Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/129/397/
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 03:49:08+00:00

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Justia › US Law › US Case Law › US Supreme Court › Volume 129 › Liverpool & Great Western Steam Co. v. Phenix Ins. Co.
and were damaged by the stranding. And the libellant afterwards, upon due adjustment of the general and particular average, paid to the assured or their assigns, in settlement of the insurance, various sums of money, amounting in all to £2720. 3s. 3d. in successive installments, most of which were paid before the filing of the libel, and the rest within a year afterwards and before the argument of this case in the district court.
By the settled law, in the absence of some valid agreement to the contrary, the owner of a general ship, carrying goods for hire, whether employed in internal, in coasting, or in foreign commerce, is a common carrier, with the liability of an insurer against all losses, except only from such irresistible causes as the act of God and public enemies. Molloy, bk. 2, c. 2, § 2; Bac.Abr. Carrier, A; Barclay v. Cuculla y Gana, 3 Doug. 389; 2 Kent Com. 598-599; Story on Bailments § 501; The Niagara, 21 How. 7, 62 U. S. 23; The Lady Pike, 21 Wall. 1, 88 U. S. 14.
If the bills of lading had not contained the clause last quoted, it is quite clear that the other clauses would not have relieved the appellant from liability for the damage to the goods from the stranding of the ship through the negligence of her officers. Collision or stranding is doubtless a peril of the seas, and a policy of insurance against perils of the seas covers a loss by stranding or collision, although arising from the negligence of the master or crew, because the insurer assumes to indemnify the assured against losses from particular perils, and the assured does not warrant that his servants shall use due care to avoid them. General Ins. Co. v. Sherwood, 14 How. 351, 55 U. S. 364-365; Orient Ins. Co. v. Adams, 123 U. S. 67, 123 U. S. 73; Copeland v. New England Ins. Co., 2 Met. 432, 448-450. But the ordinary contract of a carrier does involve an obligation on his part to use due care and skill in navigating the vessel and carrying the goods, and, as is everywhere held, an exception in the bill of lading of perils of the sea or other specified perils does not excuse him from that obligation or exempt him from liability for loss or damage from one of those perils to which the negligence of himself or his servants has contributed. New Jersey Steam Navigation Co. v. Merchants' Bank, 6 How. 344, Express Co. v. Kountze, 8 Wall. 342; Transportation Co. v. Downer, 11 Wall. 129; Grill v. General Iron Screw Co., L.R. 1 C.P. 600, and L.R. 3 C.P. 476; The Xantho, L.R. 12 App.Cas. 503, 510, 515.
"the question before propounded, namely whether common carriers may excuse themselves from liability for negligence, and a negative answer to the question thus stated was a necessary link in the logical chain of conclusions announced at the end of the opinion as constituting the ratio decidendi. 17 Wall. 84 U. S. 359, 84 U. S. 363, 84 U. S. 384. The course of reasoning, supported by elaborate argument and illustration, and by copious references to authorities, by which those conclusions were reached may be summed up as follows:"
by the negligence of himself or his servants, is unreasonable and contrary to public policy, and consequently void. And such has always been the understanding of this Court, expressed in several later cases. Express Co. v. Caldwell, 21 Wall. 264, 88 U. S. 268; Railroad Co. v. Pratt, 22 Wall. 123, 89 U. S. 134; Bank of Kentucky v. Adams Express Co., 93 U. S. 174, 93 U. S. 183; Railway Co. v. Stevens, 95 U. S. 655; Hart v. Pennsylvania Railroad, 112 U. S. 331, 112 U. S. 338; Phoenix Ins. Co. v. Erie Transportation Co., 117 U. S. 312, 117 U. S. 322; Inman v. South Carolina Railway, ante, 129 U. S. 249.
It was argued for the appellant that the law of New York, the lex loci contractus, was settled by recent decisions of the Court of Appeals of that state in favor of the right of a carrier of goods or passengers, by land or water, to stipulate for exemption from all liability for his own negligence. Mynard v. Syracuse Railroad Co., 71 N.Y. 180; Spinetti v. Atlas Steamship Co., 80 N.Y. 71. But on this subject, as on any question depending upon mercantile law and not upon local statute or usage, it is well settled that the courts of the United States are not bound by decisions of the courts of the state, but will exercise their own judgment, even when their jurisdiction attaches only be reason of the citizenship of the parties, in an action at law of which the courts of the state have concurrent jurisdiction, and upon a contract made and to be performed within the state. Railroad Co. v. Lockwood, 17 Wall. 357, 84 U. S. 368; Myrick v. Michigan Central Railroad, 107 U. S. 102; Carpenter v. Providence Washington Ins. Co., 16 Pet. 495, 41 U. S. 511; Swift v. Tyson, 16 Pet. 1; Railroad Co. v. National Bank, 102 U. S. 14; Burgess v. Seligman, 107 U. S. 20, 107 U. S. 33; Smith v. Alabama, 124 U. S. 465, 124 U. S. 478; Bucher v. Cheshire Railroad, 125 U. S. 555, 125 U. S. 583. The decisions of the state courts certainly cannot be allowed any greater weight in the federal courts when exercising the admiralty and maritime jurisdiction exclusively vested in them by the Constitution of the United States.
Second. The general maritime law is in force in this country, or in any other, so far only as it has been adopted by the laws or usages thereof, and no rule of the general maritime law (if any exists) concerning the validity of such a stipulation as that now before us has ever been adopted in the United States or in England, or recognized in the admiralty courts of either. The Lottawanna, 21 Wall. 558; The Scotland, 105 U. S. 24, 105 U. S. 29, 105 U. S. 33; The Belgenland, 114 U. S. 355, 114 U. S. 369; The Harrisburg, 119 U. S. 199; The Hamburg, 2 Moore P.C. (N.S.) 289, 319, Brown. & Lush. 253, 272; Lloyd v. Guibert, L.R. 1 Q.B. 115, 123-124, 6 B. & S. 100, 134, 136; The Gaetano & Maria, 7 P.D. 137, 143.
The decision in Lamar v. Micou, 112 U. S. 452, and 114 U. S. 114 U.S. 218, did not in the least qualify this rule, but only applied the settled doctrine that the circuit courts of the United States, and this Court on appeal from their decisions, take judicial notice of the laws of the several states of the union as domestic laws, and it has since been adjudged, in accordance with the general rule as to foreign law that this Court, upon writ of error to the highest court of a state, does not take judicial notice of the law of another state not proved in that court and made part of the record sent up unless by the local law that court takes judicial notice of it. Hanley v. Donoghue, 116 U. S. 1; Renaud v. Abbott, 116 U. S. 277, 116 U. S. 285.
The Scotland, 105 U. S. 24, 105 U. S. 29.
On such a question, we should be slow to overrule a decision of the circuit court. But we are not prepared to say that if, upon full consideration, justice should appear to require it, we might not do so, and order the case to be remanded to that court with directions to allow the answer to be amended and proof of the foreign law to be introduced. The Adeline, 9 Cranch 244, 13 U. S. 284; The Marianna Flora, 11 Wheat. 1, 24 U. S. 38; The Charles Morgan, 115 U. S. 69; Merchants' Ins. Co. v. Allen, 121 U. S. 67; The Gazelle, 128 U. S. 474. And the question of the effect which the law of Great Britain, if duly alleged and proved, should have upon this case has been fully and ably argued.
It appears by the cases cited in behalf of the appellant, and is hardly denied by the appellee, that under the existing law of Great Britain as declared by the latest decisions of her courts, common carriers, by land or sea, except so far as they are controlled by the provisions of the Railway and Canal Traffic Act of 1854, are permitted to exempt themselves by express contract from responsibility for losses occasioned by negligence of their servants. The Duero, L.R. 2 Ad. & Ec. 393; Taubman v. Pacific Co., 26 Law Times (N.S.) 704; Steel v. State Line Steamship Co., L.R. 3 App.Cas. 72; Manchester &c. Railway Co. v. Brown, L.R. 8 App.Cas. 703. It may therefore be assumed that the stipulation now in question, though invalid by our law, would be valid according to the law of Great Britain.
validity of a bottomry bond has been determined by the law prevailing at the home port of the ship, and not by the law of the port where the bond was given. The Karnak, L.R. 2 P.C. 505, 512; The Gaetano, L.R. 7 P.D. 137. See also The Woodland, 7 Benedict 110, 118, 104 U. S. 180.
This Court has not heretofore had occasion to consider by what law contracts like those now before us should be expounded. But it has often affirmed and acted on the general rule, that contracts are to be governed, as to their nature, their validity, and their interpretation, by the law of the place where they were made unless the contracting parties clearly appear to have had some other law in view. Cox v. United States, 6 Pet. 172; Scudder v. Union Bank, 91 U. S. 406; Pritchard v. Norton, 106 U. S. 124; Lamar v. Micou, 114 U. S. 218; Watts v. Camors, 115 U. S. 353, 115 U. S. 362.
In Morgan v. New Orleans &c. Railroad, 2 Woods 244, a contract made in New York by a person residing there with a railroad corporation having its principal office there, but deriving its powers from the laws of other states, for the conveyance of interests in railroads and steamboat lines, the delivery of property, and the building of a railroad in those states, and which therefore might be performed partly in New York, and must be performed partly in the other states, was held by MR. JUSTICE BRADLEY, so far as concerned the right of one party to have the contract rescinded on account of nonperformance by the other party, to be governed by the law of New York, and not by either of the diverse laws of the other states in which parts of the contract were to be performed.
"The contract was single, and the performance one continuous act. The defendant did not undertake for one specific act, in part performance, in one state, and another specific and distinct act in another of the states named, as to which the parties could be presumed to have had in view the laws and usages of distinct places. Whatever was done in Pennsylvania was a part of the single act of transportation from Attica or Waverly, in the State of New York, to the City of New York, and in performance of an obligation assumed and undertaken in this state, and which was indivisible. The obligation was created here, and by force of the laws of this state, and force and effect must be given to it in conformity to the laws of New York. The performance was to commence in New York and to be fully completed in the same state, but liable to breach, partial or entire, in the States of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, through which the road of the defendant passed; but whether the contract was broken, and if broken the consequences of the breach, should be determined by the laws of this state. It cannot be assumed that the parties intended to subject the contract to the laws of the other states or that their rights and liabilities should be qualified or varied by any diversities that might exist between the laws of those states and the lex loci contractus."
passage, and thence through the State of New Jersey to Atlantic City, was a contract to be performed in New Jersey and governed by the law of that state (Brown v. Camden & Atlantic railroad, 83 Penn.St. 316), and the other case on the ground that the baggage received at a town in Pennsylvania, to be carried to New York city, having been lost after its arrival by negligence on the part of the railroad company, the contract, so far as concerned the delivery, was to be governed by the law of New York. Curtis v. Delaware & Lackawanna Railroad, 74 N.Y. 116. The suggestion in Barter v. Wheeler, 49 N.H. 9, 29, that the question whether the liability of a railroad corporation for goods transported through parts of two states was that of a common carrier or of a forwarder only should be governed by the law of the state in which the loss happened was not necessary to the decision, and appears to be based on a strained inference from the observations of Mr. Justice Story in Pope v. Nickerson, above cited. In a later case, the Supreme Court of New Hampshire reserved any expression of opinion upon a like question. Gray v. Jackson, 51 N.H. 9, 39.
acknowledges that the goods have been shipped "in and upon the steamship called "Montana," now lying in the port of New York, and bound for the port of Liverpool," and are to be delivered at Liverpool. It contains no indication that the owners of the steamship are English or that their principal place of business is in England, rather than in this country. On the contrary, the only description of the line of steamships, or of the place of business of their owners, is in a memorandum in the margin, as follows: "Guion Line. United States Mail Steamers. New York: 29 Broadway. Liverpool: 11 Rumford St." No distinction is made between the places of business at New York and at Liverpool except that the former is named first. The reservation of liberty, in case of an interruption of the voyage, "to transship the goods by any other steamer" would permit transshipment into a vessel of any other line, English or American. And general average is to be computed not by any local law or usage, but "according to York-Antwerp rules," which are the rules drawn up in 1864 at York, in England, and adopted in 1877 at Antwerp, in Belgium at international conferences of representatives of the more important mercantile associations of the United States, as well as of the maritime countries of Europe. Lowndes on General Average (3d ed.) Appendix Q.
" Any person or persons shipping oil of vitriol, unslacked lime, inflammable matches [or] gunpowder in a ship or vessel taking cargo for divers persons on freight without delivering at the time of shipment a note in writing expressing the nature and character of such merchandise to the master, mate, or officer, or person in charge of the loading of the ship or vessel shall forfeit to the United States one thousand dollars."
From the very nature of the contract of insurance as a contract of indemnity, the insurer, upon paying to the assured the amount of a loss, total or partial, of the goods insured, becomes, without any formal assignment, or any express stipulation to that effect in the policy, subrogated in a corresponding amount to the assured's right of action against the carrier or other person responsible for the loss, and in a court of admiralty may assert in his own name that right of the shipper. The Potomac, 105 U. S. 630, 105 U. S. 634; Phoenix Ins. Co. v. Erie Transportation Co., 117 U. S. 312, 117 U. S. 321.
In the present case, the libellant, before the filing of the libel, paid to each of the shippers the greater part of his insurance, and thereby became entitled to recover so much at least, from the carrier. The rest of the insurance money was paid by the libellant before the argument in the district court, and that amount might have been claimed by amendment, if not under the original libel. The Charles Morgan, 115 U. S. 69, 115 U. S. 75; The Gazelle, 128 U. S. 474. The question of the right of the libellant to recover to the whole extent of the insurance so paid was litigated and included in the decree in the district court, and in the circuit court on appeal, and no objection was made in either of those courts or at the argument in this Court to any insufficiency of the libel in this particular.

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