McIntyre v. Tebbetts

120 S.W. 621, 140 Mo. App. 116, 1909 Mo. App. LEXIS 133
Missouri Court of Appeals·Decided June 8, 1909·Published·Cited by 4 cases

Opinions

OPINION.

GOODE, J.

(after stating the facts). — Kuhr was foreman of the wagon crew and the other members were under his authority. The wagon was, so to speak, a detached place of operation where part of defendants’ business was carried on under Kuhr’s control. He was empowered to employ men for his crew, regulate their work and let them go at his pleasure. Those facts were presented in the first instruction, and the jury were told if they found them to exist, Kuhr was a vice-principal and not a fellow-servant of the plaintiff. The court did not err in this ruling. [Miller v. Railroad, 109 Mo. 357; Russ v. Railroad, 112 Mo. 49; Edge v. Electric Ry. Co., 206 Mo. 471.] We will say all the instructions strike us as accurate and fair, and if the case should have gone to the jury on the questions of whether Knhr was a vice-principal or fellow-servant, and in which capacity he was acting at the moment of the accident, the issues were well presented. The main part of Kuhr’s task was to drive. the wagon and team. He did this as well as control the hauling and give orders to the men. Hence he discharged two-fold functions, and the principal inquiry is whether the entire evidence proved he was acting as a common member of the wagon crew at the instant he drove forward and caused plaintiff’s hurt, or as vice-[124] principal. Counsel for defendant insist the evidence shows, beyond inference to the contrary, the starting of the wagon was an act incident to his ordinary duties as driver, and in no sense an exercise of his authority as foreman. The leading opinion in this State on what is denominated the dual capacity doctrine, is Fogarty v. Transfer Co., 180 Mo. 490, wherein it appeared the driver of a freight wagon had been injured by the neg--ligent act of a foreman. Many of the facts were like those we have here, but one distinguishing circumstance appeared. Said foreman took the lines from Fogarty and undertook to back the wagon himself; thereby assuming, by virtue of the authority vested in him as foreman, to supersede the regular driver in the performance of a task the foreman had not been performing before, and in the course of which he hurt the driver. In the case at bar, when Kuhr started the team forward and hurt plaintiff, he simply continued to drive; for, properly considered, he was driving while he held the lines as the wagon and team stood waiting for plaintiff. It is plain the careless act of the foreman in the Fogarty case wears more the appearance of an exercise of mastery than does Kuhr’s as the opinion shows (loc. cit. 512); and hence it does not folloAv the capacity in which Kuhr acted was for the jury, merely because the Supreme Court held the question of capacity was for the jury in the Fogarty case. In Bien v. Transit Co., 108 Mo. App. 899, this court approved the submission of a like question on the authority of the Fogarty opinion, and it is-charged now by counsel for the defendant, that in doing so we misled the court below in the present case into submitting to the jury what was really a court matter. The facts of the Bien case regarding the magnitude and complication of the affairs controlled by the foreman who figured therein are so unlike those before us as to put that authority out of point; but we seize the opportunity to call counsel’s attention to the fact that the Supreme Court in Holweg v. Tel. Co., 195 Mo. 449, and [125] Edge v. Railroad, 206 Mo. 471, 492, approved and quoted from the opinion in the Bien ease. Counsel say we misconceived the import of the Fogarty case in holding it was applicable to an accident that had happened in this State, because the Supreme Court held the question was a jury one in obedience to the law of Illinois where the Fogarty accident happened. This contention is unsound. The Supreme Court showed in the Fogarty opinion (loc. cit. 511) the law of Illinois and the law of Missouri, as regards when the issue of vice-principal or fellow-servant is for jury or court, are not different. The courts of Missouri and Illinois hold alike on this matter, and that the question is for the jury when the facts are in dispute or reasonable men may come to different conclusions from them, and is for the court when the evidence will permit but one conclusion. Norton v. Nadebok, 190 Ill. loc. cit. 599. What we have said supra is more by way of answer to the attack of counsel on the opinion in the Bien case than in decision of this one.

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

McIntyre v. Tebbetts, 120 S.W. 621, 140 Mo. App. 116, 1909 Mo. App. LEXIS 133 (Mo. Ct. App. 1909).

120 S.W. 621 (McIntyre v. Tebbetts) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

Related

Parker v. Nelson Grain and Milling Co.
48 S.W.2d 906 (Supreme Court of Missouri, 1932)
McIntyre v. Tebbetts
165 S.W. 757 (Supreme Court of Missouri, 1914)
Mertz v. A. Leschen & Sons Rope Co.
156 S.W. 807 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1913)
English v. Roberts, Johnson & Rand Shoe Co.
122 S.W. 747 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1909)