Source: https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/298/110
Timestamp: 2017-01-24 07:29:05
Document Index: 737307130

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 33', '§ 688', '§ 688', '§ 51', '§ 53', '§ 53', '§ 53', '§ 51', '§ 1', '§ 51', '§ 1', '§ 5']

THE ARIZONA et al. v. ANELICH. | US Law | LII / Legal Information Institute
Supreme Court aboutsearch liibulletin subscribe previews THE ARIZONA et al. v. ANELICH.
298 U.S. 110 (56 S.Ct. 707, 80 L.Ed. 1075)
Argued: April 1, 2, 1936.
[HTML] Mr. Ralph S. Pierce, of Seattle, Wash., for petitioners.
Argument of Counsel from pages 111-114 intentionally omitted
In this case certiorari was granted, 297 U.S. 701, 56 S.Ct. 573, 80 L.Ed. 989, because of the importance of the question, to review a determination of the Supreme Court of the State of Washington, 183 Wash. 467, 49 P.(2d) 3, that assumption of risk is not a defense to an action brought under the Jones Act (Merchant Marine Act, 1920, § 33), 41 Stat. 1007, 46 U.S.C. 688 (46 U.S.C.A. § 688), to recover damages for the injury and death of a seaman caused by a defective appliance, a part of the equipment of a fishing vessel on which he was employed.
Since the maritime law allowed no recovery for the wrongful death of a seaman, see Lindgren v. United States, 281 U.S. 38, 50 S.Ct. 207, 74 L.Ed. 686, respondent's asserted right of action is conferred by section 33 of the Jones Act, 41 Stat. 1007, 46 U.S.C. 688 (46 U.S.C.A. § 688), which gives to a seama injured in the course of his employment, at his election, a right of action for damages at law, with trial by jury, in which 'all statutes of the United States modifying or extending the common-law right or remedy in cases of personal injury to railway employees shall apply.' In case of the death of the seaman, as a result of the injury, it similarly gives a right of action to his personal representatives in which 'all statutes of the United States conferring or regulating the right of action for death in the case of railway employees shall be applicable.'
Section 1 of the Federal Employers' Liability Act, 35 Stat. 65, 45 U.S.C. 51 (45 U.S.C.A. § 51), thus incorporated in the Jones Act by reference, gives a right of recovery for the injury or death of an employee of a common carrier by rail, in interstate or foreign commerce, 'resulting in whole or in part from the negligence of any of the officers, agents, or employees of such carrier, or by reason of any defect or insufficiency, due to its negligence, in its * * * appliances, machinery * * * or other equipment.' By section 3 of the Act, 45 U.S.C.A. § 53 (45 U.S.C.A. § 53), contributory negligence does not bar recovery, but is ground for apportionment of the damages between employer and employee, and by sections 3 and 4, 45 U.S.C. 53, 54 (45 U.S.C.A. §§ 53, 54), it is provided that no employee shall be held to have been guilty of contributory negligence or 'to have assumed the risks of his employment in any case where the violation by such common carrier of any statute enacted for the safety of employees contributed to the injury or death of such employee.'
In applying the Federal Employers' Liability Act (45 U.S.C.A. §§ 5159), in suits brought by railroad employees, it has been settled by numerous decisions of this court that assumption of risk is a defense in a suit brought to recover for injuries resulting from defective appliances, the use of which is not required by the Federal Safety Appliance Act (45 U.S.C.A. § 1 et seq.), see Seaboard Air Line Ry. v. Horton, 233 U.S. 492, 34 S.Ct. 635, 58 L.Ed. 1062, L.R.A.1915C, 1, Ann.Cas.1915B, 475; Jacobs v. Southern R. Co., 241 U.S. 229, 36 S.Ct. 588, 60 L.Ed. 970; Boldt v. Pennsylvania R. Co., 245 U.S. 441, 445, 38 S.Ct. 139, 62 L.Ed. 385. The fact that the statute deals with and extends a common-law form of liability, provides for its enforcement in common-law courts, and prescribes that certain common-law defenses, including assumption of risk, shall not be available in specified cases, led to the conclusion that such defenses, when not excluded by the terms of the statute, are impliedly authorized.
While the maritime law before the enactment of the Jones Act permitted no recovery for injuries resulting in the death of a seaman, or generally for injuries resulting from the negligence of a fellow servant or the master,
a seaman who fell sick or was injured in the course of his employment was entitled to 'maintenance and cure,' 'at least so long as the voyage was continued,' see Pacific Steamship Co. v. Peterson, supra, and to recover from vessel or owner indemnity for injuries due to unseaworthiness of the vessel or 'failure to supply and to keep in order the proper appliances appurtenant to the ship.' These propositions were laid down in answering certified questions in The Osceola, 189 U.S. 158, 175, 23 S.Ct. 483, 47 L.Ed. 760, and they have often been cited with approval by this Court. See Chelentis v. Luckenbach S.S. Co., supra, 247 U.S. 372, 379, 380, 38 S.Ct. 501, 62 L.Ed. 1171; Carlisle Packing Co. v. Sandanger, 259 U.S. 255, 259, 42 S.Ct. 475, 66 L.Ed. 927; Pacific Steamship Co. v. Peterson, supra, 278 U.S. 130, 134, 49 S.Ct. 75, 73 L.Ed. 220; Lindgren v. United States, supra.
In declaring in The Osceola, without qualification as to the assumption of risk, that the owner and vessel were liable to indemnify seamen for injuries caused by unseaworthiness of the vessel, and that unseaworthiness embraced defective appliances appurtenant to the ship, this Court adopted the pronouncements of many earlier cases in admiralty in which the rule was applied or recognized.
It was definitely applied by this Court in Carlisle Packing Co. v. Sandanger, supra; cf. Plamals v. S. S. Pinar Del Rio, 277 U.S. 151, 155, 48 S.Ct. 457, 72 L.Ed. 827.
Like considerations, and others to be mentioned, require a like conclusion with respect to the modified and in some respects enlarged liability imported into the maritime law by the Jones Act. The legislation was remedial, for the benefit and protection of seamen who are peculiarly the wards of admiralty. Its purpose was to enlarge that protection, not to narrow it. Cf. Chelentis v. Luckenbach S.S. Co., supra. Its provisions, like others of the Merchant Marine Act (
41 Stat. 988), of which it is a part, are to be liberally construed to attain that end, see Cortes v. Baltimore Insular Line, 287 U.S. 367, 375, 53 S.Ct. 173, 77 L.Ed. 368; Jamison v. Encarnacion, 281 U.S. 635, 639, 50 S.Ct. 440, 74 L.Ed. 1082; Alpha S.S. Corp. v. Cain, 281 U.S. 642, 50 S.Ct. 443, 74 L.Ed. 1086; Warner v. Goltra, 293 U.S. 155, 157, 160, 55 S.Ct. 46, 79 L.Ed. 254, and are to be interpreted in harmony with the established doctrine of maritime law of which it is an integral part. The denial in the Federal Employers' Liability Act (45 U.S.C.A. §§ 5159) of the defense of assumption of risk refers only to suits founded on the Federal Safety Appliance Act (45 U.S.C.A. § 1 et seq.), applicable alone to railroads. It can raise no inference as to the availability of the defense in suits brought to recover for injuries to seamen. No provision of the Jones Act is inconsistent with the admiralty rule as to assumption of risk. The purpose and terms of the Act, and the nature of the juristic field in which it is to be applied, preclude the assumption that Congress intended, by its adoption, to modify that rule by implication. Such has been the conclusion reached generally by the lower federal courts, although not with entire unanimity.
The seaman's right of indemnity for injuries caused by defective appliances or unseaworthiness seems to have been a development from his privilege to abandon a vessel improperly fitted out. The privilege was recognized in Dixon v. The Cyrus, Fed.Cas.No.3,930, 2 Pet.Adm. 407 (D.C.Pa., 1789), where it was held that the law will imply an engagement to the mariners that 'the ship shall be furnished with all the necessary and customary requisites for navigation, or, as the term is, shall be found seaworthy.' This case was relied on in several early cases recognizing the seaman's right to consequential damages for injuries resulting from faulty equipment. Halverson v. Nisen, Fed.Cas.No.5,970, 3 Sawy. 562; The Noddleburn (D.C.) 28 F. 855, 856; The Lizzie Frank (D.C.) 31 F. 477; and see The Wenonah, Fed.Cas.No.17,412, 1 Hask. 606. The rule that unseaworthiness releases the seaman from his contract is of uncertain origin, but it is closely related to the master's obligation to owner and shipper that the vessel be well equipped and ballasted. See Marine Ordinances of Louis XIV, Book II, art. VIII, Moloy, De Jure Maritimo et Navali (7th Ed. 1722) p. 223. The seaman's right of indemnity was sustained in The City of Alexandria (D.C.) 17 F. 390; The Edith Godden (D.C.) 23 F. 43; Olson v. Flavel (D.C.) 34 F. 477; The A. Heaton (C.C.) 43 F. 592; The Frank and Willie (D.C.) 45 F. 494; The Julia Fowler (D.C.) 49 F. 277. A seaman was denied recovery for injuries in Couch v. Steele (1853) 3 El. & Bl. 402, on the ground that the owner owed to seamen no duty to make the vessel seaworthy. This case was disapproved in The Noddleburn, supra, 28 F. 855, 857, which allowed recovery for an injury due to defective rigging. The Merchant Shipping Act of 1876, 3940 Vict. ch. 80, § 5, provided that there should be imported into every contract of service between the owner of the vessel and the seamen on board an implied obligation 'that the owner of the ship and the master, and every agent charged with the loading of the ship or the preparing thereof for sea or the sending thereof to sea shall use all reasonable means to insure the seaworthiness of the ship for the voyage at the time when the voyage commences and to keep her in a seaworthy condition for the voyage during the same.' See Hedley v. Pinkney & Sons S.S. Co. (1894) A.C. 222, strictly construing this statute.