Case Name: Michael Flynn v. Metropolitan St. Ry. Co.
Court: New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division
Jurisdiction: New York
Decision Date: 1896-11-20
Citations: 75 N.Y. St. Rep. 1144
Docket Number: 
Parties: Michael Flynn v. Metropolitan St. Ry. Co.
Judges: 
Reporter: New York State Reporter
Volume: 75
Pages: 1144–1151

Head Matter:
Michael Flynn v. Metropolitan St. Ry. Co.
(Supreme Court, Appellate Division, First Department.
Nov. 20, 1896.)
Street railroads—Injury to child on track.
A boy seven years old attempted to cross a track immediately in front of a horse car. The driver promptly turned the horses off the-track, but the dashboard knocked the boy down, and he was killed by a passing cart. Held, that negligence could not be inferred from the driver’s failure to apply the brake instantaneously with the primary duty to save the child from the horses. Williams and O’Brien, JJ,„ dissenting.
'Appeal from trial term, New York County.
Action by Michael Flynn, as administrator, against the Metropolitan Street-Railway Company. The complaint was dismissed, and plaintiff appeals.
The action is for damages resulting from the death of James Flynn, a child between seven and eight years of age. The child was bright and intelligent. He was sent from' his home on the 31st of May, 1895, on an errand which required him to> go to a store on the east side of Tenth avenue, between Fortieth and Forty-first streets. Returning from his errand, the boy attempted to cross Tenth avenue from east to west at Fortieth street, and at or near the north cross walk. A Belt Line car,, going south passed in front of him. One of the defendants’ cars (a green car) was following on down the avenue, about 20 feet behind the Belt Line car. On. the other side of the Belt Line car, and 4 or 5 feet west of the railroad track, was. a cart loaded with stone, and being driven up the avenue, towards the north. The boy went on the track (in his effort to cross) behind the Belt Line car, and a few feet in front of the horses of the defendants’ car. Lie was going quickly. The driver of the car swung his horses to the left, and thus avoided a collision between the .boy and the horses. But the dashboard of the car—the side of the car nearest the west side of the avenue—struck the boy and knocked him down. He fell in front of the neighboring cart, which passed over his body and killed him. The driver of the car had one hand upon the brake when, with the other, he was swinging his horses to the left, but he did not at the same instant turn the brake or stop the car. He devoted himself at the moment exclusively to turning the horses to the left, and this was necessary to save the child from being struck by the horses. The complaint was dismissed, and the plaintiff appeals.
Frederick H. Man, for appellant; Brownson Ker and John F. Tittle, for respondent.

Opinion:
BARRETT, J.
—The question in this case is whether the driver of the car was guilty of negligence; that is, whether there was anything to go to the jury on that head. Hpon the question of contributory negligence, we think the case might have gone to the jury. It cannot be said, as matter of law, that the child failed to exercise that degree of care which might reasonably have been expected of him. As to the main question, to wit, the driver's alleged negligence, the claim is that he made no effort to stop the car; that, while he was turning his horses to the left with one hand, he did not at the same time apply the brake with the other hand. It is clear that if the driver had applied the brake, and had not turned his horses to one side, the child would have been run over. The situation was critical, and the danger imminent. The horses were almost upon the child. There was the primary and immediate danger. What the situation imperatively demanded was that the driver should lend his energies to the swerving of the horses. He met that claim upon him with promptness and vigor. But it is said that he should have done more ; that in the midst of the excitement, and on the spur of the moment, he should have perceived the possibility of a later danger, and provided against it. There was no evidence tending to show that a driver, under such circumstances, could swerve his horses swiftly with one hand, and at the same moment adequately apply the brake with the other. Assuming, however, that the jury might have inferred that this was feasible, still the appellant's contention would extend the rule of negligence into impossible channels. What was required of the driver was the reasonable care and diligence of a person endowed with ordinary capacity, and fairly equipped for the particular service in question. What the appellant calls for is, not ordinary care and prudence, but extraordinary capacity and foresight. The driver should, in this view, possess a mind capable of thinking coolly and deliberately, yet promptly, in the midst of excitement and danger. And this great and unusual power should be coupled with the physical capacity to perform simultaneously two distinct functions, each of which,. but for this capacity, might well require the use of both hands. "What is that but saying that unless a man possesses the highest attributes of mind and body, and exercises these attributes in the highest degree, a jury is authorized to find him guilty of negligence. We cannot concur in this extreme view. Negligence could not have been justly inferred from the conceded facts of this case. The utmost that could have been inferred was an error of judgment, namely, the possibility that the child might have been saved by the union of thought and action upon the double function. The rule is that, where there is so little evidence of negligence that no reasonable man could find from it the fact of negligence, a nonsuit should be directed. " Negligence," as was said in Sutton v. Railroad Co., 66 N. Y. 243, " is ordinarily a question for the jury, but only when the facts would authorize a jury to infer it."' We think negligence could not here have been inferred from the failure to apply the brake instantaneously with the performance of the primary and imminent duty. That duty was at all hazards to swerve the horses and save the child. The imminence of the immediate danger from the horses overshadowed all else. It was concentration upon the one crucial object which constituted care and prudence. The danger law in diversion or deviation. It is said, however, that the jury might have found that the driver could have applied the brake and slowed down before thé horses' heads came so near the boy, and that, if this had been done, the accident might have been avoided with or without the sudden swerving of the horses' heads. The difficulty with this position is that there was not a particle of evidence upon which the jury could have made such a finding, or have drawn such an inference. Indeed, there was but one witness—Thomas G. Kennedy—who said that the boy was as much as six feet in front of the horses when he went upon the west track, and that witness merely " guessed " at the distance. 'This is his testimony :
" I guess the car was about six or eight feet from him at the ifcime he started to cross. The horses were going at the usual gait,—something like six miles an hour. Q. And with the horses going at the usual gait, six miles an hour, this boy starts in, six or eight feet in front, to cross over, and the driver, to prevent the horses from running him down, had to swerve them to one side ? A. To one side. The side of the car nearest the west side of the avenue hit him."
All the other witnesses called by the plaintiff put the distance at but between two and three feet. Mary McAuliffe says :
" I would put it between two or three feet in front. It was so near that the driver had to swerve the horses' heads so that they would not hit him."
William J. Hickey says that it was about the width of the car's platform, which the foreman of the jury said was a couple of inches over two feet. Hickey then testified as follows :
" The boy goes in front of the horses about two feet two inches from their heads, although this stone cart is coming along on the opposite side, right close to the track,—pretty close to the track. Q. And the horses miss him, because the driver swerves them to the east, but the dashboard strikes him and knocks him down under the cart ? A. Tes, sir."
The last witness of all, Thomas Tregoning, made this still clearer. He testified as follows:
" The boy'WS&.t so near in front of the horses' heads that the driver, to prevent the horses' heads from hitting him, had to swerve the horses to the east, and that brought him away from the brake, which is on the right,—on the west. Q. So that he couldn't attend to both at the same time, and he took the horses, instead of the brake, as the quickest way to prevent the accident. That is the way it looked, didn't it? A. Yes, sir.
This was substantially all the testimony upon the subject. Surely, from that testimony no jury could possibly have found or inferred that the use of the brake alone might have saved the boy. This testimony also accentuates the extreme difficulty of the situation, and shows most conclusively that the swerving of the horses was the urgent requirement of the moment. The driver's act in doing what he did must indeed have been almost involuntary. It Avas the one thing which any driver possessed of the least presence of mind Avould have done. Had the driver attempted to do more, and failed, there would have been greater plausibility in attributing such failure to his negligence than there is in the present charge. For then it might Avith some shoAV of reason be asserted that, with the child almost under his horses' heads, the difiver should have concentrated his efforts upon the one function Avhich the imminence of the danger called into immediate and exclusive play.
We think, therefore, that the complaint Ava-s properly dismissed, and that the judgment should be affirmed, with costs.
YAH BRUNT, P. J., and PATTERSON, J., concur.