4 Whart. 59 | Pa. | 1839
The opinion of the Court was delivered by
— The principles laid down in the charge to the jury and the directions given to them on the trial of this cause at Nisi Prius, are considered by the Court in bank correct, excepting that part, wherein the jury were advised, that there was no evidence whatever, given to them, tending to prove that the goods were injured by the perils of the sea insured against. The Court are inclined to think that there was evidence of this tendency, though very slight; yet still however slight it might be, the weight and the effect of it, were to be referred to the jury, and to be judged of exclusively by them, and not by the Court or the judge trying'the cause. The consideration of the weight and effect of it, was therefore, by the direction of the Court, improperly withdrawn from the jury. The evidence here alluded to, is contained in the protest, admitted in evidence by consent of the parties, and the depositions of s the witnesses, taken under commissions at the city of Havanna. From this evidence it is conceived, the jury might have found that the damage alleged to have been sustained, was occasioned by the perils of the sea on the voyage; and though such conclusion could not have been drawn consistently with the evidence of Captain Levely, the master of the vessel, yet the credit and effect of his testimony was also matter exclusively for the decision of the jury. They however, would seem from their verdict, either not to have understood the charge in relation to the want of evidence as to this point or to have disregarded it altogether, most likely the latter. If so, they were clearly wrong, because they were to receive the law from the Court; and the Court having advised them in respect to the want of evidence as a question of law, they were bound by their respective oaths or affirmations to have given a verdict according to law and the evidence; an obligation which they could only fulfil by giving a verdict in conformity to the charge of the Court, from whom it was their duty to take the law when given. If the rule that the jury shall receive the law from the Court, be not strictly adhered to, it is utterly hopeless to expect, that the law can be administered alike to all; because jurors, who have never made the law their study, as is almost universally the case with them all, must necessarily be measurably ignorant of it, and therefore will seldom, if ever, decide intricate causes of their heads according to it. The rules of property, as also those of civil conduct, would be misapprehended and disregarded, so that uncertainty and injustice would prevail through
There is, however, an additional reason, in this case, for doing so. The circumstances disclosed by the evidence on the trial were such, at least, as to excite strong suspicion, that the claim of the plaintiff was unfair, if not tainted with actual fraud. The conviction, however, which rested on my mind, when charging the jury, that there was no evidence given, which went or tended in the slightest degree to prove a loss or injury to the goods of the plaintiff, occasioned by such perils of the sea, in the course of the voyage, as were insured against by the defendants, rendered it unnecessary for me, as otherwise I would.have done, to present the case under that aspect to the jury. For this reason alone, I am strongly inclined to believe, that it would be doing nothing more than justice between the parties to afford them an opportunity of having the case reviewed by another jury under a direction from the Court that shall coyer every view which the jury ought to take of it. — The rule for a new trial is therefore made absolute.
Rule absolute.