Plantz v. Kreutzer & Wasem

192 Iowa 333
CourtSupreme Court of Iowa
DecidedJune 25, 1921
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 192 Iowa 333 (Plantz v. Kreutzer & Wasem) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Iowa primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Plantz v. Kreutzer & Wasem, 192 Iowa 333 (iowa 1921).

Opinion

Faville, J.

i limitation or ment01a£termbard' oi statute. This is the second appeal of this cause. The former opinion of this court is reported in 175 Iowa 562. In the opinion in the former appeal, we set out'very fully the facts in ^Ie cai;ise; and it is, therefore, unnecessary for lls restate the same at length in this opinion, Since the former trial of the action, the original plaintiff has died, and the appellee, as administrator, has been substituted as plaintiff. Upon the former appeal, the cause was reversed, and this appeal is prosecuted from a judgment for the plaintiff upon the second trial.

I. The injury out of which this action arose occurred on August 8, 1912. Plaintiff’s original petition was filed on October 9, 1912. In said petition, among other grounds of negligence, the plaintiff specified the following grounds:

“Defendants were negligent in providing an unmanageable team for plaintiff, with which to carry on his work.”

On January 21, 1914, before the first trial of the cause, the plaintiff amended his petition, and, among other things, alleged as follows:

"That defendants were negligent in providing an unmanageable team, without notice to plaintiff, which team possessed the [335]*335trait or characteristic of rushing up steep inclines, and particularly the incline leading’ from the north door of defendants’ lumber yard up onto Nevada Street, all of which was unknown to plaintiff.”

After the reversal of this cause, and on April 1, 1919, the appellee filed a further amendment to his petition, as follows':

“That defendants furnished to the plaintiff’s intestate, without notice to the plaintiff’s intestate, a team, one or both of which had the trait or characteristic of suddenly starting' or jumping or rushing up the incline at the north door of defendants’ yard, described in the petition, which doorway was low, and unsafe when approached from the south with the team in question.

“That, on or about August 8, 1912, the said team, without any indication, suddenly rushed said slope, and plaintiff’s intestate was caught, and injured as described in the petition, and from that injury has since died.

“That defendant had failed to warn plaintiff’s intestate of this habit, characteristic, and trait of the team furnished him by the defendant, and by and on account thereof, plaintiff’s intestate was caught unawares and unprepared, and as a result, received the injury described in the petition, from which injury the plaintiff’s intestate suffered, languished, and died.”

As disclosed in the former opinion of this court, the ground of negligence set forth in the foregoing portions of the petition and first amendment was not submitted to the jury at the first trial. It is the appellants’ contention that the court erred in not sustaining appellants’ demurrer to the last amendment, filed April 1, 1919, the claim being that this was, in effect, pleading a new cause of action and a new basis of recovery, and that, at the time the amendment was filed, the cause of action so pleaded was barred by the statute of limitations. We have held that, if an amendment to a petition states a new and independent cause of action, it is to be treated as the commencement of a new suit, and that, if the period of limitation upon such cause of action has intervened, the amendment is demurrable. Box v. Chicago, R. I. & P. R. Co., 107 Iowa 660; Brooks v. Seevers, 112 Iowa 480; Gordon v. Chicago, R. I. & P. R. Co., 129 Iowa 747; Van Patten v. Waugh, 122 Iowa 302.

[336]*336We have also held, however, that, if the new matter so pleaded by amendment does not state a new canse of action, but merely amplifies and enlarges a charge made in a prior pleading, or states new grounds or specifications properly germane to such charge or allegation, the amendment so made will be upheld, notwithstanding the provisions of the statute of limitations. Kuhns v. Wisconsin, I. & N. R. Co., 76 Iowa 67; Williamson v. Chicago, R. I. & P. R. Co., 84 Iowa 583; Thayer v. Smoky Hollow Coal Co., 129 Iowa 550; Cahill v. Illinois Cent. R. Co., 137 Iowa 577; Taylor v. Taylor, 110 Iowa 207.

Applying this rule to the instant case, we are of the opinion that the amendment filed April 1, 1919, was not the pleading of a new cause of action, or the specification of a new, separate, and distinct grornid of negligence; but that it merely amplified and enlarged and made more definite and specific the ground of negligence previously alleged in the original petition and in the amendment thereto of January 21, 1914, as above set forth; and that the appellants’ demurrer was properly overruled.

2. appeal and sau°?etr?a:Teo¿ same testimony. II. The vital question on this appeal is whether or not the court should have permitted the case to go to the jury on the grounds of negligence specified in the petition as amended. On the first trial of the case, the appellants moved the court for a directed verdict in their favor on various grounds, among them being that the evidence failed to show -any negligence on the part of the appellants in the matters charged in the petition. As the petition then stood, one of the matters so charged was the ground of negligence now relied upon in respect to the characteristics of the team. This motion for a directed verdict was overruled, and the court, on its own motion, withdrew this ground of negligence from the consideration of the jury. On the former appeal, we considered and set out at length the evidence in the case, and also set out the grounds of the defendants’ motion to direct a verdict, and, on review of the entire case, as then made, we held that the defendants’ motion for a directed verdict should have been sustained. Upon the retrial of the cause, the court withdrew from the consideration of the jury all grounds of negligence except the alleged negligence in furnishing an unsafe team, possessing the characteristic of rushing up the incline leading from [337]*337the north door of the appellants’ lumber yard, and in failing to warn the appellee’s decedent of said alleged habit or characteristic of said team.

It is now contended in behalf of appellee that, inasmuch as these grounds of negligence were withdrawn from the consideration of the jury at the former trial, they were not reviewed or considered by this court, and that our declaration to the effect that the motion. for a directed verdict should have been sustained is in no way a determination of the question as to this particular ground of negligence. That was the view taken by the trial court in submitting the question to the jury. The question submitted upon the former hearing of this case in this court was not merely as to whether the trial court erred in the submission of the grounds of negligence that were submitted to the jury, but also whether or not the lower court erred in said trial in not sustaining the appellants’ motion for a directed verdict. We reviewed the evidence, the grounds of negligence, and the grounds of the motion, and held that, upon the entire case as then made, the court should have sustained the motion for a directed verdict. Upon a retrial of the cause on such a state of the record, the appellee was entitled to offer further and additional evidence, if such was at his command, respecting.the negligence alleged in his petition. Landis v. Interurban R. Co., 173 Iowa 466; Meadows v. Hawkeye Ins. Co., 67 Iowa 57; Bruce v. Galvin,

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

Related

Spaulding v. Miller
264 N.W. 8 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1935)
Pettijohn v. Weede
258 N.W. 72 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1934)
Page v. Koss Construction Co.
257 N.W. 426 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1934)
Green v. Phoenix Insurance
253 N.W. 36 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1934)
Orr v. Des Moines Electric Light Co.
238 N.W. 604 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1931)
Cornick v. Weir
237 N.W. 245 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1931)
McDowell v. Interstate Oil Co.
237 N.W. 454 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1931)
Pease v. Citizens State Bank
228 N.W. 83 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1929)
Reinertson v. Struthers
207 N.W. 247 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1926)
Buttman v. Christy
198 N.W. 314 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1924)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
192 Iowa 333, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/plantz-v-kreutzer-wasem-iowa-1921.