U.S. Supreme Court CORTES v. BALTIMORE INSULAR LINE, 287 U.S. 367 (1932)

[Page 287 U.S. 367, 378]

that the standards of legal duty must be the same by land and sea. Congress meant no more than this, that the duty must be legal, i.e., imposed by law; that it shall have been imposed for the benefit of the seaman, and for to promotion of his health or safety; and that the negligent omission to fulfill it shall have resulted in damage to his person. When this concurrence of duty, of negligence and of personal injury is made out, the seaman's remedy is to be the same as if a like duty had been imposed by law upon carriers by rail.

The Court of Appeals in its reversal of the District Court assumed without deciding that the care of the seaman had been negligent and that there was a causal relation between the negligence and the death. The correctness of that assumption is challenged by counsel for the shipowner. These issues of fact being still open and undecided should be disposed of by the court below.

The judgment is reversed, and the cause remanded to the Court of Appeals for further proceedings in conformity with this opinion. Footnotes

Footnote 1 That 'any seaman who shall suffer personal injury in the course of his employment may, at his election, maintain an action for damages at law, with the right of trial by jury, and in such action all statutes of the United States modifying or extending the common-law right or remedy in cases of personal injury to railway employees shall apply; and in case of the death of any seaman as a result of any such personal injury the personal representative of such seaman may maintain an action for damages at law with the right of trial by jury, and in such action all statutes of the United States conferring or regulating the right of action for death in the case of railway employees shall be applicable.'

Compare the Act of March 30, 1920, c. 111, 1, 41 Stat. 537, 46 U.S. Code, 761 (46 USCA 761) 'Death on the High Seas by Wrongful Act,' which extends to persons other than seamen, but is limited to suits in admiralty.

Footnote 2 The authorities are brought together and carefully discriminated by Prof. Francis H. Bohlen, in an article (Moral Duty to Aid Others as Basis of Tort Liability,' in 56 University of Penn. Law Review 217, 316, reprinted in his 'Studies in the Law of Torts,' pp. 290, 315.

Footnote 3 Compare again the authorities collected by Bohlen in his 'Studies in the Law of Torts,' p. 312.