Court Opinion

ID: 9773987
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 18:05:53.463815+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:49:47.821736
License: Public Domain

Opinion on Petition to Rehear
Since the filing of our original opinion in these companion cases, the appellants have filed a Petition to Rehear, Brief in support thereof, and Supplemental Brief and Argument. Almost in their entirety, these documents do not meet the requirements of the rules of this Court. We are constrained to state, again, as has been said many times in variant language, that the office of a petition to rehear is to call the attention of the Court to matters overlooked, not those things which counsel supposes were improperly decided, after full consideration. Further, this Court has said, and says again, that a petition for rehearing should never be used for the purpose of rearguing the case on points already considered and determined, unless some new and decisive authority has been discovered which was overlooked by this Court. Rule 32 of this Court governs the subject of rehearing and says, “A rehearing will be refused where no new argument is made, and no new authority adduced, and no material fact is pointed out as overlooked.”
As stated, with one exception, the petition to rehear and briefs are squarely afoul of this interdiction. One additional authority, Taylor v. Meeks (1951), 191 Tenn. 695, 236 S.W.2d 969, is now adduced; and heavy reliance placed thereon by appellants. It is said in the briefs, with *642much, emphasis, that our original opinion in the case at bar departs from the law as enunciated in Taylor v. Meeks, supra. With this statement, we are not in agreement. While Taylor v. Meeks is another of the transportation cases, we believe that, in truth, the opinion in that case is in conformity with our original opinion in this case. In that case, the defendant Meeks operated a sawmill about ten miles from his home and regularly carried his employees back and forth in his truck. On the day of Taylor’s injury, the employees were riding home from the mill. The defendant was driving the truck. As they proceeded along the highway, the plaintiff was struck in the eye by an overhanging limb. The principal issue made in the case was that the accident did not arise out of and in the scope of the plaintiff’s employment.
The following from Taylor v. Meeks, supra, seems to make it abundantly clear that there is no conflict of principle between that case and the case at bar:
“ (3) We do not consider it important to a determination of the issue that the defendant’s employees, and especially Taylor, were not being paid any wages for the time consumed while being transported to and from work. The employer furnished the transportation, and it was beneficial to him in securing their services. In determining liability in cases of this kind the courts consider whether or not there is any causal connection between the nature of the employment and the injury. Thornton v. RCA Service Co., 188 Tenn. 644, 221 S.W. 2d 954, and cases cited. In Spradling v. Bituminous Cas. Corp., 182 Tenn. 443, 187 S.W.2d 626, 629, Mr. Justice Gailor speaking for the Court said: ‘The test applied in Barragar v. Industrial Commission, 205 Wis. 550, 238, N.W. 368, 78 A.L.R. 679, was approved by this Court in *643Free v. Indemnity Ins. Co. of N. A, 177 Tenn.. 287, 292, 145 S.W.2d 1026, 1028: “If the business of the master creates the necessity for the travel, the servant is in the course of his employment. * * * ” ’ Other cases cited in the foregoing opinion are applicable to the case at bar.
(4-6) We pretermit any consideration of the transportation being for the ‘convenience’ of one or the other of the parties. That is not the test. Adverting to the general principle of causal connection between the nature of the employment and the injury we think there is such a connection. It cannot be doubted that Taylor was on the truck by reason of and ‘in the course’ of his employment, and the accident arose ‘ out of his employment.’ These employees were being regularly carried by the employer. Had he not furnished the transportation the saw mill could not have been operated. We cam reach no other conchtsion than that the transportation was a part of the business. Moreover we think from the evidence before us there was an implied contract that these employees would be carried to and from their tvork but their wages would start upon arrival at the mill and stop upon departure. The case of Free v. Indemnity Ins. Co. of N. A., 177 Tenn. 287, 145 S.W.2d 1026, relied on by appellant has no application to the instant case.” (Emphasis supplied).
Thus it is that the very fact was present in that case, the lack of which in the instant case, cause it to fail of compensability. With this additional comment, we are content to fully adhere to our original Opinion; the Petition to Behear is denied.
Buknett, Chief Justice, and White, Dyep, and Chattin, Justices, concur.