United States Supreme Court Cases & Opinions

U.S. Supreme Court

Great Northern Ry. Co. v. Capital Trust Co., 242 U.S. 144 (1916)

Great Northern Railway Company v. Capital Trust Company

No. 107

Submitted November 15, 1916

Decided December 4, 1916

242 U.S. 144

Syllabus

Such pain and suffering as are substantially contemporaneous with death or mere incidents to it, as also the short periods of insensibility which sometimes intervene between fatal injuries and death, afford no basis for a separate estimation or award of damages under the Employers' Liability Act, as amended by the Act of April 5, 1910. St. Louis & Iron Mountain Ry. v. Craft, 237 U. S. 648, 237 U. S. 655.

Although an error not challenged in the state supreme court may not be relied on here as a ground of reversal, it is proper for this Court to point it out in anticipation of a possible new trial.

Under the Employers' Liability Act, as amended April 5, 1910, when the personal representative unites a claim for the injury suffered by the decedent with a claim for losses resulting to the beneficiaries from his death, the damages recoverable under the former claim are limited to such as will reasonably compensate for the loss and suffering of the injured person while he lived, and it is error to permit

Page 242 U. S. 145

the jury to increase them by taking account of his premature death and of what he would have earned or accomplished in the natural span of his life. St. Louis Iron Mountain Ry. v. Craft, supra.

127 Minn. 144, 128 Minn. 537 reversed.

The case is stated in the opinion.