228 N.Y. 164, 126 N.E. 814
Plaintiff and her husband were driving a buggy without lights toward Tarrytown on Neperham road on the night of August 21, 1915.1 They were struck by the defendant's automobile traveling in the opposite direction at the point where the highway curves.2 The man was killed.
The worked portion of the highway was twenty-seven and one-half feet wide at the collision point near a hydrant on the northerly side.3 Plaintiff presented evidence that the automobile approached at eighteen to twenty miles per hour on their side of the road with searchlights illuminating the entire roadway.4 Defendant testified he drove at about twelve miles per hour on the right side and saw something white only a fraction of a second before impact.5
A jury rendered a verdict in favor of the plaintiff at trial.6 The Appellate Division reversed the judgment on the law only and ordered a new trial after examining the facts and finding no error in them.7
The Court of Appeals reviewed the Appellate Division order on appeal and affirmed the reversal.8
Whether the trial court's jury instructions on the absence of lights from the plaintiff's vehicle were erroneous?9
The unexcused omission of the statutory signals is negligence in itself.10 Jurors have no dispensing power by which they may relax the duty that one traveler on the highway owes under the statute to another.11 The jury should have been instructed that the absence of lights was prima facie evidence of contributory negligence.12
Yes. On the night of August 21, 1915, plaintiff and her husband were driving a buggy without lights toward Tarrytown on Neperham road when struck by the defendant's automobile.13 The trial court refused the defendant's request to charge that the absence of a light on the plaintiff's vehicle was prima facie evidence of contributory negligence.14 Instead the court told the jury they could consider the absence of light as some evidence of negligence but not conclusive evidence.15
This error minimized unduly the gravity of the decedent's fault in a case where the statute was designed for the protection of human life and the collision occurred more than an hour after sundown.1617
The trial court's jury instructions on the absence of lights from the plaintiff's vehicle were erroneous.18
Related opinions on this issue
Justice Hogan dissented because the trial justice's charge was a full and complete statement of the law of the case.19 The charge required the jury to find that any negligence on the part of the intestate contributing to the accident would bar recovery.20 The jury had also been instructed on proximate cause.21
Hogan concluded that the majority was substituting form and phrases for substance by insisting on the specific prima facie charge.22 The charge already placed the burden on plaintiff to prove proximate cause and required a verdict for defendant upon the slightest contributory negligence.23 Hogan viewed the majority's approach as diverging from the rule of causal connection.24
Whether evidence of a nighttime collision between an automobile and an unlit buggy permits an inference that the lack of lights contributed to the collision?25
Evidence of a collision occurring more than an hour after sundown between a car and an unseen buggy proceeding without lights is evidence from which a causal connection may be inferred between the collision and the lack of signals.26 If nothing else is shown to break the connection, there is a case prima facie sufficient of negligence contributing to the result.27
Yes. The established facts show a collision at night on a curved portion of Neperham road between the defendant's automobile and the unlit buggy driven by the plaintiff's intestate.28 The defendant testified he saw something white only a fraction of a second before impact while traveling at about twelve miles per hour.29 The jury could reasonably infer from these facts that the absence of lights on the buggy contributed to the defendant's failure to see the vehicle in time.30
The plaintiff did not prove that other lights on the highway or car rendered the buggy's lights superfluous.31
Evidence of a nighttime collision between an automobile and an unlit buggy permits an inference that the lack of lights contributed to the collision.32
Related opinions on this issue
Hogan dissented on the ground that lack of vision was not on the undisputed facts the sole cause of the disaster.33 The jury found the defendant was driving on the wrong side of the road.34 The highway was well lighted by electric lamps and the car's searchlights.35
Hogan concluded that the absence of a light on the wagon had no causal connection to the collision.36 He noted that if the defendant had been on the proper side of the road the accident would not have occurred regardless of lights on the wagon.37 Hogan emphasized that the jury had credited plaintiff's evidence that the roadway was illuminated and that defendant was on the wrong side.38
Whether the Appellate Division's reversal rested solely on questions of law after it had examined the facts?39
Yes. A jury rendered a verdict in favor of the plaintiff at trial. The Appellate Division reversed the judgment on the law only and ordered a new trial after examining the facts and finding no error in them. The Court of Appeals reviewed that order on appeal and affirmed the reversal because the trial court's instructions on the statutory violation were erroneous as a matter of law.42
The Appellate Division's reversal rested solely on questions of law after it had examined the facts.43