Court Opinion

ID: 9827962
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 17:58:29.588123+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:42:40.427668
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
In disposing of this ease originally, we were of the opinion that the only material facts put in issue by the pleadings, which the bill of lading would tend to establish, was the agreement of the shippers to accompany the stock and to feed and water. A further examination of appellant’s answer discloses that, in addition to this defense, it also pleaded other stipulations In the bill of lading. For instance, it pleaded a provision which released it from any and all damages that resulted to the stock during that shipment. It was alleged that the stock were shipped at the shippers’ risk in consideration of a low freight rate; that they were not to be delivered at any specified time or any particular hour nor at any season for any particular market; that, by reason of the stipulations contained in the bill of lading, the defendant was released from all damages on account of the shipment. The effect of these stipulations in the bill of lading, if received in evidence, would be to establish defenses exempting the carrier from the consequences of its own negligence.
Our attention has been called to the case, of Pecos & N. T. Ry. Co. v. Brooks, 145 S. W. 649. This is a decision rendered by the Amarillo court, holding provisions of a contract identical with those here offered in evidence inadmissible because illegal. That case had been previously considered by us, and we were fully in accord with the conclusions there announced; but our ruling was based upon the assumption that the only legal effect of tire bill of lading, if received in evidence, would be to establish the defense that the shippers had agreed to accompany and to feed and water the stock, and that the mere fact that the bill of lading contained some other and irrelevant provisions, which could not operate injuriously to the plaintiff in the suit, did not justify its exclusion. However, we are now of the opinion that that assumption was not justified, and that the purposes for which the proffered testimony was tendered, and the effect its introduction would have had, justified the court in refusing to admit it. If the appellant desired to avail itself of those stipulations, which the carrier had eC right to make, concerning the loading and unloading and the feeding and watering of the stock, they *699should have been offered unincumbered by those which were illegal.
The motion for rehearing is granted. The judgment heretofore rendered reversing and remanding the cause will be set aside, and the judgment of the county court affirmed.