Colorado Milling & Elevator Co. v. Mitchell

26 Colo. 284
CourtSupreme Court of Colorado
DecidedApril 15, 1899
DocketNo. 3999
StatusPublished
Cited by24 cases

This text of 26 Colo. 284 (Colorado Milling & Elevator Co. v. Mitchell) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Colorado primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Colorado Milling & Elevator Co. v. Mitchell, 26 Colo. 284 (Colo. 1899).

Opinion

Me. Justice Goddard

delivered the opinion of the court.

The question presented, and elaborately argued in the court of appeals, was as to whether the action comes within the provisions of the act of 1898, and therefore the service of notice as required by sec. 2 of the act was essential to its maintenance, or whether the facts alleged constitute a cause of action entitling plaintiff to a recovery under the act of 1877, unaffected by the later act. The court of appeals held that the complaint stated a complete cause of action, and a right to recover under the act of 1877, which was not controlled or affected by the act of 1893. It, however, based its . conclusion mainly upon the fact that the title to the act of 1893 limited the right to maintain an action thereunder to the agents, servants and employees sustaining damages, and did not embrace within its terms any provisions affecting the cause of action, right of action, or the recovery of damages sustained by any other person; and that in so far as the act attempts to regulate, restrict, or in any manner affect actions by one who was in no capacity in the employ of defendant, it is obnoxious to sec. 21 of article 5 of the constitution, which provides that:

“No bill except general appropriation bills shall be passed containing more than one subject, which shall be clearly expressed in its title; but if any subject shall be embraced in any act which shall not be expressed in the title, such act shall be void only as to so much thereof as shall not be so expressed.”

If, in the title to the act, which is .“ An act concerning damages sustained by agents, servants and employees ” the word “ damages ” is used in its technical sense to express simply compensation for injuries received, or the amount which the injured party is~entitled to recover, the construction given to the title by the court of appeals is manifestly [287]*287correct. If, on the other hand, we give to it the meaning with which it is frequently used, and of which it is also susceptible as a law term, as expressing “ the injury for which compensation is sought, ” in other words, as synonymous with “ injuries,” the title sufficiently expresses the subject treated in the body of the act. We are inclined to accept the latter view, and for the purpose of this review, assume the act to he constitutional. If this view be adopted, and force he given to all the provisions of the act of 1898, it does not in any manner repeal, modify or change any of the provisions' of the statute of 1877 ; nor does it purport to specify all the causes from which a right of action may accrue in favor of an employee against an employer. Section 1 of the act, which is the only section that undertakes to specify the causes for which an injured employee may recover, is as follows:

“ Section 1. Where, after the passage of this act, personal injury is caused to an employee, who is himself in the exercise of due care and diligence at the time;
“ (1) By reason of any defect in the condition of the ways, works or machinery connected with or used in the business of the employer, which arose from or had not been discovered or remedied owing to the negligence of the employer, of of any person in the service of the employer, and entrusted by him with the duty of seeing that the ways, works and machinery were in proper condition; or “ (2) By reason of the negligence of any person in the service of the employer, entrusted with exercising superintendence whose sole or principal duty is that of superintendence;
“ (3) By reason of the negligence of any person in the service of the employer who has the charge or control of any switch, signal, locomotive engine or train upon a railroad, the employee, or in case the injury results in death the parties entitled by law to sue and recover-for such damages shall have the same right of compensation and remedy against the employer, as if the employee had not been an employee of or in the service of the employer or engaged in his or its works.”

Clauses 1 and 2, which are the only provisions that can be [288]*288said to have any bearing upon the case in hand, are, so far as they go, but a legislative recognition of the principles laid down in the former decisions of this court. At the time they were enacted, it was settled law in this state that the master was bound to personally see that reasonable care was used in providing reasonably safe and proper machinery and appliances for use in his business; and to use reasonable care in maintaining the same in suitable condition; and that agents to whom he delegated the duty of procuring the machinery, and the duty of inspecting and keeping the same in suitable repair, were not regarded as fellow-servants with those employed in the business in which such machinery and appliances were used; and therefore the master was liable for injuries resulting, without contributory negligence on their part, to other servants, through the negligence or want of due care on the part of such agents in discharging their duties in these respects; and was also liable for the negligence of the person to whom he delegated the duty of superintendence. Wells v. Coe, 9 Colo. 159; Colo. Midland Ry. Co. v. O’Brien, 16 Colo. 219; Denver, S. P. & P. R. Co. v. Driscoll, 12 Colo. 520; D., T. & G. R. Co. v. Simson, 16 Colo. 55. It is obvious, therefore, that clauses 1 and 2 create no new cause of action nor deprive the employer of any defense that existed at common law, unless it may be said that clause 1 operates to exclude the defense of implied assumption of risk on the part of the employee. Clause 8 gives a right to recover compensation for the death of, or injury to, an employee, caused by the act or omission of a class of persons for whose negligence the master was not answerable at common law; and therefore creates a new right of action; or perhaps it may be more properly said, abolishes the defense that the negligence causing the injury was that of a fellow-servant. It is manifest, therefore, that the intent of the act is at most to abolish certain defenses in certain specified cases; and in such cases to impose a compensatory limitation on the right to sue; but in no manner to prejudice the common-law rights of employees, or to interfere with the [289]*289enforcement of any right that the statute itself does not create. This is the construction given by the supreme court of Massachusetts to their act of 1887, from which our act was copied; and our legislature presumably adopted the act with the construction that had been given it by the courts of that state. In Ryalls v. Mechanics’ Mills, 150 Mass. 190, Holmes, J., after a thorough review of the English cases construing’the English statute, of which the Massachusetts act is a part, said:

“But it would not need the aid of previous exposition to show that the main purpose of the statute, as the title intimates, is to extend the liability of employers in favor of employees, that it does not attempt to codify the whole law upon the subject, and that it leaves open some common-law defenses and some common-law liabilities. In view of these general considerations, we are to construe the statute liberally in favor of employees, and we ought to be slow to conclude that indirectly, and without express words to that effect, it has limited the workman’s common-law rights most materially in respect to the conditions and time of bringing an action, and the amount which he can recover.”

And concludes:

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Ferguson v. Ringsby Truck Line, Inc.
174 F.2d 744 (Tenth Circuit, 1949)
Bank of America National Trust & Savings Ass'n v. Angelus Cloak Co.
15 P.2d 901 (California Court of Appeal, 1932)
Lee v. City of Fort Morgan
235 P. 348 (Supreme Court of Colorado, 1925)
Arzuaga v. Ortiz
266 F. 449 (First Circuit, 1920)
Collard v. Hohnstein
64 Colo. 478 (Supreme Court of Colorado, 1918)
Hawkins v. Anderson & Crowe, Inc.
164 P. 556 (Oregon Supreme Court, 1917)
Chiara v. Stewart Mining Co.
135 P. 245 (Idaho Supreme Court, 1913)
Carlock v. Denver & Rio Grande Railroad
55 Colo. 146 (Supreme Court of Colorado, 1913)
Yost v. Union Pacific Railroad
149 S.W. 577 (Supreme Court of Missouri, 1912)
Rio Grande Southern Railroad v. Nichols
123 P. 318 (Supreme Court of Colorado, 1912)
Colorado Fuel & Iron Co. v. Gardner
21 Colo. App. 273 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 1912)
Barber Asphalt Paving Co. v. Austin
186 F. 443 (Eighth Circuit, 1911)
Boggs v. Alabama Consolidated Coal & Iron Co.
52 So. 878 (Supreme Court of Alabama, 1910)
Denver & R. G. R. Co. v. Wagner
167 F. 75 (Eighth Circuit, 1908)
Burnside v. Peterson
43 Colo. 382 (Supreme Court of Colorado, 1908)
Colón v. Ponce & Guayama Railroad
3 P.R. Fed. 367 (D. Puerto Rico, 1908)
Mulligan v. Colorado Fuel & Iron Co.
20 Colo. App. 198 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 1904)
Roche v. Denver & Rio Grande Railroad
19 Colo. App. 204 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 1903)
Jarvis v. Hitch
67 N.E. 1057 (Indiana Supreme Court, 1903)
Foster v. City of Greeley
15 Colo. App. 176 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 1900)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
26 Colo. 284, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/colorado-milling-elevator-co-v-mitchell-colo-1899.