Pullman Co. v. Cox

220 S.W. 599, 1920 Tex. App. LEXIS 381
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedJanuary 9, 1920
DocketNo. 7785.
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 220 S.W. 599 (Pullman Co. v. Cox) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Pullman Co. v. Cox, 220 S.W. 599, 1920 Tex. App. LEXIS 381 (Tex. Ct. App. 1920).

Opinion

PLEASANTS, C. J.

This suit was brought by Robert L. Cox to recover damages in the sum of $2,975 for injury caused his wife, Margaret A. Cox, by the alleged wrongful act of appellant in forcing her to abandon a drawing room in a sleeping car of appellant for which she had contracted and paid appellant, after she hád retired for the night, and as a consequence of being deprived of the use of said drawing room and being compelled to sleep in an ordinary berth on the car, which was cold, and her being thus compelled to make such transfer from her warm bed in the drawing room to the cold berth, she was made sick and caused to suffer mental and physical pain.

It is alleged in plaintiff’s petition that Mrs. Cox had originally bought a ticket calling for a lower berth, but after arriving at the train, because she was the only lady on the car and objected to the conduct of some men in the car, she arranged for the drawing room, paying the difference in price. The transactions are alleged in detail, as to how she retired for the night and was later awakened by the Pullman conductor, who is alleged to have roughly and' boisterously demanded and insisted that she transfer from the drawing room to the berth, asserting that she would have to pay an extra railroad fare in order to be- permitted to occupy the drawing room, in response to which demands Mrs. Cox says the transfer was made. It is further alleged that, because of the enforced transfer, she was subjected to embarrassment and mortification in the presence of other passengers in the car, was exposed to the cold, and contracted a severe cold, which was followed by neuralgia affecting her teeth, with the re- *601 suit that some- of them had to be removed, and also affecting her physical condition to the extent that she, being a music teacher, missed a number of music lessons which she would otherwise have given, thereby causing financial loss.

The defendant answered by general demurrer, general denial, and special plea that it did not breach any contract with plaintiff, and that no breach of the contract caused or could have caused any of the injuries complained of by plaintiff. The defendant also denies that there was any cause whatever for mortification or humiliation of plaintiff’s wife under the circumstances.

With leave of the court plaintiff filed a second amended petition after the evidence offered by plaintiff had been introduced and plaintiff had rested his case. This amendment was identical with the petition in lieu of which it was filed, except that Mrs. Cox thereby became a party plaintiff and joined with her husband in the prayer for recovery of damages.

The trial in the court below with a jury resulted in a verdict and judgment in favor of plaintiffs for the sum of $2,000.

[1] The first assignment of error complains, of the judgment in favor of Mrs. Cox on the ground that the defendant had not been served with any process requiring it to answer to any demand of Mrs. Cox, and had not made an appearance nor waived service of process upon such demand.

The proposition presented under this assignment is as follows:

“Since no valid judgment can be entered in favor of one party and against another until the latter has been served with process requiring an answer, or until waiver of service and formal appearance, error is demonstrated,where, as in this case, a cause goes to trial with only one party plaintiff, and said plaintiff introduces all his evidence and rests his case, and, upon the defendant making a motion for a peremptory instruction, plaintiff then takes leave to amend, which leave is granted, over the exceptions of the defendant, and plaintiff files an amendment by means of which a second party plaintiff comes into the case and claims damages against said defendant in her own right, and not merely as a formal party; there being no issuance of process and no additional answer fijed by the defendant, and no waiver of service.”

The facts upon which the assignment is based are shown by the following bill of exceptions:

“Be it remembered that, on the trial of the above numbered and entitled cause, after the plaintiff had concluded the introduction of his evidence and rested his case, and before the defendant offered any evidence, the defendant filed in writing its request for a peremptory instruction, on the ground that the cause of action sued on was under the statute the separate property of the plaintiff’s wife, Mrs. Margaret A. Cox, and during the argument upon said motion counsel for the plaintiff stated to the court that, if it was necessary to meet the contention presented by defendant’s motion, they would ask leave to withdraw their announcement, and file an amended petition making Mrs. Margaret A. Cox a party plaintiff; whereupon the court stated that it would permit the plaintiff to file an.amended petition making the said Margaret A. Cox a party plaintiff, and that it would permit the defendant to withdraw its announcement of ready, and continue the case in the event it should desire to do so, in view of such amended pleadings, and would also permit the defendant to file any pleadings in answer to said amendment which defendant’s attorneys might deem advisable. 'That the attorneys for the defendant thereupon declined to avail itself of the right to continue the case or to file any additional pleadings, contending that if the amendment could properly be allowed there would be no need for additional pleadings, and if the same could not properly be permitted they could not and should not be required to file any further pleadings, and therefore the defendant took no action with reference to the amendment other than to except to the action of the court in permitting the amendment, and to the action of the court in overruling the request for a peremptory instruction.
“Plaintiff’s attorney having, in accordance with the leave of the court granted as aforesaid, filed an amendment to the pleadings upon which Robert L. Cox went to trial in the cause, thereby making Mrs. Margaret A. Cox a party plaintiff, and asserting a right of recovery in her behalf against the defendant; whereupon the trial proceeded and the defendant introduced its evidence. But the defendant at all times reserved its exceptions to the court’s action in permitting the amendment in question.
“After all the evidence was in, the defendant renewed its request for a peremptory instruction on the whole case upon the ground that no cause of action was shown in Robert L. Cox, and that Mrs. Margaret A. Cox was not a proper party plaintiff and was not properly made a party plaintiff, and upon the further ground that the defendant not having been served could not be required to respond to any cause of action asserted by said Mrs. Margaret A. Cox. The said request thus renewed the court overruled, to which the defendant in open court duly excepted.”

[2] This assignment cannot be sustained. The cause of action asserted in the amended petition by which Mrs. Cox became a party plaintiff with her husband was identical with that asserted in the previous petitions to which defendant had answered, and, if the husband had not been entitled to recover the damages sustained by the wife as a result of the wrongful act of the defendant, we see no reason' for holding that the defendant, after having by motion asked that judgment be rendered in its favor because Mrs.

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Bluebook (online)
220 S.W. 599, 1920 Tex. App. LEXIS 381, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/pullman-co-v-cox-texapp-1920.