Baltimore & Potomac Railroad v. MacKey

Citations

• 157 U.S. 72
• 15 S. Ct. 491
• 39 L. Ed. 624
• 1895 U.S. LEXIS 2179

Syllabus

<p>Where the evidence is conflicting, and no reasonable or proper inference can be drawn from it as matter of law, the case should be left to the jury.</p> <p>Knowledge of a defect in a car brake cannot be imputed to the employé charged with keeping .it in order, when he has had no opportunity to see it.</p> <p>When an instruction to the jury embodies several p-opositions of law, to so)ne of which there are no objections, the party objecting must point out specifically to the trial court the part to which he objects, in order to avail himself of the objection.</p> <p>Ambiguous or too forcible expfessions in a charge may be explained or qualified by other parts of it, and if the charge does not, as a whole, w'ork injustice to the party objecting, the use of such expressions will not be cause for granting a new trial.</p> <p>A railroad'company, receiving the'cars of other companies to be hauled in its trains, is bou.nd to inspect such cars before putting them in its trains, and is l'esponsible to its employés for injuries inflicted upon them in consequence of defects in such cars which might have been discovered by a reasonable inspection before admitting them to a.train.</p> <p>In an action by an executor of a deceased person against a railroad company •1.0 recover damages for the killing of the intestate, an emplové of the company, brought under the act of February 17, 1885, c. 126, 23 Stat. 307. which provides that “the damages recovered in such action'shall not be appropriated to the payment of the debts or liabilities of such decéased person, but shall inure-to the benefit of his or her family, and be distributed according to the provisions of the statute of distributions,” it is not error to charge the jury that in estimating damages they may take into consideration the age of the deceased, his health and strength, his capacity to earn money as disclosed by the evidence, his family,.who they are and what they consist of, and from all the facts and all the circum