Western Union Telegraph Company v. Lawrence Crovo

• Decision Date: 03 April 1911
• Docket Number: Nos. 81 and 87,s. 81 and 87
• Citation: 220 U.S. 364,31 S.Ct. 399,55 L.Ed. 498
• Parties: WESTERN UNION TELEGRAPH COMPANY, Plff. in Err., v. LAWRENCE J. CROVO and Walter C. Crenshaw, Partners, Trading as Crovo & Crenshaw
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

220 U.S. 364

31 S.Ct. 399

55 L.Ed. 498

WESTERN UNION TELEGRAPH COMPANY, Plff. in Err.,

v LAWRENCE J. CROVO and Walter C. Crenshaw, Partners, Trading as Crovo & Crenshaw.

Nos. 81 and 87.

Argued March 6 and 7, 1911.

Decided April 3, 1911.

Messrs. Francis Raymond Stark, Henry D. Estabrook, Rush Taggart, and George H. Fearons for plaintiff in error.

Mr. J. Kent Rawley for defendants in error.

[Argument of Counsel from page 365 intentionally omitted] Mr. Justice Lurton delivered the opinion of the court:

Action to recover statutory penalty for the negligent failure to promptly transmit a prepaid message accepted at the Richmond office of the telegraph company, addressed to a business correspondent at Brockton, New York. The declaration averred that the negligence occurred in the office at Richmond.

There was issue joined and a jury. The defendant demurred to the evidence. This was overruled because the court was of opinion that from the facts and circumstances the jury might find that the negligence in transmission occurred in the sending office at Richmond. There was a verdict and judgment for the plaintiff.

A writ of error was denied by the supreme court of appeals, under local practice, because the court thought 'the judgment was plainly right.'

The plaintiff in error has sued out two writs of error: one to the law and equity court of the city of Richmond, the trial court, and another to the supreme court of appeals of Virginia. Inasmuch as the latter court denied a writ of error, the judgment of the law and equity court was the highest court of the state to which the case could be carried, and a writ will therefore lie to that court if a Federal question is properly saved.

The statute which it is claimed operates as a regulation of interstate commerce, and under which the action was brought, is set out in the margin.

It makes it the duty of every telegraph company doing business in the state to receive and transmit prepaid messages 'faithfully, impartially, with substantial accuracy, as promptly as practicable.' But the standard of duty under the statute is precisely that imposed at common law upon such a common carrier. The imposition of a penalty for the purpose of enforcing the statute was plainly within the legislative power of the state, if the act was otherwise valid. Ling Su Fan v. United States, 218 U. S. 306, 54 L. ed. 1049, 30 L.R.A.(N.S.) 1176, 31 Sup. Ct. Rep. 21.

But it is said the act requires that messages shall be transmitted in the order received, though preference may be given to business of the United States, the state, and the public press, and that this is a regulation which may conflict with a different rule prescribed by other states,

'It shall be the duty of every telegraph company doing business in this state to receive and transmit despatches from and for other telegraph or telephone companies or lines, and from and for any person, upon the payment of the usual charges therefor, if such payment is demanded; to transmit the same faithfully, impartially, with substantial accuracy, as promptly as practicable and in the order of delivery to the said company. For every failure to transmit a despatch faithfully, impartially, with substantial accuracy, and for every failure to transmit a despatch as promptly as practicable, or in the order of its delivery to the company, the company shall forfeit the sum of $100 to the person sending or offering to send such despatch, or to the person whom it was addressed: Provided, however, that not more than one recovery shall be had on one despatch, and the recovery by one party entitled thereto shall be a bar to the recovery of the other party. But nothing herein shall prevent any such company from giving preference to despatches on official business from or to officers of the United States or the state of Virginia, or from making arrangements with proprietors or publishers of newspapers for the transmission to them for publication of intelligence of general and public interest out of its regular order.' and may constitute a hindrance and impediment to interstate commerce.

It is not clear that such result may follow if the act be regarded as applying only to despatches received within the state, although destined to persons beyond the state. The act, unlike the Indiana statute involved in the Pendleton Case, 122 U. S. 347, 30 L. ed. 1187, 1 Inters. Com. Rep. 306, 7 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1126, neither regulates delivery in nor out of the state, and prescribes no preference in transmission. The company is permitted to give certain preferences named, but is not required to do so.

But we are not called upon to consider whether that particular requirement, one separable from all the others, is valid or not. The single ground of action stated in the plaintiff's declaration was that his prepaid message had not been transmitted 'as promptly as practicable,' and that this was due to negligence within the state.

The duty of transmitting without unreasonable delay was, as already stated, the clear common-law duty of the company,—a duty to which the statute adds only the imposition of a penalty for default. The issue of fact in the state court was whether the delay, however caused, occurred within the limits of the state. Stated more definitely, it was whether the fault was that of the Richmond office, which accepted the message, or that of the New York office, where it is said the message must be relaid over another wire to reach either Brockton or Brooklyn in the state of New York. The indisputable fact was that a message addressed to Brockton, New York, was sent to Brooklyn, New York. Somebody somewhere made a blunder, by which there occurred delay in the proper transmission of the message. Now, if that mistake was made at Richmond, the negligence occurred within the limits of the state. If it was correctly sent to the relay point, and the mistake occurred in relaying, the negligence occurred beyond the limits of the state, and the failure to transmit 'as promptly as practicable' did not occur within the state limits.

This issue of fact has been found against the plaintiff in error. Nine hours after the message was accepted, the plaintiff received a written notice in these words:

The Western Union Telegraph Company,

(I...