Walcofski v. Lehigh Valley Coal Co.

Citations

• 278 Pa. 84
• 122 A. 238
• 1923 Pa. LEXIS 476

Syllabus

<p>Worhmeris compensation — Course of employment — Nature of employment — Violation of Act of June 2, 1891, P. L. 176 — Mines and mining — Coal mine — Explosion of gas — Public policy — Illegal act.</p> <p>1. There can be no legal excuse for failure to comply with an absolute statutory requirement.</p> <p>2. Public policy will not aid a man who grounds his cause on an immoral or illegal act.</p> <p>3. Where services are rendered in a transaction which is itself an immediate and direct breach of the laws, an action for compensation cannot be maintained.</p> <p>4. Where a mine owner has complied with the provisions of the Act of June 2,1891, P. L. 176, by barring off a part of a coal mine that had generated gas, and a workman, with full notice of the situation, enters such part, lights a fuse, and is injured in the ensuing explosion, he cannot recover under the Workmen’s Compensation Act.</p> <p>5. Such a place was unworkable, and the workman in entering it was no longer engaged “in the course of his employment,” and his presence therein was not “required by the nature of his employment.”</p>