Union Pac. Ry. Co. v. Artist

60 F. 365 | 8th Cir. | 1894

SANBORN', Circuit Judge,

after stating the facts as above, delivered the opinion of the court.

General words, alone, in a release, are taken most strongly against the releasor. But when there is a particular recital followed by general words the latter are qualified by the particular recital. Jackson v. Stackhouse, 1 Cow. 122, 126, and cases cited; 2 Pars. Cont. 633, note. The court below properly applied this rule to the release in this case. The general words in the last half of it are limited by the very specific recital of the injuries that the $150 was to be in settlement of, which is contained in the first half of the release. It was the claims for these injuries, and for Ihese only, that this release discharged the company from. The injury now complained of was then unknown to both parties, and their settlement was without reference to it. A disregard of the rule would work manifest injustice, and impose upon the defendant in error a release he did not intend to make. There was no error in this ruling.

Was the company liable for the malpractice of the physicians, or the carelessness of the attendants, at the hospital, if that hospital was maintained as a charitable enterprise, and not for the purpose of deriving profit from it? If one contracts to treat a patient in a hospital — or out of it, for that matter — for any disease or injury, he undoubtedly becomes liable for any injury suffered by the patient through the carelessness of the physicians or attendants he employs to carry out his contract. If.one undertakes to treat such a patient for the purpose of making profit thereby, the law implies the contract to treat him carefully and skillfully, and holds him liable for the carelessness of the physicians and attendants he furnishes. But this doctrine of respondeat superior has no just application where one voluntarily aids in establishing or maintaining a hospital without expectation of pecuniary profit. If one, out of charity, with no purpose of making profit, sends a physician to a sick neighbor or to an injured servant, or furnishes him with hospital accommodations and medical attendance, he is not liable for the carelessness of the physicians or of the attendants. The doctrine of respondeat superior no longer applies, because, by fair implication, he simply undertakes to exercise ordinary care in the selection of physicians and attendants who are reasonably competent and -skillful, and does not agree to become personally responsible for their negligence or mistakes. The same rule applies to corporations and to individuals, whether they are engaged in dispensing their own charities, or in dispensing the charitable gifts of others intrusted to- them to administer. One reason why corporations and individuals conducting hospitals supported by charitable endowments and contributions, and operated to heal the sick and injured, but not for profit, are not liable for the negligence of their employes, is, that the moneys in their hands constitute a trust fund devoted to a charitable purpose, and the courts refuse to permit it to be diverted to the very different purpose of paying for the malpractice of their physicians or the negligence of their attendants. Moreover, the corporations or individuals that administer such trusts must, after all, leave the treatment of the patients to the superior knowledge and skill of the physicians. They cannot direct the latter, as the master may ordinarily direct the servant, what to do, and how to do it. If they did do so, the physicians would be bound to exercise their own superior skill and better judgment, and to disobey their employers, if, in their opinion, the welfare of the patients required if. And, finally, the patient is not required to accept the proffered accommodations and attendance. They are but freely offered to him. He may refuse to accept them, and seek other physicians and other accommodations. It would be a hard rule, indeed, — a rule calculated to repress the charitable instincts of men, — that would compel those who have freely furnished such accommodations and services to pay for the negligence or mistakes of physicians or attendants that they had selected with reasonable care. Ho such rule has ever prevailed in this country. The rule is that those who furnish hospital accommodations and medical attendance, not for the purpose of making profit thereby, but out of charity, or in the' course of the administration of a charitable enterprise, are not liable for the malpractice of the physicians or the negligence of the attendants they employ, but are responsible only for their own want of ordinary care in selecting them. McDonald v. Hospital, 120 Mass. 432; Insurance Patrol v. Boyd, 120 Pa. St. 624, 647, 15 Atl. 553; Van Tassell v. Hospital (Sup.) 15 N. Y. Supp. 620, and note; Glavin v. Hospital, 12 R. I. 411; Laubheim v. Steamship Co., 107 N. Y. 228, 13 N. E. 781; Secord v. Railway Co., 18 Fed. 221; Richardson v. Coal Co., (Wash.) 32 Pac. 1012.

Under the evidence in this case, thfe medical department and hospitals of the Union Pacific Railway Company fall fairly within this rule, and the reasons that support the rule apply to this case with all their force. The test which determines whether such an enterprise is charitable or otherwise is its purpose. If its purpose is to make profit, it is not a charitable enterprise. If it is to heal the ‘sick and relieve the suffering, without hope or purpose of getting gain from its operation, it is charitable. Tried by this test, the hospitals and medical department of this company are a great public charity. They are supported by the voluntary contributions of this great corporation ana of its employes, without the purpose to profit thereby. We say by their “voluntary contributions” not unadvisedly. We have not failed to notice that the defendant in error -testified that the contribution of 25 cents a month made by each employe was a compulsory assessment, and that the company took it out oí the pay of such employe. But how it could be compulsory does not appear. If it was a part of the pay of the employe, the company could not lawfully take it out without his consent. If he did not consent, then he did not contribute, and the company still owes him the amount of this assessment. If he did consent, he voluntarily contributed the amount of his assessment. Whatever may be said of the contributions of the employe, there is no question whatever but that the gift of $2,000 to $4,000 per month made by the company was purely voluntary and charitable. These contributions of 25 cents per month from each employe, and of from $2,000 to $4,000 per month from the company, constituted a trust fund devoted to the purpose of furnishing hospital accommodations, physicians, and surgeons for the relief of fhe sick and injured employes without charge or expense to them. For this purpose this fund was intrusted to this company to administer. There is no evidence that there ever was any purpose or intention on the part of the company of making any profit through the operation of this hospital or the supplying of these physicians. The solo purpose that this record discloses was to relieve these employes from sickness and suffering. In Jackson v. Phillips, 14 Allen, 556, Mr. Justice Bray defined a “charity” as follows:

“A charity, in the legal sense, may he more fully defined as a gift to he applied, consistently with existing laws, for the benefit of an indefinite number of persons, either by bringing their minds or hearts under the influence of education or religion, by relieving their bodies from disease, suffering, or constraint, by assisting tlieiu to establish themselves in life, or by erecting or maintaining public buildings or works, or otherwise lessening the burdens of government.”

The gifts of this corporation and its employes are clearly within this definition. There is no doubt that any one of these employes could compel the application of this fund to the purpose for which it was collected, in any court of equity having jurisdiction. There was no express contract made by this company to treat this defendant in error in the hospital, for his injuries. It is true that he made his contribution to the fund to maintain this charitable enterprise, but he paid nothing further for his hospital accommodations or his treatment. He neither contributed nor paid any more than he would have contributed if he had never been treated at all. The company, as the trustee and administrator of this charity, offered him the hospital accommodations and the physicians in its employment, and he accepted them. From these facts no contract to treat him with ordinary skill and care can he implied, because, in all that it did in this behalf, this company was conducting a charitable enterprise. The company was not organized for the purpose of furnishing and operating hospitals and supplying medical attendance for gain, and such a business would be clearly beyond its chartered powers. It was chartered to construct and operate a railroad and telegraph line. It was under no legal obligation to give thousands of dollars per annum to furnish hospitals and physicians for its employes, and its appropriation of this money to this purpose was a gift, — a charity. If it be urged that this gift may have been prompted by an ulterior and selfish motive, — that the company may have thought that the operation of. its medical department would protect it from excessive claims for injuries resulting to its servants, —the answer is that the true test of a public charity is not the motive of the donor, but the purpose to which the money given is to be applied. If argument, authority, and illustration in support of this proposition are wanted, they will be found in the learned and exhaustive opinion of Mr. Justice Paxson in Insurance Patrol v. Boyd, 120 Pa. St. 642, 646, 15 Atl. 553. If a dozen of the employes of this company had contributed a fund, out of charity, to furnish one of their number, who was injured, with hospital accommodations and medical attendance, they certainly would not have been liable to him for the malpractice of the physicians or the negligence of the attendants they employed. If they had intrusted such a fund to a third person to administer, who, out of charity, contributed to it more largely, and he furnished the accommodations and attendance by the use of this fund, it goes without saying that he would not be liable for the negligence of the physicians or attendants he employed. That the party to whom this charitable gift is intrusted, the party that contributes most liberally to it, and the party that cannot by any .possibility derive any direct profit or benefit from it, since it is not subject to bodily ailments and injuries, is a corporation, cannot extend the limits of legal liability here.

The result is that the doctrine of respondeat superior has no application to this case. The only contract the law implies here is the agreement on the part of the company to use reasonable care to select and obtain skillful physicians and careful attendants, and if the company performed that contract it was responsible no further. In other words, it was responsible for the discharge of its own personal duty, and not for the performance of the duties of its employes. In our opinion the instruction on this subject requested by the counsel for the company should have been given, and the judgment is accordingly reversed, with costs, and the case remanded, with instructions to grant a new trial.