Carter v. Baltimore & Ohio Railroad

166 F. Supp. 307, 1 Fed. R. Serv. 2d 617, 1958 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3534
CourtDistrict Court, D. Maryland
DecidedSeptember 26, 1958
DocketCiv. A. No. 10809
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 166 F. Supp. 307 (Carter v. Baltimore & Ohio Railroad) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, D. Maryland primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Carter v. Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, 166 F. Supp. 307, 1 Fed. R. Serv. 2d 617, 1958 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3534 (D. Md. 1958).

Opinion

CHESNUT, District Judge

The defendant has filed a motion to dismiss the above entitled case. The substantial question involved is whether the plaintiff is entitled to demand a jury trial.

Rule 38 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, 28 U.S.C.A., provides in part: “The right of trial by jury as declared by the Seventh Amendment to the Constitution or as given by a statute of the United States shall be preserved to the parties inviolate. Any party may demand a trial by jury of any issue triable of right by a jury by serving on the other parties a demand therefor in writing at any time after the commencement of the action * * The 7th Amendment provides: “In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.”

The complaint alleges that the plaintiff, a stevedore employed by a stevedoring company, was working in the hold of a ship, on navigable water, moored to a dock of the defendant Railroad while employees of the defendant were engaged in transferring cargo from the dock into the hold of the ship by means of a crane owned and operated by the defendant; and that while the plaintiff was so engaged he was struck and injured by an object caused to fall on him by the negligent construction or operation of the defendant’s crane. The typewritten complaint prepared by counsel for the plaintiff and filed with the clerk designates the case as a “civil action”, and annexed to the complaint is an express demand by the plaintiff for a jury trial. The ground of the defendant’s motion to dismiss is that as the complaint does not allege diversity of citizenship, this court does not have jurisdiction of the action at law but only in admiralty, and therefore the plaintiff does not have a right to a jury trial as demanded and insisted upon by counsel for the plaintiff at the hearing. The complaint does not state any cause of action against the ship or the defendant as a shipowner (as for instance for wages or maintenance and cure), and it is not filed by the plaintiff as a seaman under the Jones Act, 46 U.S.C.A. § 688.

There is no question that this court does have jurisdiction over the case which is alleged to be a maritime tort on navigable water. The plaintiff was not employed by the defendant but has received compensation from his employer’s insurer under the Longshoremen’s and Harbor Workers’ Act, 33 U.S. C.A. § 901 et seq., which permits him to bring suit against an alleged negligent third person.

28 U.S.C.A. § 1331 gives jurisdiction to this district court in cases arising under the Constitution, Laws and Treaties of the United States “irrespective of diversity of citizenship” where the amount in controversy, as here (now by recent amendment) exceeds $10,000. Section 1332 also confers the jurisdiction of all civil actions of requisite amount where there is diversity. But as diversity is not alleged in the complaint (and I understand from counsel does not exist) there is no such jurisdiction here. 28 U.S.C.A. § 1333 provides “the district courts shall have original jurisdiction exclusive of the courts of the States, of: (1) Any civil case of admiralty or maritime jurisdiction, saving to suitors in all cases all other remedies to which they are otherwise entitled”.

The plaintiff’s contention is that jurisdiction in this case arises under section 1331; while the defendant’s contention is that there is no jurisdiction under section 1331 but only under section 1333, because the right to recovery for the type of maritime tort described in the complaint does not arise under the Constitution, Laws or Treaties of the United States but only under the general maritime law, the jurisdiction [309]*309•of which is given by section 1333, and therefore in this ease the plaintiff is not •entitled of right to a jury trial either under rule 38 or the 7th Amendment, both of which relate to the trial of •cases at common law and not to cases where the jurisdiction is in admiralty, where there has historically been no right to demand a jury trial except in .some special cases as under the Jones Act where the plaintiff’s right is based upon a particular federal statute, or when arising on the Great Lakes. 28 U.S.C.A. § 1873.

The particular question thus presented has arisen only recently, and “the plaintiff’s contention is, so far as I have noted, supported by only one judicial decision in the First Circuit. Doucette v. Vincent, 1952, 194 F.2d 834.1 It had, however, been previously considered and rejected in the Third Circuit in the case of Jordine v. Walling, 185 F.2d 662, in a full opinion by Circuit Judge Maris in 1950; and was subsequently considered and rejected in an extended opinion in the Second Circuit in 1955, by Circuit Judge Medina. Paduano v. Yamashita Kisen Kabushiki Kaisha, 221 F.2d 615. The point had also been considered and decided adversely to the plaintiff’s contention in the Seventh Circuit in 1951 in the case of Mullen v. Fitz Simmons & Connell Dredge & Dock Co., 191 F.2d 82; and in the Ninth Circuit in Modin v. Matson Nav. Co., 1942, 128 F.2d 194. See also the very recent case of Jesonis v. Oliver J. Olson & Co., 9 Cir., 1956, 238 F.2d 307, and Troupe v. Chicago, Duluth & Georgian Bay Transit Co., 2 Cir., 1956, 234 F.2d 253. Apparently the point has not been specifically heretofore decided in the Fourth Circuit but I note that District Judge Hoffman in the Eastern District of Virginia has recently decided, in a removal case, contrary to the opinion of the First Circuit, Meikle v. Leeds Shipping Co., D.C.1957, 152 F.Supp. 206. The great weight of federal authority is thus contrary to the plaintiff’s contention in this ease. Two later cases, one decided by the Circuit Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, and another in the District Court of Massachusetts, would seem to indicate that the application of the Doucette case may not be extended to somewhat different situations. Turner v. Wilson Line, 1 Cir., 1957, 242 F.2d 414, and particularly the extended discussion by Judge Wyzanski in Jenkins v. Roderick, D.C.1957, 156 F.Supp. 299, as to the absence of jury trials in admiralty and the effect of contributory negligence in admiralty which is not necessarily a bar to recovery, when compared with actions at common law, where it is. See Pope & Talbot v. Hawn, 346 U.S. 406, 74 S.Ct. 202, 98 L.Ed. 143 (as to the effect of contributory negligence in admiralty), and see also generally Benedict on Admiralty, 6th Ed. Vol. 4, 1957 Supp. p.

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166 F. Supp. 307, 1 Fed. R. Serv. 2d 617, 1958 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3534, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/carter-v-baltimore-ohio-railroad-mdd-1958.