Pennsylvania R. v. La Rue

81 F. 148, 27 C.C.A. 363, 1897 U.S. App. LEXIS 1844
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Third Circuit
DecidedJune 4, 1897
DocketNo. 7
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 81 F. 148 (Pennsylvania R. v. La Rue) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Pennsylvania R. v. La Rue, 81 F. 148, 27 C.C.A. 363, 1897 U.S. App. LEXIS 1844 (3d Cir. 1897).

Opinions

ACHESON, Circuit Judge.

A careful examination of this record has convinced us that the refusal of the court below to direct a verdict for the defendant on the grounds urged in the first and fourth points presented in the brief of the plaintiff in error was right. There was, we think, abundant competent evidence to show that the accident here in question was occasioned by the car which was afterwards seen at the Barrowpit siding, and that that was the same car mentioned by the Harrisburg- witnesses. We are also of the opinion that there was sufficient evidence from which the jury might well conclude that the injury which the plaintiff sustained was caused by negligence in the failure to substitute an oak standard for the hemlock standard, the breaking of which brought about the disaster. There was here no such inference to be drawn from the evidence, as matter of law, as would have justified the court in taking the case from the jury. Railway Co. v. Cox, 145 U. S. 593, 606, 12 [149]*149Sup. Ct. 905; Railroad Co. v. Mackey, 157 U. S. 72, 83, 15 Sup. Ct. 491.

The following stated facts, we think, are fairly deducible from tire evidence: On the evening of October 5, 1895, after dark, Augustus IL La Rue, the plaintiff below, then a fireman in the employ of ilie defendant, the Pennsylvania, Railroad Company, while in discharge of his duty upon a locomotive engine of the defendant running westward!}', near Metuehen, A1. J., and when in the act of shoveling coal into the fire box, was struck on the head and seriously in jured, and at the same time part of the cab of the engine was car ried away. At the time of the accident a freight train of the defendant was running eastwardly upon the track next to the track upon which the plaintiff’s train was running. There was in the freight train a low-sided gondola car, loaded with lumber (flooring boards), which, in consequence of the breaking of one of the uprights or standards with which the sides of the car were equipped for hold ing the lumber in place, became loosened so as to project over and beyond the side of tiie car; and the projecting lumber raked the side of the cab of the plaintiff’s engine, and struck the plaintiff. The standard that broke and caused the accident was a defective hemlock standard ai: the forward end of the lumber car on the side next to rhe plaintiff's engine. ’This car had been loaded at Williams-port, Pa., and was bound for Jersey City via Harrisburg. When the car reached Harrisburg a hemlock standard on the forward end of the car was found to be broken, and in consequence the load had shifted oat of place, and the lumber was projecting over the side of the car. The defendant’s general car inspector at that point sent the cor into the defendant’s repair yard, where there was a supply of oak standards for the equipment of lumber cars. All the standards on ibis particular car when it reached Harrisburg were of hemlock. The defendant’s foreman of car repairs (Charles Moyer) took out the broken hemlock standard, and replaced it with an oak standard, and he substituted an oak standard for the other forward hemlock one. He also took out several other hemlock standards, substituting therefor oak standards. At the other extreme end of the car, —which had been the rear end on the trip from Williamsport,-— he let the hemlock standards remain. In explaining what he did, Moyer testified that when such a loaded lumber car is under way the principal strain comes on the forward end. Either when this car was put back into the train at Harrisburg, or afterwards, and before the accident, the position of the car in the train was reversed, so that the two end hemlock standards were subjected to the principal strain. This reversal of the car in the course of transportation, whereby the weaker end became subject, to the greater strain, was a thing that might very readily occur, and ought to have been foreseen. At Harrisburg, before the car was taken out of the repair yard, the projecting lumber was properly replaced in the car. The defendant requested the com! t:o charge the jury thus:

“(1) If tlie plaintiff was injured by the improper equipment of the ear spoken of by Moyer, owing to his not having l-eplacod ah of the hemlock stakes, ami if he had been furnished with, and then had, proper stakes for that purpose, the defendant is not responsible therefor.”

[150]*150The court declined so to charge the jury, and, to the contrary, charged that, if Moyer was negligent in that matter, the defendant was answerable for his negligence. We are now to determine whether the refusal of the court to affirm the above proposition, and the instruction thus given to the jury, were correct Now, undoubtedly, it is authoritatively settled by decisions of the supreme court of the United States that, as a general rule, those entering into the service of a common master become thereby engaged in a common service, and are fellow servants, and that the common master is not liable for the negligence of one of his servants which has resulted in an injury to a fellow servant. Railroad Co. v. Baugh, 149 U. S. 368, 13 Sup. Ct. 914; Railroad Co. v. Hambly, 154 U. S. 349, 14 Sup. Ct. 983; Railroad Co. v. Peterson, 162 U. S. 346, 16. Sup. Ct. 843. But it is the equally well established doctrine of that court that it is the personal duty of the master to provide his servant with a reasonably safe place to work in, and to furnish reasonably safe tools, machinery, and appliances for the security of the servant while in the performance of his appointed work. Hough v. Railway Co., 100 U. S. 213. Thus, in Railroad Co. v. Baugh, 149 U. S. 386, 13 Sup. Ct. 921, the court said:

“A master employing a servant impliedly engages with him that the place in which he is to work, and the tools or machinery with which he is to work or by which he is to be surrounded, shall be reasonably safe. * * He has a right to look to the master for the discharge of that duty, and if the master, instead of discharging it himself, sees fit to have it attended to by others, that does not change the measure of the obligation to the employe, or the latter’s right to insist that reasonable precaution shall be taken to insure safety in these respects.”

So, also, in Railroad Co. v. Peterson, 162 U. S. 353, 16 Sup. Ct. 845, the court, speaking of the positive duties which the master owes to the servant, declared:

“He owes the duty to provide such servant with a reasonably safe place to work in, having reference to the character of the employment in which the servant is engaged. He also owes the duty of providing reasonably safe tools, appliances, and machinery for the. accomplishment of the work necessary to be done. * * * If the master be neglectful in any of these matters, it is a neglect of a duty which he personally owes to his employes; and, if the employé suffer damage on account thereof, the master is liable.

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Bluebook (online)
81 F. 148, 27 C.C.A. 363, 1897 U.S. App. LEXIS 1844, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/pennsylvania-r-v-la-rue-ca3-1897.