y 



20 



The Florists' Review 



December 7, 1916. 





LEGAL VALUATION OF TIME. 



A Suit for Time Lost. 



A Philadelphia florist was injured 

 when a wagon in which he was riding 

 was struck by a street car. He sued 

 the street railway company and was 

 awarded judgment for his physical in- 

 jury, etc., but appealed to the Supreme 

 Court of Pennsylvania, claiming that 

 the trial judge committed error in his 

 rulings on the injured man's right *o 

 recover damages for loss of time from 

 his business, on account of the accident. 

 The Supreme court affirmed the action 

 of t6e lower court, saying: 



"The plaintiff was a florist and the 

 major portion of his business was 

 wholesale; it was conducted on a range 

 covering ten acres of ground, with 5,650 

 square feet under glass and more than 

 1,000 square feet of coldframes. His 

 annual expenses amounted to about 

 $2,500, and before the accident he em- 

 ployed one man to assist him. After- 

 wards he kept this man, and also placed 

 his minor son at work in the business, 

 which continued under the plain- 

 tiff's general supervision. He esti- 

 mated the personal labor performed by 

 himself before the accident at $480 per 

 annum, and testified that since his in- 

 juries he performed probably twenty 

 per cent of his prior work, giving in 

 detail just what kind of work he had 

 done and now was able to do. 



The Plaintiff's Argument. 



"The plaintiff offered to prove his 

 receipts and expenditures 'covering the 

 period of years immediately anterior 

 to his injury * * ♦ and for the 

 years subsequent thereto, in order to 

 show decreased earning power.' This 

 was accompanied by a further offer to 

 show that the plaintiff leased the prem- 

 ises occupied by him in his business; 

 that he had no capital invested other 

 than the money required to purchase 

 seeds, etc., 'which he matured * * * 

 and sold by his own labor, with the 

 assistance of a hired employee,' and 

 that he had no other business or occu- 

 pation. These offers were refused. He 

 then offered to show, by qualified wit- 

 nesses who 'knew Mr. Blank's busi- 

 ness,' that 'the work performed' by 

 him in connection therewith was worth 

 between $1,500 and $2,000 per year. 

 This also was refused. 



"It will be observed that the origi- 

 nal offer was not to contrast a defined 

 period of time before the accident with 

 one of like duration thereafter, and 

 that there was no specific offer to prove 

 that the alleged decrease in the earn- 

 ings of the plaintiff's business was due 

 exclusively to his impaired physical 

 condition. Furthermore, there was no 

 contention that the plaintiff was so en- 

 feebled that he was entirely unable to 

 work in or superintend his business, 

 or that it had come to a stop. On the 

 contrary, it appears that, while the 

 plaintiff was in a bad nervous condi- 

 tion, he was otherwise physically fit, 

 and that the business remained a run- 

 ning concern. On this state of facts 



the trial judge instructed the jury as 

 follows: 



Other Factors Besides Labor. 



" 'A man's business which goes on 

 after he is hurt may have success or it 

 may have disaster for other reasons 

 than the accident. If he has a range, 

 no matter if it is a small range, in 

 which he raises flowers, it involves the 

 buying of stock, and it involves the 

 question of freeze-out in winter and 

 blight and other things which some- 

 times make a season disastrous, al- 

 though otherwise it would look promis- 

 ing. A man's labor enters into that 

 business as well as his stock, and the 

 fact that in one year he has a good 

 year and in another year he has a bad 

 year may be the result partly of bad 

 business conditions and partly of condi- 

 tions affecting his health. It is impos- 

 sible to split them, and the law wisely 

 says that we cannot consider the results 

 to the man's business, if it is a busi- 

 ness that goes on and if it is a busi- 

 ness in which he could employ some- 

 body else to do his work. In my view 

 of the case, owing to the fact that Mr.. 

 Blank carried on his business until to- 

 day, and could employ help to do what 

 he could not do himself, the cost of the 

 help would be something which could 

 be considered, and not what was the 

 effect ultimately upon his business as 

 shown by yearly statements. 



No Additional Expense Caused. 

 " 'As I say, I struck out that evi- 



dence, and therefore the only thing you 

 could consider would be . what expense 

 he was put to in his business, if any. 

 There was evidefice that, for a time, if 

 not all the time, before the accident he 

 employed a man to help him, at a cost 

 of $50 per month, and he employed a 

 man to help him after the accident at 

 the same price. If the accident caused 

 no change in his business, he was not 

 put to the expense of the man as a re- 

 sult of the accident, and hence he lost 

 no money on that account.' 



"In certain instances where one, as 

 the result of injuries received through 

 the negligence of another, had been en- 

 tirely deprived of the power to carry 

 on a business in which his personal 

 labor and superintendence were the 

 major assets, or where one had died as 

 the result of his injuries, and the evi- 

 dence showed regular sums given his 

 family which were earned in a business 

 that consisted principally of his labors 

 and management, we have permitted 

 evidence concerning the net earnings 

 of the injured or deceased person, on 

 the theory that it was the only way, 

 under the peculiar circumstances of the 

 case, satisfactorily to show earning 

 power. 



Profits Don't Fix Labor Value. 



"But those were exceptional cases in 

 which we said that 'profits derived 

 from an investment or the management 

 of a business enterprise are not earn- 

 ings.' Therefore 'the profits of a busi- 

 ness with which one is connected can- 

 not be made use of as a measure of his 

 earning power. Such evidence may 

 tend to show the possession of businega 

 qualities, but it does not fix their 

 value.' Under the circumstances of 

 the case at bar, we see no error in the 

 rulings and instructions called to our 

 attention in the assignments just dis- 

 cussed. ' ' S. 



ODCN LmTEft^y^ READEEi^ 



THAT POT FAMINE. 



I noticed an article in another trade 

 paper last week whicli states the pot 

 situation is causing men to be laid off 

 on account of a shortage of pots. There 

 is a shortage, but let's be fair and place 

 the blame where it belongs. 



I know there are potteries enough 

 throughout the country, each well 

 equipped with sufficient kilns and ma- 

 chinery, to make pots in plenty if men 

 could be obtained to run them. There 

 has been, and is, many dollars' worth of 

 idle machinery because of labor scar- 

 city and on labor alone I place the 

 principal reason for the pot shortage. 

 The advance in wages has been met 

 each time and no doubt will have to be 

 met again soon. The total number of 

 pots used is no greater than in former 

 years, nor is the demand larger, but 

 long delayed shipments make it appear 

 so and one good reason for delay is 

 the freight embargoes placed upon the 

 eastern cities by the railroad companies. 



The grower must understand that dur- 

 ing all last spring and summer the pot- 



ter was fighting for him, while running 

 with depleted labor force, trying to get 

 the additional labor necessary to make 

 up the stock of pots needed for the 

 fall trade, and that he is still trying 

 hard to fill his fall orders and making 

 stock for the coming winter and spring 

 trade, hoping to have enough for all 

 when needed. As far as the Whilldin 

 Pottery Co. is concerned, we are now 

 working to full capacity and gradually 

 catching up with our fall orders. Our 

 trouble at present is the freight em- 

 bargo. J. G. Whilldin, Pres. 



THE TRADE'S FAMILY SKELETON? 



I have read with interest the articles 

 in your worthy paper about the injury 

 done the trade in general by the 

 "rotten" way the cut-rate flower shop 

 and department stores sell flowers. The 

 first question is always this: Who is to 

 blame? "Not me!" says the one; 

 "Not me!" says the other. It is the 

 overstocked market, most of them say. 

 That may be true, but, in my estima- 

 tion, this is not the only cause of the 



