73 Ga. 651 | Ga. | 1885
This declaration is filed by the administrator of Lambert, an employé of the Central Railroad and Banking Company
To this declaration a demurrer was filed, “ that the laws of Georgia do not give to the said plaintiff, nor to those for whose use he sues, any right of action against these defendants for any injury occurring to plaintiff’s intestate within the state of Alabama,’ and “ that the laws of Georgia do not give any right of action for the death of any person occurring by reason of the negligence, omission, unskilfulness or default of any person or corporation, his or its officers, agents or servants, committed within the State of Alabama.”
This demurrer was overruled, and error is assigned upon the judgment overruling it.
There a South Carolina administrator brought suit in Georgia for the homicide of his intestate in South Carolina. Therefore the tort in South Carolina was in that case ruled to be a proper subject-matter for one clothed with authority to sue in this state, to recover upon in this state. The South Carolina Railroad Company was a Carolina corporation, but located in Georgia by projecting its track over the Savannah river, and liable to suit here, by the terms on which it entered Georgia as a Georgia corporation. Any suit, therefore, which could be brought against a Georgia corporation could be brought against
Hence, the conclusion irresistibly follows that the homicide of a person in another state, on a line of road purchased, owned and worked by a railroad company in this state, is actionable in this state, if the action be brought-by the person entitled to recover, by virtue of the decision in 68 Ga., 572.
The conclusion reached is, that the case of the South Carolina Railroad Company vs. Nix, administrator, logically settles principles which necessarily rule, that the administrator appointed in and by Georgia is entitled to this action. And thus the subject-matter and the parties, to-wit, a Georgia administrator and Georgia corporations, being within her jurisdiction, her courts can administer relief.
Besides all this, the real plaintiffs here, as in Alabama, are suing. The widow and children are the usees of the fund. It is to them the recovery goes. The administrator is the mere conduit pipe that conveys the substitute for the flow of a father’s blood to their nurture. If there should be a recovery, a Georgia court will see that a Georgia administrator properly distributes the fund; if there ought to be none, her courts will protect her own corporations. See also 43 Ga., 461; 49 Id., 106, and 103 U. S., 11, cited by Judge Adams.
Judgment affirmed.