Joseph McKenna

“ We repeat, we think the motive and effect of the law is not punishment in the sense of a penal law, but remuneration-'damages for a civil injury.' And a peculiar injury, one resulting from death and its deprivations-deprivations difficult to estimate (and which the common law did not estimate in individual injury and redress) , and, therefore, we think properly within the power of the state-its power to make provision for the controversies and rights that may grow out of the relations of its people. ”

“ The question of liability in some court petitioner does not contest. It contests only that the law of New Mexico, upon which liability of petitioner was based, is in conflict with the policy of the state of California, expressed in the laws and decisions of the state. ”

“ This may be conceded; there is nothing in the law of New Mexico that transcends the purpose. It does not preclude the recovery of damages; it only defines them, recognizing, as the Supreme Court of California has recognized, the incapability of precise accuracy being attained either by court or jury of the damages that may result from the death of a person to surviving relatives. ”