Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

“ It is 'a strong thing' to hold, on the indefinite evidence in this record, which I have attempted accurately to detail, that a mail crane arm is such a permanent and conspicuous source of danger to a freight engineer as to bring this case within the scope of the decisions cited, and it is a yet stronger thing to reverse the finding of a jury properly instructed, and the judgments, on a question of fact, of two state courts, which the record shows acted with full appreciation of, and with a desire to follow, the decisions of this Court with respect to assumption of risk. ”

“ The farthest point at which a bag could be picked up is twenty nine inches, and it requires a less distance than that to be sure of getting the bag. In short it would be impossible to use the contrivance with absolute certainty that no accident would happen if a man put his head out at the wrong moment. It equally is impossible to condemn railroads as wrongdoers simply for adopting the device with the conditions imposed by the Post Office Department. ”

“ But an experienced railroad man cannot be supposed to have been ignorant that such a projection threatened danger and, knowing so much, he assumed the risk that obviously would attend taking the chances of leaning well out from the train. As we have said, the only possible inference on the uncontradicted evidence of the plaintiff's witnesses was that he leaned out considerably more than fourteen inches as shown by the position of his body and the place of the cut on his head. ”

“ The probability is that the distance of the crane was somewhat greater than the minimum that we have assumed, but that we lay on one side. Confining ourselves to the case of postal cranes we are of opinion that to allow the jury to find a verdict for the plaintiff was to allow them to substitute sympathy for evidence and to impose a standard of conduct that had no warrant in the common law. ”

“ It is impracticable to require railroads to have no structures so near to their tracks as to endanger people who lean from the windows of the cars. Most passengers are familiar with cautions against putting out heads or arms. ”

“ Where, as here, three or four inches is a matter of life and death, random estimates are valueless and should not be accepted, especially when the company certainly had perfectly definite information, which was suppressed. ”