Section 22.2 Generally

• Library: Tort Law 2016

A. (§22.2) Generally

FELA (Federal Employers’ Liability Act), 45 U.S.C. §§ 51 et seq., governs the relationship between rail carriers and their employees who sustain injuries or death in the course of employment. FELA provides railroad employees a right of action in negligence against their employer.

FELA is a broad remedial statute that must be construed liberally to effectuate its humanitarian purposes. Ackley v. Chicago & N. W. Transp. Co., 820 F.2d 263, 266 (8^th Cir. 1987); Urie v. Thompson, 337 U.S. 163, 180 (1949). In his concurring opinion in Wilkerson v. McCarthy, 336 U.S. 53 (1949), Justice Douglas described Congress’s goal in enacting FELA:

The Federal Employers’ Liability Act was designed to put on the railroad industry some of the cost for the legs, eyes, arms, and lives which it consumed in its operations. . . . The purpose of the Act was to change that strict rule of liability, to lift from employees the "prodigious burden" of personal injuries which the system had placed upon them, and to relieve men "who by the exigencies and necessities of life are bound to labor" from the risks and hazards that could be avoided or lessened "by the exercise of proper care on the part of the employer . . . ."

Wilkerson, 336 U.S. at 68.

Beyond those railroad companies commonly thought of as common carriers and beyond those employees traditionally thought of as railroad workers, such as engineers, conductors, brakemen, track workers, and carmen, counsel should be aware that certain rail entities can be considered common...