20 Minn. 21 | Minn. | 1873
By the Court.
Defendant, according to its usual course of business at its elevator, weighs the quantity of wheat belonging to &t consignee into what is' called a delivery bin, from which it can be spouted into consignee’s wagon or sacks, at consignee’s pleasure.
By a regulation adopted by defendant, a consignee is required to receipt for wheat which has been thus weighed into a delivery bin for him, before taking the same from such bin, and before he can ascertain — except from defendant’s statements — whether the quantity of wheat receipted for is in the bin or not.
This action is brought to recover a certain quantity of
The court, among other things, in the course of its charge to the jury, “ in substance, stated to them that the defendant, in dealing with the public in their business as common carriers, had a right, considering the large amount and nature of their business in delivering grain, to establish suitable regulations for the orderly management of the same; and though in particular instances cases of hardship and inconvenience might arise, yet they must yield to the general public interest and the general course and usage of business in the matter, and if in this particular business the defendant had established the regulation requiring wheat to be receipted for in the bin in the manner shown by the evidence, and the plaintiff had previously so dealt with the defendant, having knowledge of such regulation and complied with the same, he must reasonably be presumed to have dealt with defendant having reference to such usage, and he would be bound to comply therewith, and to pay the charges before removing his grain.”
The plaintiffs excepted to this instruction, and they insist that the regulation referred to was unreasonable and void, and that, therefore, the court erred in admitting evidence to prove it, and to prove that plaintiffs'had before complied with it, and also in charging that they were bound to comply with it. The defendant contends that the reasonableness of the regulation was a question of fact for the jury, and that they have determined it in defendant’s favor. But this position overlooks the fact, that though the charge is that defendant
In the view which we take, however, it is perhaps not very important whether or not the question of reasonableness was passed upon by the jury as a question of fact. As to the authority of a common carrier, like the defendant, to make and enforce reasonable regulations for the conduct of its business, there is no dispute. But as to whether the reasonableness of a regulation is a question for the court or for the jury, the authorities are not harmonious. In New Jersey, it seems that the question is for the jury. State vs. Overton, 4 Zabriskie, 435 ; Ayers vs. Morris Railway, 29 N. J. (5 Dutcher) 393. In Day vs. Owen, 5 Mich. 527, the question was treated as one of mixed law and fact. In the following cases the reasonableness of certain regulations was treated and passed upon as a question of law for the court: Reed vs. Richardson, 98 Mass. 216 ; Maples vs. N. Y. and N. H. R. Co., 38 Conn. 557 ; Hibbard vs. N. Y. and Erie Railway Co., 15 N. Y. 455 ; Vedder vs. Fellows, 20 N. Y. 126; State vs. Thompson, 20 N. H. 250; Johnson vs. Railroad, 46 N. H. 220 ; Skinner vs. C. and R. I. R. Co., 12 Iowa, 191; Ch. and N. W. R. Co. vs. Williams, 55 Ill. 188 ; Du Laurans vs. 1st Div. St. P. and P. R. Co., 15 Minn. 55 ; and see Redfield on Railways, 4th Ed., ch. 6, sec. 26
On principle, as well as on authority, itfe see no reason why the reasonableness of a given regulation is not a question of law, of fact, or of mixed law and fact, according to the cir
Now, in this case there is no dispute as to the fact that the wheat in the delivery bin was the property of the plaintiffs. The defendant claimed no property in the wheat either general or special, nor any right to its present possession; the refusal to permit plaintiffs to take it away being based solely .upon plaintiffs’ refusal to receipt. The general rule of law which gives the general owner of personal property the right to the immediate possession of the same, and makes it the duty of another person who is in possession of it to deliver it up forthwith upon demand, in the absence of some right of possession on his part, entitled the plaintiffs in this case to the immediate possession of the wheat, and made it defendant’s duty to deliver up the same forthwith upon plaintiffs’ demand.
But the defendant contends that from the nature of the business in which it is engaged, it is necessary that it should take receipts from parties to whom wheat is delivered from its
On the other hand, to permit the receipt to have the effect of aprima facie binding admission that the quantity designated had been received, either by excluding proof of the circumstance attending .the execution of the receipt, or by treating such proof as insufficient to destroy the effect of the receipt, and thereby to throw upon the consignee the burden of disproving the veracity of the receipt, would be to give the defendant an advantage too unconscientious to be tolerated for a moment. It would give the defendant an advantage to which it is not possible that any rightful claim can be shown, namely, the unjust advantage of forcing the consignee to admit that to be true, the truth of which he has no means of ascertaining. The enforcement of such a regulation would be neither more nor less than a species of duress in spirit, if not in letter. It would attach to the consignee’s right to the possession of his property a condition which we have no hesitation in pronouncing to be not only unreasonable, but tyrannical. Skinner vs. Chicago and R. I. R. Co., 12 Iowa, 191; Morris and Essex R. Co. vs. Ayres, 29 N. J. 396-7; Barrett vs. Crystal Palace Co., 101 E. C. L. 984 ; 2 Redfield on Railways, (3d Ed.) p. 26, note 10. Upon these grounds our opinion is, as a conclusion of law, that the regulation in question is — as a regulation — unreasonable and void.
What we have said has, of course,, no bearing upon the issue made as to whether the plaintiffs and defendant had entered into an agreement by the terms of which plaintiffs were to give receipts of the kind spoken of. The existence of such agreement is, of course, a mere question of fact, and
With regard to the one thousand bushels of wheat in the delivery bin for which plaintiffs had receipted, (unless there was an agreement that all the wheat in the bin should be receipted for before any of it was taken away,) we see no reason why plaintiffs would not have been entitled to recover for the same if they had demanded it specifically. But the demand made was for all the wheat in the bin, and this would not be a specific demand of the one thousand bushels.
The consideration of the other questions argued in the case, seems to us practically unimportant.
The judgment is reversed, and a new trial awarded.