Chicago Company v. Pontius/Opinion of the Court

by Melville Fuller

United States Supreme Court

157 U.S. 209

Chicago Company  v.  Pontius

Section 93 of chapter 23 of the General Statutes of Kansas (1 Gen. St. Ken. 1889, p. 415) provides: 'Every railroad company organized or doing business in this state shall be liable for all damages done to any employ e of such company in consequence of any negligence of its agents, or by any mismanagement of its engineers or other employees to any person sustaining such damage.'

In Railway Co. v. Mackey, 33 Kan. 298, 6 Pac. 291, the validity of this law was drawn in question on the ground of repugnancy to the constitution of the United States, and its validity sustained. The case was brought here on error, and the judgment of the state court affirmed. Railway Co. v. Mackey, 127 U.S. 205, 8 Sup. Ct. 1161. As to the objection that the law deprived railroad com anies of the equal protection of the laws, and so infringed the fourteenth amendment, this court held that legislation which was special in its character was not necessarily within the constitutional inhibition, if the same rule was applied under the same circumstances and conditions; that the hazardous character of the business of operating a railroad seemed to call for special legislation with respect to railroad corporations, having for its object the protection of their employees, as well as the safety of the public; that the business of other corporations was not subject to similar dangers to their employees, and that such legislation could not be objected to, on the ground of making an unjust discrimination, since it met a particular necessity and all railroad corporations were, without distinction, made subject to the same liabilities.

It is now contended that the plaintiff was a bridge builder; that the legislation only applied to employees exposed to the peculiar hazards incident to the use and operation of railroads; that the railroad company could not be subjected to any greater liability to its employees who were engaged in building its bridges than any other private individual or corporation engaged in the same business; and that the statute had been so construed in this case as to make the company liable to its employees when engaged in building its bridges, notwithstanding bridge building was not accompanied, and had not been treated by legislation as accompanied, by peculiar perils, thus discriminating against the particular corporation, irrespective of the character of the employment, in contravention of the fourteenth amendment.

But the difficulty with this argument is that the state supreme court found upon the facts that, although the plaintiff's general employment was that of a bridge carpenter, he was engaged at the time the accident occurred, not in building a bridge, but in loading timbers on a car for transportation over the line of defendant's road; and Railway Co. v. Haley, 25 Kan. 35, Railroad Co. v. Harris, 33 Kan. 416, 6 Pac. 571, and Railroad Co. v. Koehler, 37 Kan. 463, 15 Pac. 567, were cited, in which cases it was held that a person employed upon a construction train to carry water for the men working with the train, and to gather up tools and put them in the caboose or tool car; a section man employed by a railroad company to repair its roadbed, and to take up old rails out of its track and put in new ones; and a person injured while loading rails on a car to be taken to other portions of the company's road,-were all within the provisions of the act in question; and the court said: 'In this case the plaintiff was injured while on a car assisting in loading timbers to be transported over the defendant's road to some other point. The mere fact that the plaintiff's regular employment was as a bridge carpenter does not affect the case, nor does it matter that the road was newly constructed, nor whether it was in regular operation or not. The injury happened to the plaintiff while he was engaged in labor directly connected with the operation of the road, and the statute applies even though it should be given the construction counsel places on it.' And see Railway Co. v. Stahley, 11 C. C. A. 88, 62 Fed. 363.

We concur in this view, and the judgment is accordingly affirmed.

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