An exception to the refusal of the presiding judge at a jury
trial to instruct the jury in language prayed for by counsel is of
no avail if the refusal be followed by instructions in the general
charge substantially to the same effect, but in the language of the
court.
A general exception to the whole of a charge to the jury will
not avail a plaintiff in error if the charge contains distinct
propositions and anyone of them is free from objections.
The case is stated in the opinion.
MR. JUSTICE FIELD delivered the opinion of the Court.
This was an action by the plaintiff to recover damages from the
Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company for injuries suffered by
him by reason of the derailment of a car attached to a train
belonging to that company, in which he was being carried as a
passenger on its line from Louisville, Kentucky, to St. Louis,
Missouri. The answer of the defendant set up that the accident was
caused by reason of a latent or hidden defect or flaw in the body
of a steel rail laid on the track of the road, a defect which no
outward inspection could detect. Issue being joined, the case was
brought to trial and certain instructions to the jury were
requested by the plaintiff which set forth with substantial
accuracy the liability of railroad companies for having defective
roads by which accidents are caused to passengers traveling in
their cars. These instructions were refused, and
Page 132 U. S. 173
to the refusal exceptions were taken. These exceptions, however,
cannot avail the plaintiff in error, because the substance of the
instructions refused was contained in the charge subsequently given
by the court. The object of the instructions was to impart such
information as would govern the jury in their deliberations, and
guide to a right conclusion in their verdict. Such information can
generally be most advantageously given after the conclusion of the
testimony and the argument of counsel, and it is not material
whether it be then given immediately in response to the request of
counsel, or be contained in the formal charge of the court.
The charge itself, though embodying the substance of the
instructions asked, also referred to other matters presenting
distinct propositions of law, but to none of them was any exception
taken pointing out specifically the matter objected to. Only a
general exception to the whole charge was made, and a general
exception of that kind will not avail a plaintiff in error where
the charge contains distinct propositions and any one of them is
free from objection. The whole charge must be substantially wrong
before such a general exception will avail for any purpose. This is
the settled law, established by numerous decisions of this Court.
Lincoln v.
Claflin, 7 Wall. 132,
74 U. S. 139;
Cooper v. Schlesinger, 111 U. S. 148,
111 U. S. 151;
Moblie & Montgomery Railway Co. v. Jurey, 111 U.
S. 584,
111 U. S. 596;
Burton v. West Jersey Ferry Co., 114 U.
S. 474,
114 U. S. 476.
It is also required by the fourth rule of this Court, which
provides as follows:
"The judges of the circuit and district courts shall not allow
any bill of exceptions which shall contain the charge of the court
at large to the jury in trials at common law, upon any general
exception to the whole of such charge. But the party excepting
shall be required to state distinctly the several matters of law in
such charge to which he excepts, and those matters of law and those
only shall be inserted in the bill of exceptions, and allowed by
the Court."
Whatever, therefore, may be the actual merits of the plaintiff's
claim to damages, nothing is presented to us by the record which we
can examine.
Judgment affirmed.