Court Opinion

ID: 8859586
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-11-26 17:43:40.730679+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:05:46.498667
License: Public Domain

TAFT, Circuit Judge
(after stating the facts as above). Upon the issue as to whether the oil was defective, the court found that there was not sufficient evidence to go to the jury, and therefore directed a verdict for the defendant. In this we think the court erred. In the remarks with which the court prefaced its charge to the jury to bring in a verdict for the defendant, the court proceeded on the theory that in the federal courts, in every case in which the evidence, taken as a whole, is such that, if a verdict should be rendered in favor of one party, the court would feel obliged to set it aside on the ground that it is against the weight of the evidence, it is the duty of the court to direct a verdict in favor of the party adducing the stronger proof. We have examined this question at great length in the well-considered case of Railway Co. v. Lowery, 43 U. S. App. 408, 20 C. C. A. 596, and 74 Fed. 463. In that case the opinion of the court, delivered by Judge Burton, shows the clear distinction between the function which the court has to discharge after a verdict has been rendered, in de*168termining whether it is so much against the weight of the evidence as to require it to be set aside, and the function which it discharges in deciding, upon a motion to direct a verdict, whether the evidence supporting the issue upon one side is of such an inconsequential character that in law it cannot support a verdict. In the case at bar the court proceeded to weigh the evidence on both sides, and, finding that the evidence tending to show that the oil was of good character so far outweighed the evidence to the contrary that he would be obliged to set aside a verdict based on the view that the oil was defective, he directed a verdict for the defendant. This was beyond the power of the court. If no evidence as to the character of the oil had been introduced by the defendant company, the evidence for the plaintiff was certainly strong enough to support a verdict based on the theory that the oil was defective.
But, though the court reached the conclusion to direct the verdict on an erroneous ground, we are of opinion that the conclusion can be supported on another ground, and that the direction to find a verdict for the defendant was right. It seems to us clear, from the testimony of the plaintiff himself as to how the ’accident occurred, that he was guilty of negligence causing the accident, and this without respect to the character of the oil. It is perfectly evident from what he states that he knew that the moving car to be coupled was a Pennsylvania car. If he did not know it, he ought to have known it, because he fixed the pin in the drawhead some time before the two cars came together, and the sill at the end of the car, the presence of which required peculiar care in coupling, was just above the drawhead, and so near to it that it was impossible that he did not see the sill if he saw the drawhead as he said he did. Indeed, he does not deny that he knew that the moving car was a Pennsylvania car with a sill. He also states that he could see and did see the drawhead of the stationary car, and could see that the link and pin were properly adjusted in it to make the coupling. If he could see that, as he testifies that he did, it is impossible to explain, except on the theory of negligence and inattention, why he did not see the sill upon that car, for the one was so near the other that with the slightest attention it could not have escaped him. His real explanation of the fact that he did not see the sills was that he did not notice them. Failure to notice • a fact so important in determining his proper course, when he had full opportunity to doi so, was gross negligence. In view of his admissions his statement that he did not have time to see the sills before the coming together of the cars is certainly not more than a scintilla of evidence to support his case, which, in a federal court, need not be submitted to a jury. The action of the court in directing a verdict was right, and the judgment is affirmed.