The Bridgeport evening farmer. [volume] (Bridgeport, Conn.) 1866-1917, 1909-05-04

LIABILITY
MEASURE
New Haven Road Contests
Constitutionality Of Act
of April %, 19O8,in Action
Brought by Employee.

Washington, May 4. - The govern
ment to-day filed in the Supreme Court
at Hartford, Conn.,, it's brief in the
case of Edgar G. Mondon, plaintiff,
against the New York, New Haven
and Hartford Railroad Company. The
case was brought under the Employ
ers' Liability act Of April %, 100, and
the government, by permission of the
court, is allowed to intervene and file
brief in support Of the constitution
ality of the act. which has been chaI-
lenged by the defendant company.
Acknowledgement Wicl<ersham and
Wade H. Ellis, his assistant, who pre-
pared the brief, have taken a strong
personal interest in this case, because
of it's great importance and, at the
outset, stated that the government has
no interest in any other question in
volved than to defend the validity of a.
gress, passed for the protection of a
vast number of citizens and for the
safety of interstate commerce. In the
case involving the constitutionality of
the former Employers Liability act
(207 u. S. 1853. the brief says, the De-
partnent of Justice was given permits
sion, in the original and Appellate
Courts, to file briefs and to be heard
in oral argument.
Congress, in adherence to the limita-
lions established by the Supreme Court
in the former case, it continues, pass
ed the act which is now the subject
of this controversy, and the attorney
general is impelled by the same sense
Of duty to the public at large to defend
the new law, as that which actuated
him in seeking to uphold the old.
earnestly to submit that the objections
urged successfully against the valid
ity of the prior act have been elimin-
ated from the new statute, and the en-
los hat il ic
court, is clearly within the constitu-
tional power of Congress.
Attention is directed to President
Roosevelts message to Congress, May
enactment of an employers liability
act, drawn to conforms to the then re-
cent decision of the Supreme Court
and eliminating the constitutional de-
fects found to exist in the former act
This Congress, exercising it's best
Judgment, proceeded to do. The Sem
ate Committee, it is pointed out, hav-
ing the matter in charge, after point
ing out the defects in the former law.
stated that the proposed measure
avoids these criticisms by combining
the application of it's provisions to the
employees of common carriers which
are within the regulative power of
Congress over commerce while employ
ed by such carrier in such commerce.
In the brief, it is contended that the
questions raised in this case are set
tied by the decision of the Supreme
Court in the former liability cases and
that the statute is constitutional,
though broad enough to include an ac-
ton for an injury sustained by a SER
want of railroad engaged in inter-
state commerce, caused by the negli-
gence of an employee not engaged in
int erstate commerce.
TN passing this statute the brief
argues, Congress was legislating sole
ly with respect to the relation of inter
Sfa ta and their eT11n10v6RS
while engaged in interstate commerce.
1t, is the object of the act to protect
an employee engaged in Interstate
commerce from injury as the result OF
any negligence of the interstate car
rier, or Of any of it's instrumentalities.
While a servant of an interstate road
is about his masters business and en-
gagged in interstate commerce, he is
entitled to and is within the protection
Of the Congressional power. The in
terstate business of railroads is SO in
terningled with their State business
that no segregation can be recognized
in regulating the relation between in
terstate carriers and their interstate
servants
The brief concludes as follows:
This is a wise, progressive. and hu-
name statute. 1t seeks, within APP
proved and conservative lines, to ac-
complish an object whose worth and
justice all men have long admitted and
many other civilized nations have long
ago attained. Legislation that is to
protect railway employees does not ben
eft a class alone. The safety of an in
terstate carriers servants means the
safety of interstate commerce itself.
with respect to this act not only it's
beueicent purposes, but the care with
which it was framed to meet the very
constitutional objections now urged
against it, should make its validity as
sured.
We respectfully submit that the act
here challenged is an appropriate ex-
ercise of the power of Congress to reg
ulate commerce between the states and
H.