entire record might support a contrary finding. Riddick v. Richmond Cedar Works, 227 N.C. 647, 43 S.E.2d 850. However, the findings of fact of the Industrial Commission are conclusive on appeal only when supported by evidence, and the Court, on appeal, may review the evidence to determine as a matter of law whether there is any evidence tending to support the findings. Hildebrand v. McDowell Furniture Co., 212 N.C. 100, 193 S.E. 294. Therefore, the determination of whether an accident arose out of the employment is a mixed question of fact and law. Plemmons v. White's Service, Inc., supra.

Examining the evidence below in the light of the foregoing principles, it apperars that the plaintiff while a student at State College years ago suffered a spine injury which since then has made him subject to epileptic convulsions at intermittent intervals. Dr. W. T. Rainey, who has treated the plaintiff for this condition for the past four or five years, characterized the seizures as 'traumatic epilepsy.' He said they produced unconsciousness and caused muscular spasms: 'that they varied, some of them just a short period of unconsciousness,--just a fleeting, hardly stop, to one in which he would have convulsions in which there would be muscular contractions.' The plaintiff testified he could feel one of these seizures when it was coming on. He said 'they give me pretty good warning.' Just before the events complained of, he felt one coming on: 'I became a little nauseated or had a funny feeling in my head.' Thus heeding the warning of the approaching seizure, the plaintiff drove the truck off on the side of the road and lay down with his head on the side of the seat opposite the steering wheel. He said: 'I stopped the truck * * * I opened the door and stuck my feet out. I more or less swung my feet so I could put my head down in the seat. My head was on the opposite side of the seat from the steering wheel.' He then lost consciousness. He said the next thing he knew his body was hanging out of the truck: 'When I knew anything, I was trying to pull myself back in. Evidently while I was in a subconscious mind I had fell and pulled myself, was trying to pull myself back into the truck because I had hold of the steering wheel, pulling on the steering wheel when I realized anything; but I was still in a daze. * * * I was outside of the truck * * * trying to pull myself back in * * * had my hands over the steering wheel, with my legs extended out of the truck beyond the running board and the door. * * * I had a severe pain in my left hip. My left leg was out opposite the running board. * * * My left foot was over the running board but not on it. It was extended beyond it, towards the ground * * * my right foot was on the running board. * * * I don't know how long I was in that position in the truck, * * * I finally managed to pull myself back in the truck, because no one came along. * * I noticed the pain...