Stacy v. Knickerbocker Ice Co.
84 Wis. 614, 1893 Wisc. LEXIS 102, 54 N.W. 1091 (1893)
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Rule of Law:
A bailee for hire is liable for the loss of or damage to bailed property only if the loss is proximately caused by the bailee's failure to exercise ordinary care.
Facts:
- A plaintiff entered into a bailment for hire contract, renting his horses to a defendant ice company.
- The contract stipulated that a specific driver, Clifford, must handle the horses.
- The ice company was engaged in harvesting ice from a lake, which created areas of open water and thin ice.
- While being driven by Clifford near the work area, the horses became frightened and uncontrollable.
- The frantic horses ran from the safe work area onto a patch of thin ice, where they broke through and drowned.
- The work Clifford was assigned to do was located at a safe distance from the thin ice.
Procedural Posture:
- The plaintiff (owner of the horses) sued the defendant ice company in the circuit court to recover the value of the drowned horses.
- The circuit court entered a judgment in favor of the defendant ice company.
- The plaintiff appealed the judgment of the circuit court to this appellate court.
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Issue:
Is an ice company, as a bailee for hire, liable for the value of horses that drowned after becoming frightened and running onto thin ice, where the company's alleged negligent acts or omissions would not have prevented the loss?
Opinions:
Majority - Lton, C. J.
No. An ice company, as a bailee for hire, is not liable for the value of horses that drowned because the loss was not caused by any negligence or lack of ordinary care on its part. The fundamental principle of bailment is that a bailee for hire is only liable for losses resulting from a want of ordinary care; if property is lost without the bailee's fault, the owner bears the loss. The plaintiff alleged the ice company was negligent by (1) failing to erect a statutory fence around the thin ice, (2) failing to notify the driver of the thin ice's location, and (3) failing to have rescue equipment available. The court found that none of these alleged failures caused the accident. The statutory fence would have been 'but gossamer' against the powerful, frantic horses. Notifying the driver would have been futile, as he was powerless to stop the uncontrollable animals. Finally, there is no legal rule requiring rescue equipment, and even if present, it would have been of no avail as the horses went under the ice into deep water almost immediately. The true cause of the loss was the horses becoming frightened and uncontrollable, for which the ice company was not to blame.
Analysis:
This case provides a classic illustration of the causation element in negligence claims within the context of a bailment for hire. The court's decision emphasizes that a breach of duty, even a statutory one, does not create liability unless that breach is the actual and proximate cause of the harm. It reinforces the principle that a bailee is not a strict insurer of the bailed goods. Future cases involving bailment and negligence will look to this analysis to distinguish between conditions that merely exist at the time of an accident and those that are the legal cause of it.
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