Norfolk Southern Railway Co. v. Sorrell
166 L. Ed. 2d 638, 549 U.S. 158, 2007 U.S. LEXIS 1006 (2007)
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Rule of Law:
Under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act (FELA), the same standard of causation must be applied to assess both the negligence of the railroad and the contributory negligence of the employee.
Facts:
- Timothy Sorrell worked as a trackman for Norfolk Southern Railway Company.
- On November 1, 1999, while working, Sorrell was driving a dump truck loaded with asphalt on a gravel road next to railroad tracks.
- Another Norfolk truck, driven by fellow employee Keith Woodin, approached Sorrell's truck.
- Following the interaction between the two trucks, Sorrell's truck veered off the road and tipped over.
- Sorrell sustained neck and back injuries as a result of the accident.
- Sorrell's account was that Woodin's truck forced him off the road.
- Woodin's account was that Sorrell negligently drove his own truck into a ditch.
Procedural Posture:
- Timothy Sorrell filed suit against Norfolk Southern Railway Company in a Missouri state trial court under FELA.
- At trial, the court instructed the jury with a 'contributed in whole or in part' causation standard for Norfolk's negligence and a 'directly contributed to cause' standard for Sorrell's contributory negligence.
- Norfolk's objection to the differing standards was overruled by the trial court.
- A jury returned a verdict in favor of Sorrell for $1.5 million.
- The trial court denied Norfolk's motion for a new trial, which was based on the allegedly improper jury instructions.
- Norfolk (appellant) appealed the judgment to the Missouri Court of Appeals, an intermediate appellate court.
- The Missouri Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court's judgment.
- The Missouri Supreme Court, the state's highest court, denied Norfolk's request for discretionary review.
- Norfolk petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court for a writ of certiorari, which was granted.
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Issue:
Does the Federal Employers' Liability Act (FELA) permit courts to apply a different, more stringent standard of causation for an employee's contributory negligence than the standard applied to the railroad's negligence?
Opinions:
Majority - Chief Justice Roberts
No. The Federal Employers' Liability Act (FELA) does not permit the application of different causation standards for railroad negligence and employee contributory negligence. The text, common-law background, and structure of FELA's comparative negligence scheme all indicate that a single standard must be used to evaluate the causal contribution of each party's negligence. Although FELA expressly departs from the common law in several ways, it does not abrogate the common-law principle that the same causation standard applies to both a defendant's negligence and a plaintiff's contributory negligence. Furthermore, FELA's mandate to reduce damages 'in proportion to the amount of negligence attributable to such employee' works most logically and fairly when the jury compares 'like with like' under a unified standard of causation.
Concurring - Justice Souter
I agree with the majority that the same standard of causation must apply to both parties. However, I write to clarify that the controlling standard should be the traditional common-law rule of proximate cause. The Court's landmark decision in Rogers v. Missouri Pacific R. Co. did not, as some courts have held, create a more 'relaxed' standard of causation. Instead, Rogers merely rejected a flawed 'sole proximate cause' test and clarified how to handle cases with multiple contributing causes, without altering the fundamental requirement that a plaintiff must prove its injury was proximately caused by the defendant's negligence.
Concurring - Justice Ginsburg
I agree that a single causation standard governs both railroad and employee negligence. I write to emphasize that the Court's precedent has already established what this standard is: the 'relaxed' standard from Rogers v. Missouri Pacific R. Co., which asks whether the employer's negligence 'played any part, even the slightest, in producing the injury.' This standard is, in effect, the definition of proximate cause applicable in FELA cases, reflecting Congress's strong remedial purpose to protect railroad workers. The term 'proximate cause' is inherently confusing and should be avoided in jury instructions in favor of the plain-language 'any part, even the slightest' test from Rogers.
Analysis:
This decision resolves a conflict among state and federal courts by establishing a uniform rule that causation under FELA must be symmetrical for both plaintiffs and defendants. By mandating a single standard, the Court promotes consistency and simplifies the jury's task of apportioning fault in comparative negligence cases. However, the Court deliberately left open the critical question of what that single standard should be, creating a direct and unresolved tension between the concurrences over the correct interpretation of the Court's seminal causation case, Rogers. This leaves lower courts with clear guidance on symmetry but continued uncertainty about the substantive test for causation itself.
