Court Opinion

ID: 9832736
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 22:08:49.135094+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:51.162124
License: Public Domain

On Appellee’s Motion for Rehearing.
Counsel for appellee present a very forceful and plausible argument to the effect that the special charge that we held should have been given is, in part at least, a general charge, and hence was properly refused. Some of the authorities cited seem to give force to that contention, such as Employers’ Liability Assur. Corp. v. Light (Tex. Civ. App.) 275 S. W. 685; Humble Oil & Refining Co. v. McLean (Tex. Com. App.) 280 S. W. 557; Crawford v. El Paso Sash & Door Co. (Tex. Com. App.) 288 S. W. 169.
The respectful and insistent argument of counsel in behalf of appellee, we think, merits a more extended discussion of our view relating to the instruction attacked than was expressed in our original opinion holding that it should have been given as requested. The charge requested and now attacked in its entirety reads as follows:
“You are instructed that an injury is sustained ‘in the course of employment,’ as that term is elsewhere used in the charge submitted to you, when said injury has to do with and originates in the work of the employer and is received while, engaged in or about the furtherance of the affairs or business of the employer, whether upon the employer’s premises or elsewhere.”
“You are further instructed in this connection that an injury is not sustained ‘in the course of employment’ if the employee at the time of. receiving the injury is engaged on a mission of his own convenience and not in the furtherance of the affairs or business of the employer.”
The first paragraph of the charge is in substantial accord with the charge relating to that subject submitted to the jury among other definitions along with special issues.
Appellant did not prepare and tender to the trial court and request the court to submit to the jury any special issues for a fact finding on the defense suggested in the second paragraph of the requested instruction, and appellee’s contention is that the second paragraph of the charge is nothing more or less than a general charge instructing the jury as to the law arising on the facts, or one phase of the facts,' and hence was properly refused.
Article 2189, Rev. Oiv. Statutes, reads in part as follows: “In submitting special issues the court shall submit such explanations and definitions of legal terms as shall be necessary to enable the jury to properly pass upon and render a verdict on such issues.”
No objection is made to the first paragraph of the special charge; the contention relates alone to the second paragraph. It may be conceded that, viewing the second paragraph alone, disconnected with the first paragraph, the criticisms made are well taken, but we think the two paragraphs are to be considered together as a whole and as a definition with an appropriate explanation, and, when so considered, are easily understood and calculated to enlighten the jury. The first paragraph in an affirmative form defines when an employee is “in the course of his employment.” It seems to us that in the same connection it cannot be erroneous to give the converse, the negative of the proposition. We think the jury, with both the affirmative and negative instructions before them, will be the better able to correctly determine the vital question of whether at the very time of appellee’s injury he was engaged “in the course of his employment.” Logically, it requires both the negative and the affirmative to make the definition complete. It is not universally true that language in a general form announcing a proposition of law added to a definition of terms is erroneous. A familiar illustration of this is to be found in an approved definition of “proximate cause.” Such definitions uniformly end in, “there may be more than one proximate oause.” As will be seen by reference thereto, the statute quoted specifically requires the court in giving special issues to submit such explanations as well as such definitions as shall be necessary to “enable the jury to properly pass upon and render a verdict on such issues.” The statute has not designated just what “explanations” shall be given, but it evidently indicates that they shall be such as will be helpful to the jury. As said in the case of Robertson & *470Mueller v. Holden, 1 S.W.(2d) 570, by Justice Speer of section B of tlie Commission of Appeals:
“In the nature of things, the statute has not attempted to declare what ‘legal terms’ shall be explained or defined further than ‘shall be necessary to enable the jury to properly pass upon and render a verdict on such issues.’ Reasonable necessity, considering the term or terms used, then, should be the test. Ordinary words of simple meaning, of course, need not be defined. But those terms which in law have a distinct fixed meaning which an ordinary person would not readily understand should, upon proper request, be defined. This is recognized in the universal practice in negligence cases of the giving of a definition of such terms as ‘ordinary care,’ ‘negligence,’ ‘proximate cause,’ ‘unavoidable accident,’ and the like.”
In the same case, quoting from the head-notes, it is said: “In action for injuries tried on special issues, in which court defined term ‘proximate cause,’ failure of court on specific objection of defendant to omission of definition of ‘new independent cause’ to define such term was error requiring reversal.”
It will be seen by reference to the evidence detailed in our original opinion that the closely contested issue in the case was whether at the time of appellee's accident he was engaged in the course of his employment, and we can but think it well within the approved 'rules relating to the subject for the court in a definition which explains when an employee ’may be said to be working in the course of his employment to in the same connection explain when such employee will not be working in the course of his employment.
The further contention in behalf of ap-pellee that the benefit sought by the special instruction is not available because appellant requested no special issue for a fact finding by the jury is answered by the decision of Robertson & Mueller v. Holden, already cited. It is there said:
“It is the right of a party, upon'properly presenting the matter, to have proper definitions and explanations of terms given. Hines v. Hodges (Tex. Civ. App.) 238 S. W. 349, writ refused; Davis v. Pettitt (Tex. Com. App.) 258 S. W. 1046; Northern Texas, etc., Co. v. Jenkins (Tex. Civ. App.) 266 S. W. 175; Owens v. Navarro, etc., District, 115 Tex. 263, 280 S. W. 532.
“The Court of Civil Appeals does not question the propriety or even the necessity of proper definitions, but it puts its decision upon the ground that the matter was not properly presented; that the defendants should have submitted to the court a specially requested charge curing the omission, for which holding they cite a number of Court of Civil Appeals decisions which seem to support it. But the later holding of the' Supreme Court in Gulf, etc., Ry. Co. v. Conley, 113 Tex. 472, 260 S. W. 561, 32 A. L. R. 1183, undoubtedly establishes a contrary rule. It makes a distinction that is worthy of notice, and explains perhaps the refusal of writs in some of the cases by the Courts of Civil Appeals apparently sustaining the Court of Civil Appeals in this case. That distinction is with respect to the correlative effect of articles 1971 and 1985 of our statutes (Vernon’s Sayles’ Ann. Civ. St. 1914). The Supreme Court says:
“ ‘These two statutes were enacted to accomplish the same purpose, and we think a failure to submit any particular issue under either statute can be reviewed on appeal only where the record shows a special charge was tendered on that issue.
“But in the instance of a defective or erroneous charge on a subject or issue which the court has undertaken to charge upon, the objections required by article 1971 take the place of special charges, and render it unnecessary that the latter be tendered. It is immaterial whether the matter objected to in the court’s charge is a mere defective or incomplete statement of the law or issue to be determined, or is affirmatively erroneous; objections which sufficiently specify the error will preserve the point on appeal, without the necessity of again directing the court’s attention to the same subject by special charge.’ (Italics ours.)
“It is thus the rule that, whether the defect in the court’s charge be an affirmative error or mere omission, a proper objection pointing out the defect is a sufficient predicate for reversal. This is obviously sound reasoning, for, if the objection to the charge itself specifically points out the defect, there is no need of a second complaint based upon the refusal of a requested charge presenting the identical matter. It is a most common sense interpretation of the statutes.”
Without further discussion, we conclude that the motion for rehearing should be overruled.