delivered the opinion of the court.
On March 10, 1915, S. Ontra & Brother delivered to the .Pacific Mail Steamship Company at Yokohama, Japan, 56 cases of “Drawn work goods and Renaissance,” consigned to their oWn order at New York, and received a bill of lading for ocean transportation to San Francisco and thence by the Southern Pacific Company and its connections, by rail, to destination. The property was delivered to the Southern Pacific Company and without new billing was carried to a junction with the line of the petitioner, the Union Pacific Railroad Company, and while in its custody was totally destroyed in-a cоllision. The respondent, successor in interest to the consignor, claimed in this suit^the right -to recover the fair invoice value of the goods, $17,549.01, and the petitioner conceded his right to recover, but only to the amount of the agreed valuation of $100 per package,. $5,600, to which it contended he was- limited by the bill of lading. All of the facts are stipulated or proved by undisputed evidence.
Thе Appellate Division — First Department New-York Supreme Court — rendered judgment in favor of respohclent for $5,600, with interest and costs, but on appeal to the Court of Appeals of that State the judgment of the Appellate Division was reversed and an order was entered that *319 a judgment should be rendered by the Supreme Court in favor of respondent for $17,549.01, with interest and costs. The case is brought hеre on certiorari.
On the face of the bill of lading received at Yokohama was 'the notation: “Weight 26,404 lbs.; Ocean weight rate, 50/, Freight $132.02. Rail, mipimum carload weight 30,000 lbs., wgt. rate $1.25, Freight $375-00.” (Thus the ocean and rаil rates áre separately stated, and the latter is $1.25 per 100 lbs., minimum carload.) On the back of the bill of % lading were printed thirty-one conditions, the thirteenth of which contained the provision that, “ It is exprеssly agreed that the goods named in this bill of lading are hereby valued at not exceeding $100.00 per package . . . and' the liability of the Companies therefor, in case of the total loss of all or any of the said goods from any cause, shall not exceed $100.00 per package.”
The petitioner was an interstate common carrier by rail at the time of the shipment involved and as suсh had filed with the Interstate Commerce Commission schedules of rates and regulations under which the property was moving at the time it.was destroyed. By these schedules the earlier was bound, and to them it was limited, in contracting for traffic.
Southern Ry. Co.
v.
Prescott,
In these schedules was included a rule, designated as Rule 9A, which rеads: “Unless otherwise provided, when-property is transported, subject to. the provisions of theWestern Classification, the acceptance and use are,required, respectively,^ thе ‘Uniform Bill of Lading,’ ‘Straight’ or ‘Order’ as shown on pages 87 to;9.0, inclusive.”
For the purposes of this case, only, it is admitted, and *320 accepted by this court, that this rule 9A permitted and required that the property should be treated as moving east of San Francisco undеr the Uniform Bill of Lading, although, in fact, no other than the Yokohama bill of lading was issued. This Uniform Bill of Lading contained, among other conditions, the following: “ The amount of any loss or damage for which any cаrrier is liable shall be computed on the basis of the value of the property (being the bona-fide invoice price, if any,' to the consignee, including the freight charges, if prepaid) at the place and time of. shipment under this bill of lading, unless a lower value has been represented in writing by the shipper or has been agreed upon or is determined by the classification or tariffs upon which the rate is based, in any of which events such lower value shall be the maximum amount to govern such computation whether or not such loss or damage occurs from negligence.”
Upon the facts thus stated the petitioner contends that the agreed valuation of $100 per package or case in the Yokohama bill of lading is necessarily imported into the Uniform Bill of Lading,' becomes the valuation “agreed upon” within the terms and conditions quoted from that bill, and limits the respondent’s reсovery to that amount, $5,600, regardless of the value of the property and of the fact that it was lost by the carrier’s negligence.
To this contention it is replied by the respondent: that it is admitted by the рetitioner that its filed arid published schedules contained but one rate applicable to the shipment as it was carried east of San Francisco; that that rate, $1.25 per 100 pounds minimum carlоad, was charged in the Yokohama bill of lading; and that,.since no choice of rates was given,' or could be given, to the shipper, any agreement, in form a valuation of the property, mаde for the purpose of limiting the carrier’s liability to less thari the real value thereof, in case of loss by negligence, was void and without effect.
*321
In many cases, from the decision in
Hart
v.
Pennsylvania R. R. Co.,
As a matter of legal distinction, estoppel is made the basis of this ruling — that, having accepted the benefit óf the lower rate, in . cоmmon honesty the shipper may not repudiate the conditions on which it was obtained — but the rule and the effect of it are clearly established.
The petitioner admits all this, but contends that it has nevеr been held by this court that such choice of rates was essential to the validity of valuation agreements, and, arguing that they should be sustained unless shown to have been fraudulently or oppressively obtained, it affirms the validity of the agreement in the Yokohama bill of lading, and cites as a decisive authority
Reid
v.
American Express Co.,
With this contention we cannot agree.
This court has consistently held the law to be that it is against public policy to permit a .common carrier to limit its common-law liability by contracting for exemption from the consequences of its own negligence or that of its servants (
And in the Piper Case it is said (p. 444): “In the previous decisions of this court upon the subject it has been said that the limited valuation for which a recovery may be had does not permit the carrier to defeat recovery because of losses arising from its own negligence, but serves to fix the amount of recovery upon an agreed valuation made in consideration of the lower rate stipulated to be paid for the service/’
The
Reid Case, supra,
does not conflict with these decisioris, for in that case the bill of lading containing the undervaluation, which was there sustained, expressly recited that the freight was adjusted on the basis of the agreed value and that the carrier’s liability should not exceed that sum “unless a value in excess thereof be specially declared, and statеd herein, and extra freight as may be agreed on paid.” The bill of lading was for ocean carriage only, London to New York, to which, of course, the Interstate Commerce Act was not applicable, (36 Stat. 544, § 1;
Armour Packing Co.
v.
United States,
Thus this valuation rule, where choice is given to and ac *323 cépfed by a shipper, is, in effect, аn exception to the common-law rule of liability of common carriers, and the latter rule remains in full effect as to all cases net falling within the scope of such exception. Having but оne applicable published rate east of San Francisco the petitioner did not give, arid could not lawfully have given, the shipper a choice of rates, and therefore the stipulation of value in the Yokohama bill of lading, even if treated as imported into the Uniform Bill of Lading, cannot bring the case within the valuation exception, and the carrier’s liability must be determined by thе rules of the common law. To allow the contention of the petitioner, would permit carriers to contract for partial exemption from the results of their own negligence without giving to. shippers any compensating privilege. Obviously such agreements could be made, only with the ’gnorant, the unwary or with persons deliberately deceived. It results that the 'judgment of the Supreme Court of the State of New York, entered upon the order of' the Court of Appeals of that State, must be
Affirmed.