Opinion ID: 6328260
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Post-Death Damages at the Common Law: There

Text: Were and Are None. Over 200 years ago, Lord Ellenborough declared that “[i]n a civil Court, the death of a human being could not be complained of as an injury.” Baker v. Bolton, 1 Camp. 493, 170 Eng. Rep. 1033 (1808). Indeed, “[n]othing is better settled than, at common law, the right of action for an injury to the person is extinguished by the death of the party injured.” Mich. Cent. R. Co. v. Vreeland, 227 U.S. 59, 67 (1913). Said another way: actio personalis moritur cum persona—a personal right of action dies with the person. Henshaw v. Miller, 58 U.S. 212, 213 (1854). The common law simply does not provide a cause of action, either for the victim’s estate or the victim’s family, against a tortfeasor if the victim dies before a judgment is obtained. It goes without saying that the common law, by failing to provide a cause of action, also fails to compensate the victim’s estate and the victim’s family for the value of the life the victim would have lived had he survived.