Court Opinion

ID: 9810539
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 21:52:45.474164+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:39:59.671434
License: Public Domain

Clark, C. J.,
dissenting: It is found by the jury, by consent, that the goods were received by the defendánt at Jamesville, N. C., 10 August, 1906, and were not delivered to the consignee .a.t Williamston till 20 August. It is admitted that the goods were applied for by the consignee on 14 *103August and again on 11 August. Williamston is only eleven miles from Jamesville, and there is no intermediate station. This is an appeal from a judgment for a penalty of $20 for unreasonable delay under Revisal, sec. 2632. Tbe jury found that there was unreasonable delay in getting the goods from Jamesville to the plaintiff 'at Williamston. It would not seem that this conclusion could be reasonably controverted. The defense is that the goods really reached Williamston 14 August .and were in the warehouse of the defendant, but that the agent of the defendant there delivered to the consignee on 14 August a different package, and on 11 August erroneously told the consignee that the goods had not come; but finding on 20 August that the goods were there, so informed the consignee, who came that day and got them. The defendant contends that it did not fail to “transport” the goods in a reasonable time, because in fact they got to Wil-liamston by 14 August, though it denied them to the consignee till 20 August.
The defendant is surely “sticking in the bark.” There is no technical mystery in the word “transport.” It simply means “to carry.” The contract which the defendant made by the bill of lading was not merely to carry the goods from Jamesville to Williamston, but from the consignor at James-ville to the consignee at the defendant’s station at Williams-ton. It includes, according to the due and recognized course of dealing of common carriers and by the very terms of the contract, taking the goods from the consignor at the defendant’s station at Jamesville and their - delivery to the consignee at the defendant’s station at Williamston. Nothing else would be a discharge of the contract in the bill of lading to transport the goods from “A” at one point to “B” at another. It is not contended by the consignee that the goods should be delivered to him elsewhere than at the defendant’s *104warehouse in Williamston; but there was certainly no compliance (till 20 August) with the contract to deliver to the consignee, for he applied at the defendant’s depot at that place and was refused the goods. They are not carried or transported to him at Williamston when on his application at the proper place he is denied'them.
The “carrying” or “transporting” of goods within a reasonable time is a common-law duty. The Revisal, 2632, simply enforces the discharge, of that duty by the penalty therein provided. The common-law duty of transporting goods to the consignee was not performed if upon application of the consignee at the office of the carrier the goods are not delivered to him.
It is a matter of vital importance to the public that carriers shall perform their common-law duty of carrying goods to consignees without unreasonable delay. Both Congress and the State Legislatures have been engaged in framing statutes to regulate the conduct of common carriers, by prohibiting excessive charges and prohibiting discrimination and delays in the discharge of their duties to the public, and in other respects. It cannot be a reasonable and just construction of Revisal, sec. 2632, that the Legislature meant that this railroad has discharged its contract and legal duty to carry these goods to the consignee at Williamston by carrying them to Williamston, but refusing them to the consignee when he applied for them. That is to “make the law of none effect.” It is to “keep the word of promise to the ear, but breáis it to the hope.”
It was probably negligence, and not intentional, that the agent at Williamston denied that the goods were there. So it would have been if the goods had laid at Jamesville. It was not necessary that unreasonable delay in transporting the goods to the consignee should be wilful. That there is an*105other statute, Revisal, sec. 2631, compelling the carrier under a penalty to receive goods when tendered, in no wise takes from the purview of the contract in the bill of-lading the duty of transporting them thereafter, and carrying them not merely to Williamston, but delivering them to the consignee at that place, when demanded by him. The goods do not necessarily go into the carrier’s warehouse at the place of destination, but are often delivered from the car or the platform. The defendant’s agent at the destination is as much a part of the “transporting” force as the shipping clerk at the place of origin. Delay due to the negligence of either is the negligent delay of the carrier.
This is a remedial statute. It should be given the plain, every-day, well-understood meaning of the words which are used to guarantee the enforcement of the duty of the railroad company to carry the goods to the consignee when applied for by him at the place of destination. It is said by Macaulay in his History of England (ch. 12), quoting a current statement, that ,an ingenious lawyer could “drive a coach and six through an act of Parliament.” However that may have been as to the lawyers of England in the courts of that day, it is not true in the courts of this State, whose earnest object, in this case as in all others; is to ascertain and effectuate, not defeat, the intent of the Legislature, especially as to remedial legislation widely affecting the business of the State. The difference between the members of the Court is -as to what, was the relief which the Legislature meant to guarantee shippers by this statute. It could hardly have deemed that it would be any relief to the public to require'the common carrier merely to transport the goods without unreasonable delay to its warehouse at the destination, while denying their possession to the consignee when demanded. The goods are *106still unreasonably delayed as long as delivery of them to the consignee is refused without cause. What can it matter to the consignee where the goods are detained, so long as they are in fact unreasonably detained by the carrier and refused to him? Was it the object of the statute to prohibit merely unreasonable delay in carrying the goods to the destination, or to secure their prompt receipt by the consignee at the destination ?
The object of the Court being to search for and ascertain the intent of the Legislature in enacting Revisal, sec. 2632, it will throw light upon that investigation to note that in section 2641 in the same subchapter it is provided that when only a portion of the shipment has reached the place of destination, “the carrier shall be required to deliver to the consignee such portion of the consignment as shall have been received, upon .payment or tender of the freight charges due upon such portion.” It is not controverted here that .the freight was paid, and if the transportation of part of the consignment includes delivery to the consignee, there must be a violation of the statute giving a penalty for unreasonable delay, when all of the goods are received and none are delivered when (as here) the freight is paid and the goods are demanded.
Besides^ section 2633 of the same subchapter provides, “upon payment or tender of the amount due on any shipment which has arrived at its destination, * * * such common carrier shall deliver the freight in question to the consignee or consignees.” These sections, 2633 and 2641, show that a delivery of goods upon demand is a constituent element in discharging the duty of transporting the goods to the consignee, an unreasonable delay to do which justly subjected the carrier to the small penalty of $20 here recovered for taking ten days to carry this consignment eleven miles from the con*107signor at one station to the consignee at the next station upon tbe same road, there being no station between. If the statute cannot be enforced because the defendant’s negligence and delay in getting the goods from the consignor to the consignee occurred after they reached the defendant’s station at Williamston instead of before, then the law as thus construed is a very defective relief to the public from the evil intended to be remedied, and gives to any carrier free hand to destroy the business of any consignee, if disposed to discriminate .against him.
It may be noted that the General Assembly, by chapter 461, Laws 1907, just enacted (8 March), has provided that Re-visal, sec. 2632, under which this action was brought, “shall be construed to require the delivery at destination within the time specified.”