Feathers v. McLucas

41 Misc. 2d 498, 245 N.Y.S.2d 282, 1963 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 1250
CourtNew York Supreme Court
DecidedDecember 20, 1963
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 41 Misc. 2d 498 (Feathers v. McLucas) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New York Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Feathers v. McLucas, 41 Misc. 2d 498, 245 N.Y.S.2d 282, 1963 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 1250 (N.Y. Super. Ct. 1963).

Opinion

Isadore Bookstein, J.

The defendant, the Darby Products of Steel Plate Corporation, designated “ The Darby Corporation ” in the summons and complaint in this action, and hereinafter called “ Darby ”, has brought on this motion to dismiss the several causes of action stated against it on the ground that the court lacks jurisdiction over the person of the defendant, “ Darby”. The motion presents questions as to the interpretation, the retroactive effect, and the constitutionality of section 302 of the Civil Practice Law and Rules. Objections to the court’s jurisdiction based upon the misnomer of the corporation have been withdrawn.

“Darby” is a corporation organized under the laws of Kansas. Its only place of business is located in Kansas City in that State. The corporation’s business is the manufacture of cargo pressure tanks or vessels for use in the transportation of explosive and flammable liquefied petroleum products including propane gas. The manufactured products of the corporation are shipped to the purchasers from the plant in Kansas City, Kansas, and bills for the purchase price are sent from its offices there. The corporation has never been authorized to do business in New York. It has no place of business, no agents, [500]*500representatives or employees, and no warehouses or display rooms in this 'State. It has no assets of any kind in New York.

In 1956 ‘ ‘ Darby ’ ’, under a contract with Butler Manufacturing Co., a Missouri corporation, (hereinafter called “ Butler ”) having its principal office at Kansas City, Missouri, manufactured a pressure tank or vessel for carrying liquefied petroleum products including propane gas. The tank was delivered by “Darby” to “Butler” which affixed to it the undercarriage and wheels. The completed tank trailer was sold by “ Butler ” to E. Brooke Matlack, Inc., a Pennsylvania corporation (hereinafter called “Matlack”) engaged in the business of transporting goods, wares and merchandise in interstate commerce in the States of Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, New Jersey and other States. Delivery of the tank in question was made by “ Butler ” to “ Matlack ” in 1957.

On July 25, 1962, the tank trailer drawn by a tractor owned by Robert J. McLucas, whose administratrix is a party defendant to this action, was carrying a cargo of propane gas owned by the defendant Phillips Petroleum Company to a destination in Vermont. In Berlin, County of Rensselaer, New York, the tank allegedly ruptured and exploded. This action is brought by the plaintiffs to recover damages for personal injuries and damage to their property caused by the explosion. The summons and complaint were served upon the president of “ Darby ” in Kansas City, Kansas, on September 4,1963.

The power of a State to exercise a personal jurisdiction over nondomiciliaries was greatly extended by International Shoe Co. v. Washington (326 U. S. 310, 320 [1945]) and McGee v. International Life Ins. Co. (355 U. S. 220 [1957]). In the former case it was held that the requirements of due process for the exercise of personal jurisdiction over persons absent from the territory of the forum were met if the absentee had such minimum contacts with the State that the maintenance of the suit did not offend “ traditional conception of fair play and substantial justice ”. In the latter the court said (p. 223): “It is sufficient for purposes of due process that the suit was based on a contract which had substantial connection with that State.”

The cases establishing the “ minimum contacts ” test do not establish that jurisdiction was acquired over “ Darby ” by personal service upon its president in Kansas. Service of the summons was made under section 313 of the Civil Practice Law and Rules which provides that service outside the State may be made upon a person domiciled in the State or subject to the jurisdiction of the State under sections 301 or 302. Section 301 provides that a court may exercise ‘1 such jurisdiction over [501]*501persons, property or status as might have been exercised heretofore.” It is clear that “ Darby” had no such contacts with New York as would have permitted the courts of New York State to exercise an in personam jurisdiction over it prior to the effective date of the Civil Practice Law and Rules. If jurisdiction is to be sustained, authority for its exercise must be found in the provisions of section 302 of the Civil Practice Law and Rules.

The only paragraph of subdivision (a) of section 302 which might apply is the second. It authorizes a court to exercise personal jurisdiction over a nondomiciliary if “in person or through an agent, he:

“ 2. commits _a tortious act within the state ”. If the words ‘ ‘ commits a tortious act ’ ’ are synonymous with the words, “ commits a tort ” jurisdiction should be sustained since it is the general rule that ‘ ‘ the place of the wrong is in the State where the last event necessary to make an actor liable for an alleged tort takes place.” (Conklin v. Canadian-Colonial Airways, 266 N. Y. 244, 248 [1935].) If, however, the words require the presence within the State of the actor or his agent, the service herein made was ineffective to subject “Darby” to the jurisdiction.

It has been held that a State statute may constitutionally authorize the courts of the State to exercise personal jurisdiction over a nondomiciliary of the State, upon constructive service of process, where the nondomiciliary or his agent has, within the State, committed a tortious act. (Smyth v. Twin State Improvement Corp., 116 Vt. 569 [1951]; Nelson v. Miller, 11 Ill. 2d 378.) In both cases the agent of the defendant was within the State when the tortious acts were committed. In Gray v. American Radiator & Std. Sanitary Corp. (22 Ill. 2d 432 [1961]) the court went further. Upon facts very much like those of the case now before the court, it was held that the Illinois statute authorized the courts of the State to exercise personal jurisdiction over a foreign corporation, and that the statute was constitutional. / /

Before the Gray case was decided, the case of Hellriegel v. Sears Roebuck & Co. (157 F. Supp. 718) was presented to the Federal District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. There, Ohio and Wisconsin corporations were made defendants in an Illinois action to recover damages for negligence in the manufacture of a lawn mower which was subsequently sold by Sears Roebuck & Co. to a resident of Illinois. The court held that the words “ the commission of a tortious act ” within the State cannot mean the same thing as “ commission of a tort,” and that sections 16 and 17 of the Illinois Civil Practice Act [502]*502authorized the exercise of personal jurisdiction over nondomiciliaries only where the defendant committed the act in Illinois. After the Gray case was decided the case of McMahon v. Boeing Airplane Co. (199 F. Supp. 908 [N. D. Ill., 1961]) came before the court. It was conceded that the Federal court was bound by the Illinois Supreme Court’s interpretation of the statute, but Chief Judge Campbell who had written the opinion in the Hellriegel case said in referring to that case (p.

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Bluebook (online)
41 Misc. 2d 498, 245 N.Y.S.2d 282, 1963 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 1250, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/feathers-v-mclucas-nysupct-1963.