Gulf, C. & S. F. Ry. Co. v. Hamrick
Gulf, C. & S. F. Ry. Co. v. Hamrick
Opinion of the Court
Appellee, as plaintiff below, sued the railway company and the Director General of Railroads for damages. resulting from alleged improper handling of a shipment of 93 head of appellee’s cattle from Cleburne to the North Fort Worth market. The railway company was dismissed from the suit, and the Director General has appealed from an adverse judgment.
The county court has no jurisdiction of causes where the “matter in controversy” exceeds $1,000, exclusive of interest. Const., art. 5, § 16 (article 1764, R. S.). The matter in controversy is not the amount prayed for, nor the amount stated generally in the petition, where the items going to make up the total value or damages are specifically stated and the aggregate sum thereof differs from the amount prayed for, or stated generally. The total of the items specifically set out comprises the “matter in controversy” in case of such conflict. Ry. v. Berry, 177 S. W. 1187; Wilson v. Ware, 166 S. W. 705; Ry. v. Coal Co., 102 Tex. 478, 119 S. W. 294; Times Co. v. Hill, 36 Tex. Civ. App. 389, 81 S. W. 806; Burke v. Adoue, 3 Tex. Civ. App. 494, 22 S. W. 824, 23 S. W. 91; Tel. Co. v. Hawkins, 85 S. W. 847. Here the total of the items of damage specifically set out was in excess of $1,000, and for the purpose of determining jurisdiction the amount so ascertained will control, notwithstanding the general allegations fixed the amount of damages at a sum within, the jurisdictional amount, and the prayer for recovery was only for that sum. The fact that there was an excess of only $32.50 does not matter. In Tel. Co. v. Hawkins, supra, the excess was only 25 cents; in Wilson v. Ware, supra, $1,61. Nor does it matter that appellee in his petition calculated the loss of $1.50 per hundredweight on 49,000 pounds of beef to be $670, since the correct sum of this alleged loss was $735, and the actual total of the specific items of damage alleged by appellee is $1,032.50, of which amount the county court was without jurisdiction. The judgment must be reversed.
The matters complained of by the Director General in the second to seventh assignments of error are not likely to arise in another trial. The statements under the 'eighth to fourteenth assignments of error are insufficient to entitle those assignments to consideration, and the fifteenth, complaining of the insufficiency of the evidence to support the verdict, becomes immaterial.
The judgment is reversed, and the cause remanded.
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Reference
- Full Case Name
- GULF, C. & S. F. RY. CO. Et Al. v. HAMRICK
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- 12 cases
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- Published