Supreme Court of the United States, 1922

North Carolina Railroad v. Lee

Supreme Court of the United States · Decided October 16, 1922 · Brandeis

260 U.S. 16; 43 S. Ct. 2; 67 L. Ed. 104; 1922 U.S. LEXIS 2334 (United States Reports)

Counsel

Mr. S. B. Prince, with whom Mr. H. O’B. Cooper, Mr.. John N. Wilson and Mr. L. E. Jewries were on the briefs, for petitioner., Mr. R. C. Sirudwick, with whom Mr. John A. Barringer was on the brief, for respondent.

Cases that cite this one

26 later published cases cite this decision. The 25 that cite it most often are listed here.

Schroeder v. Davis (8th Cir. 1929)
Baggott v. Southern Ry. Co. (District Court, E.D. South Carolina 1924)
Illinois Central Railroad Company v. William P. Rogers, Attorney General of the United States, as Successor to the Alien Property Custodian (D.C. Cir. 1958)
United States v. De Queen & Eastern Railroad (United States District Court for the Western District of Arkansas 1958)
United States v. Diesel Tanker A. C. Dodge, Inc. (District Court, E.D. New York 1957)
Anderson v. Chesapeake Ferry Co. (Va. 1947)
Morgenthau v. Sugar Land Ry. Co. (5th Cir. 1936)
Commissioner of Internal Revenue v. Midland Val. R. Co. (10th Cir. 1932)
Kansas City Southern Ry. Co. v. Commissioner of Int. Rev. (8th Cir. 1931)
United States v. Sakharam Ganesh Pandit (9th Cir. 1926)
Stanton v. Ruthbell Coal Co. (W. Va. 1945)
Wynn v. Southern Bell Telephone & Telegraph Co. (Ga. Ct. App. 1929)
Illinois Terminal Co. v. Commissioner (United States Board of Tax Appeals 1926)
Pennsylvania Rd. Co. v. Oberlander (Ohio 1925)
New York, O. & W. R. Co. v. Commissioner (United States Board of Tax Appeals 1925)
McGill v. Oregon Short Line R. (9th Cir. 1924)
North Carolina Railroad v. Story (N.C. 1927)
Virginian Railway Co. v. Mullens (Supreme Court of the United States 1926)
North Carolina Railroad v. Story (Supreme Court of the United States 1925)
E. I. Dupont De Nemours & Co. v. Davis (Supreme Court of the United States 1924)
Davis v. Pringle (4th Cir. 1924)
Weiss v. Director General of Railroads (Mass. 1924)
Wabash Railway Co. v. Elliott (Supreme Court of the United States 1923)
New Jersey Shipbuilding & Dredging Co. v. Davis (District Court, S.D. New York 1923)
Davis v. Dawkins (Ala. 1922)

This list shows which later cases cite this one. It does not say how they treated it, and no review of that has been done. Not a substitute for Shepard’s or KeyCite — verify before relying.

Opinion

Mr. Justice Brandeis

delivered the opinion of the Court.

The Southern Railway includes a line in North Carolina which is held under a. ninety-nine year lease. On that line an employee was killed in March, 1919 — apparently while engaged in intrastate commerce. His admin-istratrix brought, in a court of the State, this action for damages, alleging that the line was then being operated *17 by the Southern as lessee, and that the lessee’s negligence in operation caused the injury. Only the lessor, the North Carolina Railroad Company, was made defendant. Its liability was asserted under a local rule by which a railroad corporation is liable for injuries resulting from a lessee’s negligence in operation.' Logan v. North Carolina R. R. Co., 116 N. Car. 940. The defendant set up the fact that, at the time of the' accident, the Southern system was being operated solely by the Director General of Railroads under the Federal Control Act, March 21, 1918, c. 25, 40 Stat. 451. On that ground it requested a ruling that the plaintiff could not recover. This request was refused; and the court instructed the jury that, if the Government was operating, the railroad, it was doing so in the capacity of a lessee and that the defendant “ would still be responsible for the acts and conduct of the Government at the time it was operating ” the same. The verdict was for the plaintiff; and the judgment entered thereon was affirmed by the Supreme Court of North Carolina without opinion. This Court granted a writ of certiorari. 255 U. S. 567. Thereafter, the liability of carriers during federal control was considered in Missouri Pacific R. R. Co. v. Ault, 256 U. S. 554.

•The Government operated this railroad not as lessee, but under a right in the nature of eminent domain. ,It operated through the Director General, not through the Southern Company as agent. The Ault Case holds that the Director General alone was made subject, by § 10 of the Federal Control Act, to the “liabilities as common carriers, whether arising under Staté or Federal laws or at common law.” To permit an action for injuries suffered during federal control to be brought either against the Southern Company as lessee, or against the North Carolina Company as lessor, would be inconsistent with the provisions of that act. This is now recognized by the *18 Supreme Court of North Carolina. Lane v. Southern Ry. Co., 182 N. Car. 774; Barbee v. North Carolina R. R. Co., 182 N. Car. 775.

Reversed.

Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.