Craker v. Chicago & Northwestern Railway Co.
Wisconsin Supreme Court
APPEAL from the Circuit Court for Sauk County. Action for insulting, violent and abusive acts alleged to have been done to tbe plaintiff by tbe conductor of one of defendant’s trains while plaintiff was a passenger on such train. Answer, a general denial. The substance of plaintiff’s testimony at the trial was as follows : She’ was about twenty years of age, and a school teacher, when the facts occurred on which the action was founded.
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APPEAL from the Circuit Court for Sauk County. Action for insulting, violent and abusive acts alleged to have been done to tbe plaintiff by tbe conductor of one of defendant’s trains while plaintiff was a passenger on such train. Answer, a general denial. The substance of plaintiff’s testimony at the trial was as follows : She’ was about twenty years of age, and a school teacher, when the facts occurred on which the action was founded. On a certain morning, she went to defendant’s depot at Reeds-burgh in Sauk county, for the purpose of taking the train to Baraboo in that county, but was a few…
1Opinion of the CourtRyan, C. J.
I. We cannot help thinking that there has been some useless subtlety in the books in the application of the rule respondeat superior, and some unnecessary confusion in the liability of principals for willful and malicious acts of agents.This has probably arisen from too broad an application of the dictum of Lord Holt, that “ no master is chargeable with the acts of his servant but when he acts in the execution of the authority given to him, and the act of the servant is the act of the master.” Middleton v. Fowler, 1 Salk., 282. For this would seem to go to excuse the master for the negligence…
2Cases cited14 opinions
- Philadelphia & Reading Railroad v. DerbySupreme Court of the United States · 1853
- Jeffersonville Railroad v. RogersIndiana Supreme Court · 1871
- Ramsden v. Boston & Albany RailroadMassachusetts Supreme Judicial Court · 1870
- Weed v. . the Panama Railroad CompanyNew York Court of Appeals · 1858
- Baltimore & Ohio Railroad v. BlocherCourt of Appeals of Maryland · 1867
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3Cited by139 opinions
- Brown v. SwinefordWisconsin Supreme Court · 1878
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- Merrill v. Los Angeles Gas Elec. Co.California Supreme Court · 1910
- Jane Doe v. Celebrity Cruises, Inc.Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit · 2004
- Samms v. EcclesUtah Supreme Court · 1961
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