Illinois Central Railroad v. Byrne

68 N.E. 720, 205 Ill. 9
CourtIllinois Supreme Court
DecidedOctober 26, 1903
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 68 N.E. 720 (Illinois Central Railroad v. Byrne) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Illinois Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Illinois Central Railroad v. Byrne, 68 N.E. 720, 205 Ill. 9 (Ill. 1903).

Opinion

Mr. Justice Magruder

delivered the opinion of the court:

The main contentions of the appellant company in this case are, first, that the contract between appellee and appellant was that the car, containing appellee’s theatrical scenery and apparatus, should be hauled from Decatur to Bloomington by a passenger train, which was to leave Decatur on Monday morning about nine o’clock, and that appellant did not agree to haul the car in any other train or in any other way; and second, that appellant was not obliged to haul the car until it had passed the inspection of its car inspector, and that, by reason of the broken condition of the draw-bar on one end of the car, it did not pass such inspection.

In connection with the first contention of the appellant, it claims that it was not bound to perform the contract as made, because such contract was illegal and in violation of the statute, and also of its own charter. Section 21 of the “Act in relation to fencing and operating railroads,” approved March 31, 1874, provides as follows: “In no train shall freight, merchandise or lumber cars be run in the rear of passenger cars, and if such cars, or any of them, shall be so run, the officer or agent who so directed, or knowingly suffered such arrangement to be made, shall'each be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and punished accordingly.” (3 Starr & Cur. Ann. Stat.—2d ed.—p. 3277). Appellant’s contention is that, inasmuch as, by the terms of this statute, it was forbidden to haul the car in question in the rear of the passenger train to start from Decatur on Monday morning, the contract made by it was a void contract, and could not be enforced. It is said in relation to such a contract, that, the parties being in pari delicto, the law leaves them where it finds them, and that no question of estoppel or ratification can possibly arise.

The trial court held the law upon this subject to be as contended for by the appellant, because it gave to the jury for the appellant the following instruction numbered 5, to-wit:

“Even if you believe from the evidence Hovey [the appellant’s freight agent] agreed with plaintiff’s manager, the defendant should haul the car in controversy at the rear end of the passenger train on Monday morning, such agreement, if any such is shown by the evidence, was one prohibited by the laws of this State, and is wholly invalid and illegal. You are instructed, therefore, such agreement, if any, did not bind the defendant, and as to it, you will find the defendant not guilty.”

In view of this instruction, so given at the request of the appellant, the latter has no reason to complain of the action of the court in that regard. But it was a question in dispute between the parties whether or not the contract was to haul the car by this particular passenger train, which was to leave Decatur on the morning of Monday, February 4, about nine o’clock. Both parties submitted the question to the jury whether the contract was to haul the car by this particular train, or whether the appellant agreed to haul the car from Decatur to Bloomington in time for the theatrical performance to be given at Bloomington on the evening of Monday, February 4, without reference to any special or particular train. If the contract was a general agreement to take the car from Decatur to Bloomington in time for the performance, the appellant could have hauled it by attaching it to a locomotive, or a freight train, and thus a violatiop of the statute by attaching it to a passenger train would have been avoided.

It is true that the draw-bar at one end of the car in question was broken, but there is testimony, tending to show that the draw-bar at the other end of the car was in good condition, and that, by turning the car around and attaching the end Where the draw-bar was not broken, the car could have been hauled from Decatur to Bloomington within the time specified; and there is also evidence, tending to show that the appellant, through its agent or agents, agreed thus to haul it, or allowed appellee to believe that they would so haul it. If the appellant agreed to haul the car by thus attaching the end of it, which was in good condition, to some locomotive or train, it waived its objection that the car was not in good condition for transportation. These questions were all questions of fact, and- were submitted to the jury by proper instructions, and the jury have found them against the appellant. The judgment of the Appellate Court, affirming the judgment of the circuit court, is binding upon us, so far as these questions are concerned.

For instance, the second instruction, given for the appellee by the trial court, was as follows:

“If you believe from the evidence plaintiff made a contract with the Illinois Central Railroad Company to haul his car from Decatur to Bloomington without reference to any particular train it should be connected with, or to the condition of the car, in time to enable him to give his show there, and that he paid for such hauling; and if you further believe from the evidence said railroad company could have hauled said car, coupled by its good end either to a locomotive or to the rear end of a train, other than a passenger train, without danger in excess of the ordinary danger incident to the hauling of other cars, and if you further believe from the evidence plaintiff informed said railroad company’s agents at Decatur of his engagement or contract to give a show in Bloomington on the evening of February 4, 1895, and that, after said agents became so informed, the said railroad company failed or refused to haul said car to Bloomington in time to enable plaintiff to give his show in Blooming-ton, then the plaintiff is entitled to recover all additional expense, if any has been shown by the evidence necessarily incurred by him, and all profits which he would have received for giving the said performance in Bloomington, after deducting the expense of advertising his show in Bloomington, if said car had in fact been hauled to Bloomington in time to enable him to give said show in Bloomington, if you believe from the evidence he would have received any such profits.”

This instruction submitted to the jury the question, whether or not the contract was that appellant should haul the car to Bloomington without reference to any particular train it should be connected with, and without reference to the condition of the car. It also left to the jury to find whether the car could have been hauled, even if the draw-bar at one end of it was broken, by coupling its g'ood end to a locomotive, or to the rear end of a train other than a passenger train.

The court gave a number of instructions for appellant, and among others, the following numbered 2, to-wit:

“In the absence of a contract or agreement to the contrary, the defendant was not required or bound in law to haul the car in controversy in any other train or in any other way than contemplated or provided in such contract or agreement. And if, therefore, you believe from the evidence the contract or agreement in this case was, the car in controversy should be hauled in or by the Monday morning passenger train, then the defendant was not required to haul it in any other train, or in a special train, or by a special engine.

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Bluebook (online)
68 N.E. 720, 205 Ill. 9, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/illinois-central-railroad-v-byrne-ill-1903.