Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad v. Spirk

70 N.W. 926, 51 Neb. 167, 1897 Neb. LEXIS 272
Nebraska Supreme Court·Decided April 21, 1897·No. No. 7069·Published·Cited by 8 cases

Opinion

Harrison, J.

. John and Eman Spirt commenced separate actions against the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad Company to recover damages alleged to have accrued in their favor on account of their unlawful and wrongful expulsion, prior to arrival at their destination, from one of the trains of the company, upon which they were passengers. The alleged causes of action had their origin in the same state of facts; hence after issues joined the causes were, on motion presented therefor, consolidated, the evidence introduced but once and the one jury returned a verdict thereon in each case favorable to plaintiffs. The company has prosecuted error proceedings to this court.

Before answer there was a motion interposed in behalf of the company, in each case, to strike out of the petitions certain portions thereof quoted in the motion. The refusal of the trial court to act in accordance with these [172] motions is the subject of one assignment of error. If the matter sought to be stricken out of the pleadings contained anything immaterial, which we need not now decide, if it also contained any material averment or averments, which it clearly did, it was proper to overrule the motions, and there was no error in so doing. There was no prejudicial or available error in the overruling of the motions to strike out disclosed by the record presented to this court.

After the issues had been joined and the cases called for trial, at the inception of the introduction of evidence on behalf of defendants in error, counsel for the plaintiff in error objected to the reception of any evidence, on the* ground that the facts stated in the. petitions were insufficient to constitute a cause of action. This was overruled; and the action of the court in this regard is assigned and urged as error. Where, as in this case, the objection to the sufficiency of a petition, that it does not state a cause of action, is not interposed until on the trial, the pleading will be liberally construed, and if possible sustained. (Roberts v. Taylor, 19 Neb., 184.) Read and interpreted in accordance with the foregoing rule, the petitions herein were sufficient and not open to the criticism urged against them, viz., that it did not appear that defendants in error were at the time rightfully on the train from which they alleged they were ejected. The petitions disclosed that the defendants in error purchased tickets, which entitled them to a safe passage on or over plaintiff in error’s road from a named starting point to a designated destination, and that they became passengers on said railroad accordingly, and took seats in the cars of plaintiff in error, to be carried to their journey’s end, and were carried directly toward their destination until a station called Benkleman, on the line of road, was reached, where they were unlawfully and forcibly ejected from the train or car in which they were riding. The foregoing is, in substance and in short, a statement of the portions of the pleadings attacked, and the averments were, we think, [173] sufficient to show a cause of action in favor of the parties seeking redress for alleged wrongs.

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Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad v. Spirk, 70 N.W. 926, 51 Neb. 167, 1897 Neb. LEXIS 272 (Neb. 1897).

70 N.W. 926 (Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad v. Spirk) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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