97 F. 140 | 8th Cir. | 1899
This was an action brought on August 12,1898, by the executor of the last will of John 33. Webber, who died on March 27,1895, from the effects of an injury which he received on November 1, 1893, while lie was riding as a passenger on one of the cars of the defendant in error, to recover the expenses o£ his sickness and the amount of the loss of his earnings between the time of his injury and the time of his death. The complaint counted upon the contract of transportation solely. It was that the railway company made an agreement with the deceased to carry him safely; that it did not do so, but injured his back, head, and spine, and thereby destroyed Ms capacity to work and caused him to die; that between the time of Ms injury and the day of his death Ms injuries caused him to expend §4,000 for care, assistance, nursing, and medical attendance, and caused him to lose his earnings, which would have been §100 per month; and that the plaintiff in error was the executor of his will, and as such was entitled to recover these amounts from the defendant in error. The contract was made, the injury wa.s inflicted, and the action was brought in the state of Minnesota. For more than 30 years prior to the commencement of the suit the statutes of that state contained these provisions:
“Section 1. A canse of action arising out of an injury to tlie person dies with the person of either party, except as provided in the next section. All other canses of action by one against another, whether arising on contract or not, survive to the personal representatives of the former, and against the personal representatives of the latter.
“Sec. 2. When death is caused by the wrongful act or omission of any party, the personal representatives of the deceased may maintain an action, if he might have maintained an action, had lie lived, for an injury caused by the same act or omission; but the action shall be commenced within two years after the act or omission, by which the death was caused; the damages thereon cannot exceed five thousand dollars, and the amount recovered is to be for the exclusive benefit of the widow and next of kin, to be distributed to then; in the same proportions as the personal property of the deceased person.” Gen. St. Minn. 1866, p. 545, c. 77; Gen. St. 1878, p. 825, c. 77.
In 1891 section 2 was amended by ike addition of this clause:
“Provided that any demand for the support of the deceased and for funeral expenses, duly allowed by the probate court, shall be first deducted.” Gen. St. 1894, §§ 5912, 5913.
Section 2 was again amended, in 1897, by the addition of this proviso:
“Provided, that If an action had been commenced by such deceased person during his lifetime for such injury which had not been finally determined, such action does not abate by the death of the plaintiff, but may be continued by the personal representatives of the deceased, for the benefit of the game persons and limited to the same amount of recovery as herein provided.” Laws Minn. 1897, c. 261.
Under these statutes, the circuit court sustained a demurrer to the complaint, and dismissed the action, and this ruling is the only error assigned in this case.
The argument of counsel for the plaintiff in error, stated in the form of a syllogism, is: An action on a contract does not abate by the death of a party. This is an action on a contract. Therefore tMs action did not abate, and the executor of the will of the deceased
If doubts could arise whether or not the legislature intended what the plain words of section 1 express, when it enacted this statute, they would be dispelled by the reason of the rule, and by the subsequent legislative and judicial construction which the enactment has received. Section 1 declared that every cause of action arising out of a personal injury should die with the person, except as provided by section 2. Section 2 provided that when death was caused by the wrongful act or omission of a party the personal representatives of the deceased might maintain an action for the injury, if the deceased could have done so, and that the damages recovered should he distributed to the widow and next of kin in the same proportions as the personal property of the deceased was distributed. It is not probable that the legislature intended to provide by this statute for the survival of two actions for a personal injury which resulted in death,— one under section 1 for the diminution of the estate of the deceased between the time of his injury and his death, and another under section 2 for the pecuniary loss to his widow and next of kin. And yet this is the inevitable result of the construction for which counsel for the plaintiff in error contend. It is more reasonable, more in accord with that recognized public policy which deprecates a multiplicity of suits, and more in consonance with the express terms of the statute, to believe that it was the purpose of the legislature to provide for a single action, in which all recoverable damages resulting from the injury and the death should be assessed and adjudicated, and to abate all others, in favor of the deceased or of his legal representatives, which might arise out of the injury or the death. The subsequent legislation, and the effect given to it by the supreme court of Minnesota, lend strong support to this view. In 1891 the legislature provided that there should he deducted from the damages recovered by the widow and next of kin under section 2, before their distribution to them, any demands for the support of the deceased and funeral expénses. This was, in effect, a legislative declaration that the personal representatives could recover under section 2 the amount of the expense incurred for care, nursing, and medical attendance while the deceased was suffering from the injury which caused his death, and the supreme court of the state so interpreted the amended statute. Sykora v. Machine Co., 59 Minn. 130, 134, 60 N. W. 1008. If the
Counsel for the respective parties to this action have presented a careful and exhaustive review of the decisions of the English and American‘ courts upon the rule of the common law that a personal action dies with the person. But the statute of Minnesota is so plain and positive in its terms that we do not feel at liberty to disregard, evade, or explain it away, and we must decline to follow them in this discussion. It would be a futile task, however interesting and agreeable, to trace the common-law rule through the decisions of the courts of various jurisdictions, to accurately state its limitations and exceptions, and to compare it with the local law of Minnesota. Whatever the result of such an investigation, that law must still prevail, and it is too plain to be construed away. When the language of a statute is unambiguous, and its meaning is clear, arguments by analogy or from history and attempted judicial construction serve only to create doubt and to confuse the judgment. They serve to obscure far more than to elucidate the meaning of the law. There is no safer or better canon of interpretation than that, when the terms of a statute are plain and its meaning is clear, the legislature must be presumed to have meant what it expressed, and there is no room for