70 Ga. 680 | Ga. | 1883
This record presents for determination but a single question, which arises under Code of 1882, §2971, and is whether the adult child of a party who has been killed by a railroad train, and who has left neither widow or minor child, can maintain a suit against the corporation, to recover damages for the homicide ? The section in question, as it stood in the Code of 1873, was as follows: “ A widow, or if no widow, a child or children may recover for the homicide of the husband or parent, and if suit be brought by the widow or children, and the former, or one of the latter, dies pending the action, the same shall survive in the first case to the children, and in the latter case to the surviving child or children.” The Code of 1882 makes this addition : “ The plaintiff, whether widow, or child or children, may recover the full value of the life of the deceased, as shown by the evidence. In the event of a recovery by the widow, she shall hold the amount recovered, subject to the law of descent, just as if it had been personal property descending to the widow and children from the deceased, and no recovery had, under the provisions of this section and the law of which it is amendatory, shall be subject to any debt or liability of any character of the deceased husband or parent.”
In this additión is embodied the provisions of an act, approved December 16th, 1878, and which is entitled “an act to amend §2971 of the Code of 1873, so as to provide that, in case of suits under said section, either the widow or
The section, as it stood prior to the passage of this act, had been several times interpreted by this court. In David vs. The Southwestern Railroad Company, 41 Ga., 223, it was held that, if a widow die pending a suit for the homicide of her husband, the right of action for such homicide survives to the children, and in such last suit, the measure of damages is the injury to the children, to be measured as in case of the widow, by a reasonable support for them, according to the condition, etc., of their father, and according to the expectation of his'life as found by the mortuary tables.” Inasmuch as afatheri.s bound ordinarily for the support of his children only during their minority, the necessary inference from this decision would have been that only minor children were entitled to the action, in case there was no widow, or the widow had died during the pendency of the suit brought by her; but McOay, J., delivering the opinion of the court, was not content to leave this important matter to inference, however clear and strong that inference was. He says: “ The measure of damages in such a case is the present worth of a reasonable support for them during minority, according to the expectation of their father’s life,” etc. M. & W. R. R. Co. vs. Johnson, 38 Ga., 433. The act of 1878 effected no other change in this decision than the measure of damages which it laid down. If it had been the intention of the legislature to have extended this right to adults as well as
A very broad construction would be required to deduce from these changes as to the measure of damages and the descent of the property, in case of the widow’s death, the right of an adult child to recover, where there was neither widow nor minor child. Such a construction, it seems to us, would be a wide departure from the manifest purpose of the legislature, as it is to be gathered from the scope and design of this act, taken in connection with the decisions that led to its passage. In all interpretations, the courts are enjoined to look diligently for the intention of the general assembly, keeping in view, at all times, the old law, the evil and the remedy. Code, §4, par. 9. In ascertaining this intention, we are first to apply to the words their ordinary signification (Ib., par. 1; 4 Ga., 485, 486), and to interpret them according to their common sense. 46 Ga., 281. Noseitur a sociis is a familiar rule of construction, and ascertains the precise meaning of words from others with which they are associated and from which they cannot be separated without impairing or destroying the evident sense they were designed to convey in the connection used. Applying these rules to that portion of the law
This view dispenses with the necessity of determining the question made upon the exceptions taken pendente lite by the defendant, as it effectually disposes of the case.
Judgment affirmed.