Court Opinion

ID: 9636971
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 14:51:12.031023+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:09:51.767143
License: Public Domain

BIGGS, Circuit Judge
(concurring).
I am forced to the conclusion that the Supreme Court in its opinion in Caldarola v. Eckert, 332 U.S. 155, 67 S.Ct. 1569, 91 L.Ed. 1968, overruled implicitly or, at least limited the doctrine of Hust v. Moore-McCormack Lines, 328 U.S. 707, 66 S.Ct. 1218, 90 L.Ed. 1534, to such a degree that nothing now remains upon which Aird’s position in the case at bar properly may be bottomed. In so concluding I am aware that the majority opinion in Hust did not hold that the General Agent was the owner pro hac vice of the S. S. “Mark Hanna” for Mr. Justice Rutledge limited the court’s conclusion in that regard albeit he stated 328 U.S. 723, 724, 66 S.Ct. 1226, that “the Maritime Commission’s standard contract make[s] it hardly more than dubious that respondent did not stand pro hac vice as employer with the Government.” In the con*612curririg opinion of Mr. Justice Douglas, with whom Mr. Justice Black agreed, the liability of the General Agent is based squarely on the proposition that it was to be deemed to be the owner pro hac vice of the vessel insofar as a seaman was concerned.
In the Caldarola case the Supreme Court held expressly that the General Agent was not the owner pro hac vice of the S. S. “Everagra” albeit this conclusion was based upon the New York law as set out in Cullings v. Goetz, 256 N.Y. 287, 176 N.E. 397. Moreover in the majority opinion in Caldarola Mr. Justice Frankfurter explained and expressly limited the application of the principle of the Hust case by stating: “We there held that under the Agency contract the Agent was the ‘employer1 of an injured seaman as that term is used in the Jones Act, and a seaman could therefore bring the statutory action against such an ‘employer’ ”. I had thought that a distinction could not be based upon the status of the General Agent as “employer” under the Jones Act and its standing in its other relations to a seaman. As limited or interpreted by Caldarola the doctrine of the Hust case cannot give Aird the standing to maintain his suit.
I therefore concur in the result reached by this court.