Clark v. Burns

118 Mass. 275, 1875 Mass. LEXIS 355

• Court: Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
• Decided: September 4, 1875
• Status: Published

Opinion

Gray, C. J.

The liabilities of common carriers and innkeepers, though similar, are distinct. No one is subject to both liabilities at the same time, and with regard to the same property. The liability of an innkeeper extends only to goods put in his charge as keeper of a public house, and does not attach to a carrier who has no house and is engaged only in the business of transportation. The defendants, as owners of steamboats carrying passengers and goods for hire, were not innkeepers. They would be subject to the liability of common carriers for the baggage of passengers in their custody, and might perhaps be so liable for a watch of the passenger locked up in his trunk with other baggage. But a watch, worn by a passenger on his person by day, and kept by him within reach for use at night, whether retained upon his person, or placed under his pillow, or in a pocket of his clothing hanging near him, is not so intrusted to their custody and control as to make them liable for it as common carriers. Steamboat Crystal Palace v. Vanderpool, 16 B. Mon. 302. Tower v. Utica Railroad, 7 Hill, 47. Abbott v. Bradstreet, 55 Maine, 530. Pullman Palace Car Co. v. Smith, 7 Chicago Legal News, 237.

Whether the defendants’ regulations as to keeping the doors of the state rooms unlocked, the want of precautions against theft, and the other facts agreed, were sufficient to show negligence on the part of the defendants, was, taking the most favorable view for the plaintiff, a question of fact, upon which the decision of the court below was conclusive. Fox v. Adams Express Co. 116 Mass. 292. Exceptions overruled.