Union Railway & Transit Co. v. Kallaher

Citations

• 114 Ill. 325
• 2 N.E. 77

Syllabus

<p>1. Negligence—two corporations acting together—when the servants of one to be regarded as also the servants of the other. In an action to recover for the death of the plaintiff’s intestate, occasioned, as was alleged, by the wrongful act of the servants of the defendant company, a railway and transit company engaged in transferring, with its own motive power, trains of cars over the St. Louis bridge across the Mississippi liver, it appeared this service was performed under a_ private arrangement between the defendant company and another corporation—the bridge company—for a compensation paid by the latter company, the two companies thus acting together in the transportation of passengers over the bridge, and in that regard there was concert of action between them. The collector of fares for the bridge company was on the trains crossing the bridge, by the consent, and certainly with the knowledge, of the defendant company, and it permitted that servant of the bridge company to control the movements of its trains. On the occasion in question, the plaintiff’s intestate was a passenger on one of defendant’s trains, and while the train was passing over one of the approaches to the bridge it was stopped in obedience to a signal given by the collector of fares for the bridge company, and by his direction the passenger was put off the train upon a trestle, from which he fell and was killed. It was held, as affecting the question of the liability of the defendant, that the collector of fares for the bridge company, while he was the servant of that company, was to be considered, for the time being, at least, and while so engaged on the train, as the servant of the defendant also.</p> <p>2. Instruction—amendment by erasure, leaving words still legible. It was objected that in erasing a sentence from an instruction, the words were still legible. The matter intended to be stricken out was of no importance whatever, and it mattered little whether the jury could still read it or