Opinion ID: 736223
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Ordinary Prudence

Text: 30 The above survey of our decisions shows the confused start and the diverted path leading to the settled law in this Circuit that a Jones Act employer is bound by a greater-than-ordinary standard of care towards its employees and that a seaman owes only a slight duty to look after his own safety. We agree with the Third Circuit that nothing in the text or structure of the FELA-Jones Act legislation suggests that the standard of care to be attributed to either an employer or an employee is anything different than ordinary prudence under the circumstances. Fashauer v. New Jersey Transit Rail Operations, Inc., 57 F.3d 1269, 1283 (3d Cir.1995). In addressing a seaman's duty to act with reasonable care, the Third Circuit reasoned: 31 By its very terms, the FELA provides that the damages shall be diminished by the jury in proportion to the amount of negligence attributable to such employee. 45 U.S.C. § 53. The statute does not distinguish between degrees of negligence; the statute does not say that the plaintiff only has a slight duty of care. Under the statute, a plaintiff's recovery is reduced to the extent that he is negligent and that such negligence is responsible for the injury. In such a situation, one must assume that Congress intended its words to mean what they ordinarily are taken to mean--a person is negligent if he or she fails to act as an ordinarily prudent person would act in similar circumstances. Such a reading also is in accord with the FELA's pure comparative negligence scheme; and to adopt [plaintiff's] argument would be to abandon the clear dictate of the statute in favor of a policy decision to favor employees over employers. 32 Id.; see also Tiller v. Atlantic Coast Line R. Co., 318 U.S. 54, 67, 63 S.Ct. 444, 451, 87 L.Ed. 610 (1943) (holding that the employer's liability is to be determined under the general rule which defines negligence as the lack of due care under the circumstances; or the failure to do what a reasonable and prudent man would ordinarily have done under the circumstances of the situation). Our sister circuits have similarly held. See, e.g., Smith v. Tow Boat Serv. & Management, Inc., 66 F.3d 336 (9th Cir.1995) (unpublished) (rejecting slight care standard); see also Karvelis v. Constellation Lines, S.A., 806 F.2d 49, 52-53 & n. 2 (2d Cir.1986), cert. denied, 481 U.S. 1015, 107 S.Ct. 1891, 95 L.Ed.2d 498 (1987), (approving jury instruction informing that both employer and employee under Jones Act are charged with duty of reasonable care under the circumstances); Ybarra v. Burlington N., Inc., 689 F.2d 147, 150 (8th Cir.1982) (approving jury instruction that railroad has duty to exercise reasonable care for protection of employees); Joyce v. Atlantic Richfield Co., 651 F.2d 676, 681 (10th Cir.1981) (defining negligence as failure to use reasonable care). 33 We find further support for our position in Supreme Court precedent. In Urie v. Thompson, 337 U.S. 163, 174, 69 S.Ct. 1018, 1027, 93 L.Ed. 1282 (1949), the Court emphasized that the term negligence is to be defined by the common law principles as established and applied in the federal courts. (internal quotations and citation omitted). Although the Court's discussion refers specifically to § 51 negligence, it would defy logic not to extend this reasoning to the term as used in § 53, which discusses a plaintiff's contributory negligence. See also Consolidated Rail Corp. v. Gottshall, 512 U.S. 532, 542-44, 114 S.Ct. 2396, 2404, 129 L.Ed.2d 427 (1994) (holding that common law principles are entitled to great weight in FELA analysis unless expressly rejected in text of statute). 34 A seaman, then, is obligated under the Jones Act to act with ordinary prudence under the circumstances. The circumstances of a seaman's employment include not only his reliance on his employer to provide a safe work environment but also his own experience, training, or education. The reasonable person standard, therefore, and a Jones Act negligence action becomes one of the reasonable seaman in like circumstances. To hold otherwise would unjustly reward unreasonable conduct and would fault seamen only for their gross negligence, which was not the contemplation of Congress. See Robert Force, Allocation of Risk and Standard of Care Under the Jones Act: Slight Negligence, Slight Care?, 25 J. Mar. L. & Com. 1, 31 (1994). 35 By ascribing to seamen a slight duty of care to protect themselves from the negligence of their employers, Spinks and its progeny, specifically Brooks, are repugnant to the principles we espouse today and are therefore overruled. Moreover, by attributing to Jones Act employers a higher duty of care than that required under ordinary negligence, Allen and its progeny repudiate the reasonable person standard and are also overruled.