Court Opinion

ID: 9631861
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 10:53:23.658774+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:08:02.773449
License: Public Domain

Wertz, J.
(dissenting): I wish to supplement the foregoing dissenting opinion of Parker, J., in which I concur. Appellants predicate error on the lower court’s action sustaining appellee’s motion to strike the defense of contributory negligence and assumption of risk from appellants’ answers. The appellants in their answers made certain admissions not material to this particular question involved, and in addition each appellant alleged in his answer the following:
“11. Further answering, this defendant states that plaintiff’s decedent, Clarence C. Modlin, at the time described in her petition, was in charge of and operating the train described and that said train was late and that the crossing described in plaintiffs petition is in an 85-mile an hour zone, that plaintiffs decedent was required by the rules and regulations of his employer to maintain a speed of not less than 85 miles an hour while going over said crossing, and that due to the fact that said train was late, plaintiffs decedent was operating said train at a speed greatly in excess of 85 miles an hour, to wit: at least 100 miles an hour; that as said train approached said crossing it emerged from a curve some 1,900 feet to the northeast and from which point plaintiff’s decedent first had a clear view of said crossing; that with the train speed 85 miles an hour it could not be brought to a stop in less than 3,000 feet; that plaintiffs decedent carelessly and negligently and unlawfully operated said train at a greater speed than would permit him to bring said train to a stop within 'his assured clear distance ahead; that in keeping with the rules and requirements of said railroad he carelessly and negligently operated said train at the aforesaid high and excessive speed, and unable to bring said train to a stop at said crossing when occasion required, and that the negligence of plaintiff’s decedent in the foregoing respects directly caused or directly contributed to cause his death, and this defendant pleads said negligence of plaintiff’s decedent in bar of her action.”
Appellee filed a motion to strike the italicized portion of the afore*439mentioned answers, which motion was by the court sustained as a matter of law.
It is obvious that the appellants’ answers set up the defense of contributory negligence on the part of the railroad engineer in the operation of his train at the time and place in question, and that the court in sustaining the motion to strike that defense denied the appellants the right to offer any proof on that issue.
Section 60-710, G. S. 1949, provides what an answer shall contain. Among other things, the defendant may set forth in his answer as many grounds of defense, counterclaim, setoff, or for relief as he may have whether they be such as have heretofore been denominated legal or equitable or both. We have stated many times, as will be disclosed by the cases cited under section 60-710, that a defendant has a right to form his pleadings so as to meet such conditions and contingencies of the case as his opponent might possibly attempt to prove. (Funkhouser Equipment Co. v. Carroll, 161 Kan. 428, 168 P. 2d 918; Kennedy v. Monroe, 165 Kan. 168, 173, 193 P. 2d 220.) When the lower court struck the matters of defense from appellants’ answers, it denied them the right to show any acts or circumstances on the part of the engineer in the operation of the train at the time and place in question which might be considered negligence barring his widow’s recovery.
It may be noted that no motion was filed by appellee requiring appellants to make their answers more definite and certain. Kansas long ago adopted the statutory rule of liberal construction of pleadings. G. S. 1949, 60-736 reads:
“In the construction of any pleading, for the purpose of determining its effect, its allegations shall be liberally construed with a view to substantial justice between the parties.”
See also Campbell v. Kansas Power & Light Co., 165 Kan. 134, 193 P. 2d 177; Owens v. Deutch, 156 Kan. 779, 137 P. 2d 181, and cases therein cited, pp. 783-4. In construing the above statute, this court has repeatedly held that where a demurrer is filed to a pleading or motion to strike a pleading on the ground that it does not state a cause of action or defense without first presenting a motion to have the allegations of the pleading made more definite and certain, the allegations of such pleading will be liberally construed in favor of the pleader.
I am unable to agree with the lower court in sustaining a motion to strike the defense as set forth in appellants’ answers as a *440matter of law; to do so in my opinion grants the right to a railroad company to operate its trains outside the cities of this state at any speed it so desires under any and all circumstances and holds that such excessive speed does not constitute negligence on the part of the railroad or its engineer and agents. As early as A. T. & S. F. Rld. Co. v. Hague, 54 Kan. 284, 38 Pac. 257, this court held that while railroad companies may move their trains at such rates of speed as the character of their machinery and roadbeds may make practicable, they must not forget that increased speed for the train means increased danger to those who must cross the tracks and that increased care on their part to guard against accidents becomes a duty. And again in the case of Schaefer v. Interurban Railway Co., 104 Kan. 394, 179 Pac. 323, this court reiterated that while high speed alone is not negligence, it may be and should be considered in connection with all other circumstances such as the physical condition of the crossing and the topography of the immediate vicinity in determining whether the railway company was exercising due care in operating its train, and that such due care or want of it depends to some extent upon the speed at which the train approached the crossing.
It adds nothing to the annals of law, in a dissenting opinion, to exhaust the opinions of the courts of many states holding that speed of a train alone — in the absence of statute or regulation restricting the speed of trains at the place of the accident — is not negligence, but that speed considered with other circumstances may constitute negligence.
I realize this is an age of speed and that it is necessary for railroads to operate their trains at a speed in keeping with the age. Ry the same token, thousands of miles of high-speed highway have been developed in this country for the purpose of moving traffic, and this was done in keeping with the age. Over these highways thousands of buses carrying helpless school children travel daily crossing railroad tracks which intersect such highways, and thousands of people are being carried by buses as passengers for hire crossing the railroad tracks, and they, too, have some rights. To hold as a matter of law that it is not negligence for a railroad train to operate its locomotive over such highways at a speed of 85 to 100 miles per hour, and under other conditions set forth in the portion of the answer stricken, grants to railroad companies special privileges and rights such as have not been granted to any other person or corporation within our state, and it would appear to me *441that it denies those using the public highways an equal protection of the law, and leaves any party injured on such crossing without a remedy.
If the majority opinion as I construe it follows the rule of stare decisis in this state, then I am of the opinion that such rule is antiquated and should be changed. This is an age of progress in all phases of our lives, and the law cannot stand alone as resistant to the change about us; it must keep step in this forward progress. Wherever conditions and circumstances make it necessary to modify or change the law in order that equity be done, the law of old cases must give way to the progress of the times even as it must in industry, in science, and other fields. In the language of Dwy v. Connecticut Co., 89 Conn. 74, 92 Atl. 883 at page 99:
“That court best serves the law which recognizes that the rules of law which grew up in a remote generation may, in the fullness of experience, be found to serve another generation badly, and which discards the old rule when it finds that another rule of law represents what should be according to the established and settled judgment of society, and no considerable property rights have become vested in reliance upon the old rule. It is thus great writers upon the common law have discovered the source and method of its growth, and in its growth found its health and life. It is not and should not be stationary.”
I am of the opinion that the judgment of the lower court should be reversed and a new trial granted with instructions to reinstate the stricken portion of appellants’ answers.
Smith, J., joins in the foregoing dissenting opinion.