Wahlmann v. C. Becker Milling Co.

198 Ill. App. 608, 1915 Ill. App. LEXIS 29
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedDecember 1, 1915
StatusPublished

This text of 198 Ill. App. 608 (Wahlmann v. C. Becker Milling Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Wahlmann v. C. Becker Milling Co., 198 Ill. App. 608, 1915 Ill. App. LEXIS 29 (Ill. Ct. App. 1915).

Opinion

Mr. Justice Boggs

delivered the opinion of the court.

This case was before this court at its March Term, 1914, and is reported in volume 188 Appellate Reports at page 381. On the former hearing, said cause was reversed and remanded on the ground that the trial court erred in taking the case from the jury and entering judgment against appellee for costs.

On the subsequent trial a verdict for $6,000 was returned by the jury and judgment rendered thereon, from which judgment this appeal is prosecuted.

The opinion rendered on the former hearing contains a pretty complete statement of the facts in connection with said injury and they need not be restated at length. At the former hearing in this court, one of the principal contentions urged by appellant why appellee should not recover in this suit was because it was claimed that appellee was acting as superintendent of appellant’s mill at the time of his injury, and that therefore under the law, it was his duty as such superintendent to see that the machinery in question was properly guarded; and that his failure to do so would bar his administrator from a recovery for his death.

This question was gone into fully on the hearing at that time and our views on this question are fully set out in the opinion. We there said: “It is said by counsel for defendant that the cost of repairing or placing of guards over these pulleys would be but a trifle and that the deceased could easily have placed such guards, and that by his failure so to do he became liable for a penalty. We do not believe that a person in charge of the machinery, taking care of it, as the deceased was, would incur a penalty for failure to install machinery that he had not been directed by the master to place therein when the master was actively participating in and managing the business of the going- concern. This duty primarily rested upon Becker. The theory that the plaintiff cannot recover because of his failure or neglect to place the guards upon the machinery must be based upon the principle that although he may have been an employee, as he certainly was, he was guilty of negligence and assumed the risk of working with the machinery without guards. But, if this were true, it would not excuse the defendant from doing what the law requires of him, and the penalty imposed upon the defendant is to withdraw from it the defense of contributory negligence and assumed risk. The Supreme Court of this State seems to construe this act the same as the Mining Act, for it says, in the ease of Streeter v. Western Wheeled Scraper Co., 254 Ill. 257, 1 N. C. C. A. 828: ‘For many years we have held, in the construction of the Mining Act, that neither assumed risk nor contributory negligence is available as a defense to a suit for damages caused by a wilful violation of the provisions of that act. Bartlett Coal & Mining Co. v. Roach, 68 Ill. 174. * * * This law was passed to protect employees, and in view of the construction given to the Mining Act in regard to the assumption of risk, the General Assembly must have supposed that the same construction would be given to this act in that regard.’ Waiving the question as to the effect that the neglect of the deceased to place guards upon these pulleys would have upon the right of action for his injury, and the limiting of the right of defense of the defendant, yet the evidence shows he was receiving wages and not only looking after the machinery but was performing work, and performed such work as required him to pass near these pulleys, and there was at least evidence tending to show that he was an employee, and the evidence was not of that character that would warrant a court in saying that as a matter of law he was such a superintendent as would deprive him of the benefits of the statute. We think the case should have been submitted to the jury.” This question is now sought to be reopened by appellant through its instructions, but we do not deem it necessary to again go into this question as ye believe it to be one of fact for the jury under the instructions of the court.

Appellant also urges as ground for the reversal of said judgment, first, that “doping” the belts in order to keep them from slipping was, under the provision of the statute, the making of repairs, and that it was the duty of appellee’s intestate to stop the machinery for said purpose; second, that the guards suggested by plaintiff’s witnesses would not protect employees passing or working near the dangerous machinery; in other words, that they were not such guards as the statute contemplated.

First: The first section of the act entitled “An Act to provide for the health, safety and comfort of employees in factories, mercantile establishments, mills, and workshops in this State,” passed by the Legislature in 1909, provides among other things that “All dangerous places in or about mercantile establishments, factories, mills or workshops, near to which any employee is obliged to pass, or to be employed shall, where practicable, be properly inclosed, fenced or otherwise guarded. No machine in any factory, mercantile establishment, mill or workshop, shall be used when the same is known to be dangerously defective, and no repairs shall be made to the active mechanism or operative part of any machine when the machine is in motion.” (J. & A. 5386.)

It is urged by appellant that the provision “no repairs shall be made to the active mechanism or operative part of any machine when the machine is in motion” would apply to the “doping” of the belt as was testified to in this case; that when the deceased, Victor Hahn, was doping the belt he was repairing the machine, and was therefore violating the statute above referred to which prohibits making repairs when the machine is in motion.

We do not believe that such things as oiling machinery, or doping belts to prevent their slipping, has ever been called or classified as repairs by mechanists. The definition given by Webster for the word “repair” is: “To restore to a sound or good state after decay, injury, dilapidation or partial destruction.” We think it must be held that the Legislature in using the word “repair” gave to it its ordinary meaning.

Second: It is contended by appellant that under the provisions of the Statute of 1909 (J. & A. 5386), requiring “All dangerous places in or about mercantile establishments, factories, mills or workshops, near to which any employee is obliged to pass, or to be employed shall, where practicable, be properly inclosed, fenced'or otherwise guarded,” requires that machinery of the character of the “Nordyke roll” and “Allis roll” in appellant’s mill shall be entirely inclosed.

It was urged by appellant that if the machinery were inclosed that then before the belts mentioned could be doped, it would be necessary to remove the covering from the machinery, and that if this were done appellant would not be required to otherwise guard the machinery. In other words, it is urged by appellant that the machinery in question should be' entirely covered, and that before the belts could be “doped” this covering must be removed, and, 'when removed, the machinery would be in the same condition it was in at the time appellee’s intestate was injured.

It is, therefore, argued that it cannot be said that the failure to guard or protect the machinery in question was the proximate cause of the injury to appellee’s intestate.

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

Related

Bartlett Coal & Mining Co. v. Roach
68 Ill. 174 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1873)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
198 Ill. App. 608, 1915 Ill. App. LEXIS 29, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/wahlmann-v-c-becker-milling-co-illappct-1915.