IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT
_____________________
No. 92-7378
_____________________
EARL WAYNE COATS,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
Cross-Appellant,
v.
PENROD DRILLING CORPORATION,
ET AL.,
Defendants,
PENROD DRILLING CORPORATION, and
HYTORC, M.E.,
Defendants-Appellants,
Cross-Appellees.
_________________________________________________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Mississippi
_________________________________________________________________
(August 8, 1995)
Before POLITZ, Chief Judge, KING, GARWOOD, JOLLY, HIGGINBOTHAM,
DAVIS, JONES, SMITH, DUHÉ, WIENER, BARKSDALE, EMILIO M. GARZA,
DeMOSS, BENAVIDES, STEWART and PARKER, Circuit Judges.
KING and HIGGINBOTHAM, Circuit Judges:
For more than a century, general maritime law has held joint
tortfeasors jointly and severally liable for all of the plaintiff's
damages suffered at their hand. Under that rule, the risk of
noncollection is borne by the defendants. The plaintiff can
collect his entire judgment from a single defendant, leaving to the
defendants allocation of fault among themselves. We reheard this
case en banc to consider the contention that we should adopt a new
rule of "modified joint liability." This proposal would limit each
joint tortfeasor's maximum liability to the amount for which that
tortfeasor would have been liable to the plaintiff if only the
negligence of that tortfeasor and the negligence of the plaintiff
were compared. The new rule would, for the first time in maritime
history, shift the risk of noncollection to the plaintiff. It
would allocate the risk of noncollection of an admiralty judgment
among the contributorily-negligent plaintiff and the defendants in
proportion to their respective faults. Because replacing joint and
several liability in the general maritime law with modified joint
liability would be neither authorized nor prudent, we affirm the
judgment of the district court.
I. FACTS AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
The facts and procedural history of this case were set forth
in the panel opinion, Coats v. Penrod Drilling Corp., 5 F.3d 877
(5th Cir. 1993), cert. denied, 114 S. Ct. 1303, reh'g en banc
granted, 20 F.3d 614 (5th Cir. 1994), and only those portions
necessary to the issues discussed herein are restated.
Maritime Industrial Services is a corporation organized under
the laws of Ras Al-Khaimah, United Arab Emirates with branch
offices in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. It performs repair and maintenance
services for oilfield and marine vessels, and its employees are all
expatriates, primarily from India, Pakistan, and the United States.
MIS uses Lee's Materials Services, Inc. in Houston, Texas to
perform various services in the United States. Through Lee's, MIS
2
advertised its job openings in the Houston Chronicle (Texas),
Lafayette Advertiser (Louisiana), and Mobile Register (Alabama).
In 1987, David Shelton, manager of the Hytorc Division of MIS,
travelled from the United Arab Emirates to Mississippi on vacation
and to interview prospective employees for MIS. During his trip,
Shelton held a meeting in Laurel, Mississippi that was attended by
several young men, including the plaintiff, Earl Wayne Coats.
Shelton explained that he was soliciting employees to operate MIS
equipment on certain offshore vessels. At the meeting, Shelton
offered a job to Coats, and Coats accepted. Their agreement
included thirty days per year of paid vacation with airfare back to
Mississippi. MIS also promised to pay for Coats' return to
Mississippi at the termination of his employment. The term of
Coats' employment was indefinite. Coats obtained an updated
passport as instructed by Shelton, and MIS, through Lee's, sent him
a plane ticket to Dubai. Coats arrived in the United Arab Emirates
and started work on December 1, 1987.
While working for MIS, Coats lived on shore and worked on
various jack-up rigs owned by different customers of MIS. The
majority of Coats' work consisted of operating a hydraulically
powered torque wrench used to loosen and tighten large nuts and
bolts. During Coats' employment with MIS, Penrod Drilling
Corporation, a Delaware corporation with its principal place of
business in Dallas, Texas, contracted for MIS to perform pressure
testing on Penrod's Rig 69. The pressure testing was necessary to
prepare the rig for its next drilling operation. At the time, Rig
3
69, a jack-up drilling rig, was located in the Port of Mina Saqr in
the territorial waters of the United Arab Emirates. Although it
was twenty feet from shore in forty feet of water and connected to
land by a gangway, it was prepared to sail and did so three days
after the accident. Rig 69 flies the United States flag, and its
home port is New Orleans, Louisiana. Penrod maintained a local
office in the United Arab Emirates to assist in the operation of
Rig 69.
MIS assigned Coats to perform the pressure testing for Penrod.
Coats was inexperienced at this task and had to ask for assistance
from Penrod personnel. All safety procedures were prepared to meet
standards of the United States. As Coats was working aboard Rig
69, Penrod's bullplug failed at a pressure less than it was rated
to withstand, causing the fluid under pressure to erupt. The
eruption knocked Coats down, resulting in a severe and disabling
injury to his knee. After the accident, MIS flew Coats to
Hattiesburg, Mississippi for treatment and started paying his
medical expenses. Most of these payments were made through Lee's.
Meanwhile, MIS filled Coats' job with Chris Stennett, another
Mississippi resident who attended Shelton's meeting in Laurel.
On April 10, 1989, Coats sued Penrod, MIS, and Lee's1 in the
Southern District of Mississippi. The complaint asserted federal
jurisdiction based on diversity of citizenship and admiralty and
alleges, inter alia, negligence on the part of Penrod and MIS, the
1
The district court granted Lee's motion for summary
judgment and dismissed it from the case.
4
unseaworthiness of Rig 69, and entitlement to maintenance and cure
from MIS under the Jones Act. Soon thereafter, MIS terminated its
payment of benefits to Coats. Coats then amended his complaint
against MIS to seek compensatory and punitive damages under the
general maritime law for wrongful termination of maintenance and
cure and to allege wrongful termination of health insurance
benefits under ERISA. Penrod cross-claimed against MIS for
indemnity and contribution under the general maritime law.
Before trial, the district court issued a number of orders in
response to motions filed by the parties. The court ruled that MIS
had sufficient contacts with Mississippi to justify the assertion
of personal jurisdiction and that it would apply United States law,
rather than the law of the United Arab Emirates, to Coats' personal
injury claims. MIS was estimated to be doing over one million
dollars a year of business in Texas at the time of the accident.
Under American law, the court determined that Coats was not a Jones
Act seaman and was not entitled to maintenance and cure (and
associated damages), but the court found that Coats qualified as a
Sieracki seaman with the attending right to sue under the warranty
of seaworthiness. See Seas Shipping Co. v. Sieracki, 328 U.S. 85
(1946).2 The court also declined to dismiss the case under the
doctrine of forum non conveniens.
2
The court also dismissed Coats' claims under the Longshore
and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act because Coats' injuries did
not occur "upon navigable waters of the United States." 33
U.S.C. § 905(b). As Judge Garwood correctly notes in note 2 of
his dissent, the viability of Sieracki seaman status, questioned
by Judge DeMoss in his dissent, is not before us.
5
The case proceeded to trial on Coats' claims against Penrod
for negligence and unseaworthiness and against MIS for negligence,
wrongful termination of maintenance and cure, and wrongful
termination of benefits under ERISA. After the court directed a
verdict against Coats on his claim for punitive damages based on
MIS' termination of maintenance and cure, the jury returned a
verdict for Coats, assessing damages of $925,000 and assigning 20%
fault to Coats, 20% to Penrod, and 60% to MIS. The court reduced
the award by Coats' comparative fault to $740,000 and entered
judgment against Penrod and MIS jointly and severally. The court
also awarded costs to Coats in the amount of $7,889.04. In
addition, the court awarded Coats $26,524.82 in penalties against
MIS alone for its wrongful nonpayment of benefits as required by
ERISA. MIS did not contest on appeal its liability under ERISA for
benefits payable to Coats under his contract of employment. All
parties appealed.
In this opinion we address only the choice of law issue and
Penrod's proposal for modified joint liability. The portions of
the panel opinion addressing personal jurisdiction over MIS (Part
II), see Coats, 5 F.3d at 881-85; forum non conveniens (Part IV),
see id. at 889; and Coats' cross-appeal (Part VI), see id. at 890-
92, are reinstated.
II. CHOICE OF LAW
A. Subject Matter Jurisdiction in Admiralty
Turning to the district court's application of United States
law, MIS first argues that the choice of law is between the law of
6
the United Arab Emirates and Mississippi law, rather than the
general maritime law. This conclusion rests on the contention that
the district court lacked subject matter jurisdiction in admiralty,
and therefore, the only basis for federal jurisdiction is
diversity. If so, the district court should have applied
Mississippi's choice of law rules in deciding between foreign and
state law. See Klaxon Co. v. Stentor Elec. Mfg. Co., Inc., 313
U.S. 487, 496 (1941); Erie R.R. Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U.S. 64
(1938).3 MIS asserts that Mississippi would apply the law of the
United Arab Emirates to this case.4
MIS argues that the activity giving rise to Coats' accident
does not have a sufficient connection to traditional maritime
activity to support admiralty tort jurisdiction. See Jerome B.
Grubart, Inc. v. Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co., 115 S. Ct. 1043,
1048 (1995); Sisson v. Ruby, 497 U.S. 358, 365 (1990); Foremost
Ins. Co. v. Richardson, 457 U.S. 668, 674 (1982); Executive Jet
Aviation, Inc. v. Cleveland, 409 U.S. 249, 268 (1972). While this
circuit formerly applied a multi-factor approach to determine
whether there was a substantial relationship to traditional
maritime activity, see, e.g., Kelly v. Smith, 485 F.2d 520, 525
3
Mississippi follows the Restatement (Second) approach which
requires application of the law of the place of injury, absent a
more significant relationship with another state. Mitchell v.
Craft, 211 So. 2d 509, 515 (Miss. 1968).
4
Penrod has not joined MIS in this argument, apparently
because Penrod's claim for contribution or indemnity against MIS
is based on general maritime law. If the law of the United Arab
Emirates is not applicable, Penrod may prefer to have general
maritime law apply rather than Mississippi law.
7
(5th Cir. 1973), cert. denied, 416 U.S. 969 (1974), that approach
was rejected by the Supreme Court in Grubart. According to
Grubart, the "connection" inquiry for admiralty tort jurisdiction
involves two inquiries. A court must first "assess the general
features of the type of incident involved to determine whether the
incident has a potentially disruptive impact on maritime commerce."
Grubart, 115 S. Ct. at 1048 (citations omitted) (internal
quotations omitted). Second, a court must determine "whether the
general character of the activity giving rise to the incident shows
a substantial relationship to traditional maritime activity." Id.
(citations omitted) (internal quotations omitted). For this second
inquiry, we ask "whether a tortfeasor's activity, commercial or
noncommercial, on navigable waters is so closely related to
activity traditionally subject to admiralty law that the reasons
for applying special admiralty rules would apply in the case at
hand." Id. at 1051.
MIS performs repair and maintenance services for oilfield and
marine vessels. Penrod is engaged in offshore oil drilling.
Penrod contracted with MIS because Rig 69 needed pressure testing
before its next drilling operation. As to the first "connection"
inquiry, the incident can be described in general terms as an
injury to a worker while repairing and maintaining a jack-up rig in
navigable waters. Without a doubt, worker injuries, particularly
to those involved in repair and maintenance, can have a disruptive
impact on maritime commerce by stalling or delaying the primary
activity of the vessel. As to the second inquiry, the repair and
8
maintenance of a jack-up drilling rig on navigable waters is
certainly a traditional maritime activity. Moreover, we note that
this tort occurred aboard a vessel on navigable waters. Providing
compensation for shipboard injuries is a traditional function of
the admiralty laws. See Sisson, 497 U.S. at 368-75 (Scalia, J.,
concurring) (arguing that all vessel-related torts fall within the
admiralty jurisdiction). Thus, the activity giving rise to Coats'
accident has a sufficient connection to traditional maritime
activity to support exercise of our admiralty tort jurisdiction.
MIS' reliance on Sohyde Drilling & Marine Co. v. Coastal Gas
Producing Co., 644 F.2d 1132 (5th Cir. 1981), is misplaced. There,
we applied the Kelly factors and concluded that admiralty
jurisdiction was lacking in a suit for property damage arising from
the blowout of a high-pressure gas well located in a dead-end canal
slip in Louisiana. Coastal, the operator of the well, had hired
Sohyde to perform workover operations to correct a loss of
production. While denying jurisdiction over the property damage at
issue, the court remarked that claims for personal injury suffered
on navigable waters would certainly fall within admiralty. Id. at
1136-37. Therefore, Sohyde actually supports the exercise of
admiralty jurisdiction in this case, one involving only personal
injury. MIS' arguments are without merit.
B. The Lauritzen-Rhoditis Factors
The Lauritzen-Rhoditis factors govern the choice of law: (1)
the place of the wrongful act; (2) the law of the flag; (3) the
allegiance or domicile of the injured worker; (4) the allegiance of
9
the defendant shipowner; (5) the place of the contract; (6) the
inaccessibility of the foreign forum; (7) the law of the forum; and
(8) the shipowner's base of operations. Hellenic Lines, Ltd. v.
Rhoditis, 398 U.S. 306, 308-09 (1970); Lauritzen v. Larsen, 345
U.S. 571, 583-91 (1953). "The test is not a mechanical one in
which the court simply counts the relevant contacts; instead, the
significance of each factor must be considered within the
particular context of the claim and the national interest that
might be served by the application of United States law." Fogleman
v. Aramco, 920 F.2d 278, 282 (5th Cir. 1991). "The significance of
each factor in a nontraditional maritime context like offshore oil
production may vary from that in the traditional shipping context
in which the Lauritzen-Rhoditis test arose." Id.; see also Bailey
v. Dolphin Int'l, Inc., 697 F.2d 1268, 1275 (5th Cir. 1983)
(involving a jack-up drilling rig); Cuevas v. Reading & Bates
Corp., 770 F.2d 1371 (5th Cir. 1985) (same); Jack L. Albritton,
Choice of Law in a Maritime Personal Injury Setting: The Domestic
Jurisprudence, 43 La. L. Rev. 879 (1983) (discussing the difference
between "bluewater" and "brownwater" cases). The place of the
wrongful act, the allegiance or domicile of the injured, and the
place of the contract, which are less important in the shipping
context, are more significant in nontraditional cases such as this
one. Chiazor v. Transworld Drilling Co., 648 F.2d 1015, 1019 (5th
Cir. 1981). Our review of the district court's decision to apply
United States law is de novo. See, e.g., Fogleman, 920 F.2d at
282.
10
The first factor is the place of the wrongful act. Coats'
accident occurred in the territorial waters of the United Arab
Emirates, and because this is a nontraditional maritime case, this
factor is entitled to considerable weight.
The second factor is the law of the flag. "The law of the
flag has traditionally been of cardinal importance in determining
the law applicable to maritime cases." Id. (citing Lauritzen, 345
U.S. at 583-84). MIS is not a shipowner and therefore this factor
has no specific application to it. Penrod's Rig 69 flew the United
States flag. Penrod argues that the flag of the vessel in this
case is fortuitous, because Coats was assigned to six different
drilling rigs with different owners and allegiances. The record
indicates that in addition to the PENROD 69, Coats worked aboard
the MARESK VICTORY, the TRIDENT III, the TRANSOCEAN V, the W.T.
ADAMS, and the SEDCO 91. Penrod, however, does not say what flag
each of these vessels flew and we are unable to find this
information in the record. We cannot conclude that Coats' injury
aboard a United States flag vessel, as opposed to a vessel
registered in another country, was fortuitous without knowing what
flags these other rigs flew.
The third factor is the allegiance or domicile of the
plaintiff. Coats is a United States citizen, and despite his move
overseas, he maintained his residence in Mississippi, where MIS
agreed to fly him for his vacations, and where he returned after
the accident. Indeed, MIS purchased insurance to pay costs of
"repatriation" in the event of an accident. Nevertheless,
11
defendants contend that Coats' domicile was in the United Arab
Emirates. They argue that he moved to that country with the intent
to remain because his job with MIS was for an indefinite term and
one is generally domiciled where he works. In Fogleman, however,
the plaintiff was a Louisiana resident who had worked in Saudi
Arabia for eight years, and we determined his domicile to be in the
United States. Coats is, a fortiori, domiciled in the United
States.
Fourth is the allegiance of the defendant shipowner. Penrod's
allegiance is without question to the United States. Rig 69 flies
the United States flag and Penrod's principal place of business is
Dallas, Texas. MIS is not a shipowner, but we still take into
account its organization under the laws of the United Arab
Emirates.
The place of the contract is the fifth factor, and another
that is here entitled to weight. As the district court stated,
Coats apparently executed an Arabic contract in the United Arab
Emirates for the purpose of obtaining a work visa; however, the
parties agreed to all of the contract terms in Mississippi. Thus,
as the district court clearly found, Coats' employment contract was
formed in Mississippi, and this factor favors United States law.
Cf. Fogleman, 920 F.2d at 283 (noting that plaintiff signed all
eight of his contracts in Saudi Arabia).
The sixth factor, inaccessibility of the forum, is only
relevant to forum non conveniens. Lauritzen, 345 U.S. at 589-90.
12
The seventh factor is the law of the forum; here, general maritime
law. Fogleman, 920 F.2d at 283.
The final factor is the base of operations. In the
nontraditional context, we have held that "'it is the base from
which the rig is operated on a day-to-day basis rather than the
base of operations of the corporate or ultimate owner of the rig
which is important for choice of law purposes.'" Id. at 284
(quoting Bailey, 697 F.2d at 1275 n.22). Penrod has a local office
in the United Arab Emirates to assist in the operation of Rig 69.
The record shows that this office is occupied by the rig
superintendent who frequently communicates with Penrod's office in
Dallas, Texas by facsimile. We addressed a similar situation in
Bailey. There, the local office in Singapore "was in daily contact
with the Houston office by telex or telephone, usually providing it
with drilling reports." 697 F.2d at 1271 n.6. In addition, "the
day-to-day decisions respecting the activities and operations of
the [rig] were made by [the area manager] or [the rig manager and
drilling superintendent] or by personnel on the rig." Id. We
nevertheless agreed that the base of operations was not in the
United States. Id. at 1274. Therefore, we are constrained to find
that Penrod's base of operations for purposes of this case is in
the United Arab Emirates. MIS' base of operations is also in the
United Arab Emirates; it has no offices anywhere else. Despite the
business it conducts through Lee's in the United States and the
fact that it has a substantial number of American employees, its
day-to-day operations are conducted in the United Arab Emirates.
13
Considering these factors and weighing them in this offshore
oil drilling context, we agree with the district court's decision
to apply general maritime law. Of the factors deemed more
significant in this context, only the place of the wrongful act
favors foreign law; the allegiance of the plaintiff and the place
of contract refer us to United States law. The law of the flag and
the allegiance of the defendant shipowner also point to United
States law. In short, the United States has a greater interest in
applying its law to this case than the United Arab Emirates. Coats
was recruited in the United States, accepted the job while in this
country, was supervised by American employees, suffered injury
aboard an American vessel, and was flown home to recover. After
his return, MIS willfully terminated benefits due Coats under
ERISA, resulting in liability that it never questioned on appeal.
See Albritton, Choice of Law, supra (noting the unlikelihood of
courts denying the benefit of American maritime law to an American
citizen who is recruited to work overseas and does not give up his
permanent United States residence).
Prior cases are less instructive in such a fact-specific
inquiry as here. Regardless, our decision today is consistent with
precedent. With one exception, our decisions involving
nontraditional, "brownwater" vessels have involved a foreign
plaintiff injured off the coast of a foreign country seeking the
protections of American law. We have uniformly rebuffed these
attempts. See, e.g., Cuevas v. Reading & Bates Corp., 770 F.2d
1371 (5th Cir. 1985); Koke v. Phillips Petroleum Co., 730 F.2d 211
14
(5th Cir. 1984); Bailey v. Dolphin Int'l, Inc., 697 F.2d 1268 (5th
Cir. 1983); Vaz Borralho v. Keydril Co., 696 F.2d 379 (5th Cir.
1983); Chiazor v. Transworld Drilling Co., 648 F.2d 1015 (5th Cir.
1981).
The one exception is Fogleman, where we refused to allow an
American plaintiff to sue under United States law for an injury
that occurred in Saudi Arabia. Fogleman, a Louisiana resident,
went to work for Fluor Arabia in Saudi Arabia. He applied for the
job by completing a "Foreign Employment Application" and mailing it
to Saudi Arabia. Fluor Arabia is a subsidiary of Fluor
Corporation, a Delaware corporation with its principal place of
business in California, but is only authorized to do business in
Saudi Arabia. Fogleman worked under a series of eight one-year
contracts, all signed in Saudi Arabia, and lived aboard a boat
flying the Saudi Arabian flag. Fluor Arabia had a contract with
ARAMCO, and pursuant to that contract, Fluor Arabia assigned
Fogleman to work with ARAMCO. Fogleman sustained a sharp pain in
his chest while transferring from an oil platform to a workboat
that flew the Panamanian flag and later suffered a heart attack,
allegedly caused by excessive work hours aboard ARAMCO's oil
platform. Fogleman sued ARAMCO and Fluor Arabia, and we affirmed
the district court's application of Saudi Arabian law to ARAMCO and
Fluor Corporation. 920 F.2d at 281.
The contacts with the United States in Fogleman were not as
strong as in this case. The vessels involved did not fly the
United States flag, and all of the plaintiffs' contracts were
15
signed in the foreign country. Moreover, the allegiance of both
defendants was foreign. Id. at 282-83. "[T]he only significant
factor pointing to the application of United States law [was] the
domicile of the plaintiff." Id. at 284. We are persuaded that the
connections with the United States in this case are substantial and
require a different result than Fogleman.
III. JOINT AND SEVERAL LIABILITY Penrod argues
that traditional joint and several liability, under which even a
contributorily-negligent plaintiff may recover his entire damages
award from any defendant held to be partially responsible, has no
place in a world where comparative negligence is the norm. Penrod
points out that under the present scenario, Coats, who was found by
the jury to be 20% responsible for his injuries, will be able to
satisfy 100% of his judgment from the equally-negligent Penrod.5
In Penrod's view, Coats should have to bear part of the risk that
the judgment against MIS, found 60% responsible for Coats'
injuries, may be wholly or partially uncollectible.6 Consequently,
Penrod seeks to modify the district court's judgment by limiting
Coats' ability to recover the entire judgment from either Penrod or
MIS in proportion to Coats' own contributory negligence. To
accomplish this change in the judgment, Penrod advocates the
5
After subtracting Coats' 20% contributory fault, the trial
court's judgment was for $740,000 jointly and severally against
Penrod and MIS. Under traditional joint and several liability
principles, Penrod -- equally as responsible as Coats (20% fault)
-- will be liable for the entire $740,000 judgment.
6
We note that no evidence of insolvency or uncollectibility
has been presented in this case.
16
adoption of modified joint liability in the general maritime law.
According to Penrod, the modified joint liability proposal is a
fairer allocation of the responsibility of each party, and is
consistent with developments in the state law that have abolished
or modified traditional joint and several liability. To understand
why we reject the invitation to adopt modified joint liability, we
must begin by understanding the changes that the proposal would
work in the general maritime law.
A. Understanding the Proposal
Penrod's modified joint liability proposal adopts an approach
advocated sixty years ago by Charles O. Gregory, a professor of law
at the University of Chicago. See Charles O. Gregory, Legislative
Loss Distribution in Negligence Actions, 77-79, 142-48 (1936).
Judge Garwood in turn advocated Professor Gregory's approach, using
the example of a three-car accident in which all three parties --
plaintiff A, defendant B, and defendant C -- are equally at fault:
"the risk that C will not compensate plaintiff A . . . is borne by
A and B in the respective ratios that the fault of each of them
bears to the total fault of both." Simeon v. T. Smith & Son, Inc.,
852 F.2d 1421, 1436-48 (5th Cir. 1988) (Garwood, J., concurring in
part and dissenting in part), cert. denied, 490 U.S. 1106 (1989).
The court would divide B's negligence by A's and B's combined
negligence (A + B) to calculate the extent of B's maximum
liability, which in this hypothesis would be 50%, or 33% / 66%.
Thus, at a maximum, A can collect from B half of the damages
awarded -- rather than the two-thirds A would have been able to
17
collect from B under traditional joint and several liability. B
would then have a contribution claim against C for that amount of
the judgment it actually pays over its 1/3 share of fault.
The jury here awarded total damages of $925,000 and found the
plaintiff, Coats, to be 20% responsible, Penrod to be 20%
responsible, and MIS to be 60% responsible. The adoption of
Penrod's modified joint liability proposal would provide Coats with
a judgment that includes a joint liability component and a several
liability component against each defendant.7 Penrod's proposal
would work as follows:
Penrod's maximum liability would be $462,500:
20 X 925,000
20 + 20
(Penrod's negligence divided by the sum of Penrod's and Coats'
negligence, multiplied by the total damages award)
Similarly, MIS' maximum liability would be $693,750:
60 X 925,000
20 + 60
(MIS' negligence divided by the sum of MIS' and Coats'
negligence, multiplied by the total damages award)
The trial court would then subtract MIS' maximum liability
($693,750) from the amount Coats can collect ($740,000)8 to arrive
at $46,250 for which Penrod is solely liable. This $46,250 figure
7
The formula for calculating the joint liability component
and the several liability components can be algebraically
expressed. See Simeon, 852 F.2d at 1449 n.2 (King, J., specially
concurring).
8
Coats is 20% contributorily negligent. Thus, even though
the total damages award is $925,000, Coats' maximum recovery is
$740,000 (80% of the total damages).
18
is Penrod's several liability component. Similarly, when Penrod's
maximum liability ($462,500) is subtracted from the total amount
that Coats can collect ($740,000), MIS is solely liable for
$277,500 of the judgment. This $277,500 figure is MIS' several
component. Finally, Penrod's and MIS' joint liability component
($416,250) is calculated by subtracting the sum of Penrod's sole
liability ($46,250) and MIS' sole liability ($277,500) from Coats'
maximum overall recovery ($740,000).9
Coats could pursue Penrod for the amount of Penrod's maximum
liability ($462,500), and then seek recovery from MIS for the
remaining $277,500 ($740,000 - $462,500) that Coats can collect.
Because Penrod would have paid more ($462,500) than its 20% share
of fault ($185,000),10 Penrod would have a contribution claim
against MIS for the extra $277,500 ($462,500 - $185,000) in damages
that it paid over to Coats. Similarly, Coats could pursue MIS for
the amount of MIS' maximum liability ($693,750), and then seek
recovery from Penrod for the remaining $46,250 ($740,000 -
9
Note that the sum of the joint liability component and the
several liability components should equal the plaintiff's maximum
overall recovery. In this case, $416,250 (joint component) +
$46,250 (Penrod's several component) + $277,500 (MIS' several
component) = $740,000 (Coats' maximum recovery).
Similarly, the sum of the joint liability component and an
individual defendant's several liability component should equal
that defendant's maximum liability. For example, $416,250 (joint
component) + $46,250 (Penrod's several component) = $462,500
(Penrod's maximum liability). In the same manner, $416,250
(joint component) + $277,500 (MIS' several component) = $693,750
(MIS' maximum liability).
10
Penrod's 20% share of fault is calculated by multiplying
Coats' total damages award ($925,000) by twenty percent.
19
$693,750) that Coats can collect. Because MIS would have paid more
than its 60% share of fault ($555,000),11 MIS would have a
contribution claim against Penrod for the extra $138,750 ($693,750
- $555,000) in damages that it paid over to Coats.
The modified joint liability proposal benefits defendants.
Penrod would be liable for $740,000 under traditional joint and
several liability, but only for $462,500 under modified joint
liability. On the other hand, the proposal hurts plaintiffs,
because full recovery of damages is harder to get under modified
joint liability than under the traditional scheme. Mathematically,
"[s]ince a defendant's joint liability would become defined by a
sum which is less than the total amount of the defendants' combined
liabilities, a plaintiff could recover the total amount he is owed
only by enforcing the judgment against each and every defendant."
Simeon, 852 F.2d at 1449 (King, J., specially concurring). It also
goes without saying that the plaintiff will have to expend
additional effort and money to collect the award from two different
defendants, a circumstance which becomes more expensive with each
additional co-defendant. Furthermore, in the event that one
defendant is statutorily immune, insolvent, or otherwise judgment-
proof, the plaintiff will receive less than his total recoverable
damages as found by the trier-of-fact, even if he recovers against
all remaining defendants. For example, at best, Coats would
receive only 63% of his maximum recovery ($462,500 / $740,000) if
11
MIS' 60% share of fault is calculated by multiplying
Coats' total damages award ($925,000) by sixty percent.
20
MIS is insolvent or otherwise judgment-proof. Although there is no
evidence of insolvency or uncollectibility in the case before us,
Penrod and the proponents of modified joint liability justify this
result by arguing that a partially-negligent plaintiff, such as
Coats, should bear part of the risk of noncollection, rather than
placing the entire burden upon the defendants.12
12
Judge Garwood's position has evolved somewhat over the
years since Simeon. In his partial dissent in Simeon, and in his
dissent here, Judge Garwood develops his modified joint liability
proposal by devising a joint liability component and a several
liability component for each defendant. We have always proceeded
under the assumption that resort to the joint and several
components is necessary to the operation of his proposal.
Likewise, we have always proceeded under the assumption that a
plaintiff can only recover the total amount that he is owed by
enforcing the judgment against each and every defendant. Indeed,
in his dissent, Judge Garwood states that "Apportionment of
Liability also notes that the Simeon dissent approach requires
`the plaintiff to pursue enforcement of the judgment against all
solvent defendants in order to recover the full amount.'" Judge
Garwood does not dispute this assessment, but merely notes that
Apportionment of Liability "does not expressly characterize this
as undesirable."
In his present dissent, Judge Garwood tells us, however,
that "it will always suffice to simply provide in the judgment a
maximum amount which may be collected from each particular
defendant," and he implies that reference to the components, and
to the complex formulas that form the basis for calculating these
components, is unnecessary.
Judge Garwood's new position, however, is simply incorrect
in a situation (common in maritime personal injury cases) where
there are more than two defendants. In this situation, if there
is no problem of insolvency or uncollectibility, then a judgment
specifying only a maximum amount of liability and a proportionate
share of fault for each defendant will suffice. If, however,
there are more than two defendants, at least two of which are
solvent and at least one of which is insolvent (e.g., three
defendants, only one of which becomes insolvent), then the
plaintiff, because he can only achieve full recovery by
collecting each defendant's several component and one
satisfaction of the joint component, will need to know the
several liability of each solvent defendant. Furthermore, each
solvent defendant will want to know the amount that it is solely
21
B. The Case for Modified Joint Liability
Penrod asserts that modified joint liability should be adopted
for two basic reasons. First, Penrod argues, the traditional rule
of joint and several liability was not intended to apply to a
contributorily-negligent plaintiff. As Penrod sees it, the removal
of the requirement that the plaintiff be wholly innocent has
unfairly allowed a contributorily negligent plaintiff to recover
the entire judgment from a defendant whose fault is minuscule.
Second, Penrod notes that the general maritime law has been
responsive to changes in the common law and to legislative
enactments. In light of the modifications to joint and several
liability enacted by many states, Penrod argues that admiralty
courts should change the general maritime law to respond to these
developments. We disagree with both of these contentions.
1. The traditional rule of joint and several liability
The traditional rule of joint and several liability can be
traced back to eighteenth century England and the case of Hill v.
Goodchild, 98 Eng. Rep. 465, 5 Buff. 2790 (K.B. 1771). The rule
liable for, i.e., its several component, so that it does not
overpay the plaintiff at this pre-contribution stage.
Similarly, if the plaintiff has fully recovered before one
of the defendants becomes insolvent (i.e., post-collection, but
pre-contribution), the defendant that paid the joint component
will want to know the insolvent defendant's several component
such that it can be recovered from the overpaid plaintiff.
Otherwise the risk of noncollection is disproportionately borne
(vastly so) by the defendant that paid the joint component.
In summary, there is no way to avoid the computation of the
joint and several components of each defendant's liability, and
consequently, there is no way to avoid the complexity of the
formulas included in Judge Garwood's dissent.
22
was derived from the principle that a cause of action was
"unitary," and therefore, apportionment of damages by the jury was
not permitted. See W. Page Keeton et al., Prosser and Keeton on
The Law of Torts § 46, at 323 & n.5 (5th ed. 1984) [hereinafter
"Prosser & Keeton"] (collecting cases). Consequently, it was
impossible to impose upon the individual defendants anything less
than entire liability. See Larry Pressler & Kevin V. Schieffer,
Joint and Several Liability: A Case for Reform, 64 Denv. U. L.
Rev. 651, 655 (1988).
Originally, joint and several liability was confined to
situations where the joint tortfeasors acted "in concert." See
Pressler & Schieffer, supra, at 660; see also Prosser & Keeton,
supra, § 46, at 322-23. The rule was combined with the common-law
rules of procedural joinder, which were limited in application to
tortfeasors acting "in concert." Consequently, under the
restricted joinder rules, defendants could not be joined, and joint
liability could not be imposed, unless the defendants had in fact
acted together to cause the harm. This circumstance apparently led
the American courts to equate "joinder" and "joint liability." See
Pressler & Schieffer, supra, at 660; see also id. ("At common law,
the concepts of procedural joinder and joint and several liability
were indistinguishable because there could be no joinder of parties
unless it was alleged that they were jointly responsible for acts
done in concert.").
A separate rationale of imposing "entire liability" developed
alongside the concept of joint liability for those acting "in
23
concert." Under this corollary reasoning, "a defendant might be
liable for the entire loss sustained by the plaintiff, even though
the defendant's act concurred or combined with that of another
wrongdoer to produce the result or, as the courts have put it, that
the defendant is liable for all consequences proximately caused by
the defendant's wrongful act." Prosser & Keeton, supra, § 47, at
328. This notion reflected the belief that a tortfeasor should be
responsible for all consequences stemming from his actions,
regardless of the fortuitous circumstance that others may also have
contributed to the injury.
By 1876, the common-law rule of joint and several liability
was being discussed in the admiralty setting:
Nothing is more clear than the right of a plaintiff,
having suffered such a loss, to sue in a common-law
action all the wrong-doers, or any one of them, at his
election; and it is equally clear, that, if he did not
contribute to the disaster, he is entitled to judgment in
either case for the full amount of his loss. He may
proceed against all the wrong-doers jointly, or he may
sue them all or any one of them separately . . . .
Acts wrongfully done by the co-operation and joint agency
of several persons constitute all the parties wrong-
doers, and they may be sued jointly or severally; and any
one of them, said Spencer, C.J., is liable for the injury
done by all . . . .
The Atlas, 93 U.S. 302, 315 (1876). In this context, as in others,
the concern that the innocent plaintiff receive full recovery of
his damages was offered as one of the primary justifications for
joint and several liability. In fact, as we will explain, this
consideration has apparently taken on an elevated significance in
maritime law because of special concerns unique to the admiralty,
especially its role as "protector" of seamen. Joint and several
24
liability has the benefit of allowing a seaman to pursue and to
collect his entire damages award from one co-defendant when the
generally international character of his profession might make it
difficult or impossible to locate or to collect from other
tortfeasors.
Penrod argues that joint and several liability was
"historically one of two counterbalancing principles arising out of
the legal theory of the 19th Century that all parties are
responsible for all of the consequences of their negligence."
According to Penrod, the "second half" of this couplet is the
concept of contributory negligence, which at common law would cut
off all recovery for the partially-responsible plaintiff. Thus,
only a wholly-innocent plaintiff had the advantage of collecting
his entire damages award from any of the jointly liable defendants.
As Penrod argues, when the tide of comparative negligence swept the
nation, and a plaintiff's own negligence was no longer an absolute
bar to recovery, the balance of the "couplet" was destroyed. Thus,
because joint and several liability was born in the context of the
wholly-innocent plaintiff, Penrod argues that it should be limited
to that context.13
13
Penrod points out that modified joint liability would not
alter the "traditional" recovery of a wholly-innocent plaintiff.
In situations where a plaintiff is found to be without fault, his
proportionate share of fault, by definition, will be 0%. Under
modified joint liability, the defendant's proportionate share of
fault would be divided by the sum of the plaintiff's 0% and that
defendant's proportionate share of fault, yielding that
defendant's maximum liability. As Penrod illustrates, assuming a
wholly-innocent plaintiff and a defendant who is 20% at fault,
the equation is as follows:
25
In support of its position, Penrod points to The Atlas,
contending that it was the first case to adopt joint and several
liability in admiralty. See The Atlas, 93 U.S. at 314 ("[P]roof of
entire innocence or freedom from fault . . . entitles the promoter
of a suit for such a claim to full compensation for his loss from
the guilty party."). While The Atlas may have been such a
foundational case, see Edmonds v. Compagnie Generale
Transatlantique, 443 U.S. 256, 260 n.7 (1979) ("We stated the
common-law rule in The Atlas and adopted it as part of admiralty
jurisprudence . . . . "), Penrod's position is simply not
compelling because its statement of history is incomplete. The
move to comparative negligence in maritime personal injury law
occurred over a century ago with the decision in The Max Morris,
137 U.S. 1, 14-15 (1890).14 See also Socony-Vacuum Oil Co. v.
0 + 20 = 20
20 divided by 20 = 1 or 100%
Thus, the faultless plaintiff can still recover 100% of its
judgment from any of the creditworthy and non-immune defendants.
14
In The Max Morris, the Supreme Court also affirmed a lower
court's decree for divided damages. See The Max Morris, 137 U.S.
at 15. Significantly, however, the Court noted that the divided
damages issue was "the only question certified," and therefore,
the Court's jurisdiction was "limited to reviewing this
question." Id. As the Court concluded:
Whether, in a case like this, the decree should be for
exactly one-half of the damages sustained, or might, in the
discretion of the court, be for a greater or less proportion
of such damages, is a question not presented for our
determination upon this record, and we express no opinion
upon it.
Id.
26
Smith, 305 U.S. 424, 429 (1939); The Arizona v. Anelich, 298 U.S.
110, 122 (1936); Prosser & Keeton, supra, § 67, at 471 ("Outside of
admiralty, comparative negligence did not appear in American
jurisprudence until the early twentieth century."). Indeed, as
early as 1920, the rule of comparative negligence was incorporated
into the Jones Act and into the Death on the High Seas Act. See 46
U.S.C. § 688 (Jones Act); 46 U.S.C. § 766 (DOHSA); see also United
States v. Reliable Transfer Co., 421 U.S. 397, 408 n.13 (1975)
(noting that comparative negligence is applicable under the Jones
Act and under DOHSA). The move to comparative negligence, however,
did not abrogate admiralty's application of joint and several
liability, and the two doctrines have continued to work side-by-
side in the maritime law. Three Supreme Court decisions strongly
support this proposition, and Penrod points to no decision, Supreme
Court or otherwise, to the contrary.15
15
Despite Judge Garwood's reliance in dissent on Petition of
Kinsman Transit Co., 338 F.2d 708 (2d Cir. 1964), the approach
taken in Kinsman Transit is not the approach advocated by Penrod
and the dissent. In Kinsman Transit, Kinsman was one of three
liable parties, but its liability had been limited by statute.
See id. at 713. Thus, at the time of the judgment, Kinsman's
share had already been determined to be uncollectible, and the
Second Circuit reallocated Kinsman's responsibility
proportionately among the other two parties. See id. at 726.
In the instant case, however, no evidence of
uncollectibility is present in the record. Nevertheless, the
proposal advocated by Penrod and the dissent would still
"reallocate" as part of the initial judgment -- before it is
determined that Penrod's or MIS' share is uncollectible. Thus,
the dissent's proposal builds the risk of noncollection into the
judgment, disadvantaging the plaintiff regardless of whether a
defendant's share actually proves to be uncollectible. Simply
put, although the dissent maintains that Kinsman Transit "is
directly on point and should control," the approach in Kinsman
Transit fails to provide direct support for the dissent's
27
In Pope & Talbot, Inc. v. Hawn, Hawn, a carpenter, was working
for Haenn, an independent contractor, aboard Pope & Talbot's ship.
See 346 U.S. 406, 407 (1953). After suffering injuries on the
ship, Hawn brought a negligence and unseaworthiness action against
Pope & Talbot under general maritime law. Id. Pope & Talbot
impleaded Haenn and sought contribution or indemnity. The district
court rendered judgment against Pope & Talbot for 100% of the
damages less 17.5% for the proportion due to plaintiff's fault. It
also awarded contribution to Pope & Talbot for Haenn's share of
fault. See id. at 408. The court of appeals affirmed Hawn's
judgment against Pope & Talbot, but reversed the judgment of
contribution because there was no right of contribution in such
cases. See id. The Supreme Court affirmed the application of
joint and several liability even though Pope & Talbot had no right
of contribution against Haenn and even though Hawn was at fault.
In other words, the Court treated comparative fault as consistent
with traditional joint and several liability. The plaintiff was
responsible for his own share of comparative fault, but the risk of
noncollection fell on defendants, rather than on an injured victim.
proposal. Similarly, the dissent's reliance on the non-admiralty
cases of Prestenbach v. Rains, 4 F.3d 358 (5th Cir. 1993), and
Davis v. Commercial Union Insurance Co., 892 F.2d 378 (5th Cir.
1990), is also misplaced, because in those cases, the partially-
liable employer was known to be statutorily immune before
judgment was entered.
Finally, as will be discussed further, we merely note that
Kinsman Transit was decided before a series of Supreme Court
admiralty decisions concerning uniformity between the legislative
and the judicial maritime law.
28
In Edmonds v. Compagnie Generale Transatlantique, 443 U.S. 256
(1979), Edmonds, the plaintiff longshoreman, was injured on a ship
not owned by his employer stevedoring company. See id. at 258. He
received benefits from his employer under the Longshore and Harbor
Workers' Compensation Act (LHWCA), and he additionally brought a
negligence action against the shipowner under 33 U.S.C. § 905(b) --
a provision of the LHWCA added by Congress in 1972 to specifically
authorize such suits. See id. The jury apportioned the $100,000
of damages as follows: 10% to the plaintiff, 20% to the shipowner,
and 70% to the stevedoring company. The trial court reduced the
award by the amount of the plaintiff's negligence, but the court
could not permit Edmonds to recover any of the judgment from the
employer stevedoring company because the employer was not a party
to the suit, as the LHWCA had specifically limited its liability.
See id. at 261. Consequently, at the end of the day, the
shipowner, whose conduct was determined to have caused only 20% of
the harm, was held to be liable for 90% of the entire judgment --
even though it had no contribution rights against the statutorily-
immune stevedore.
The shipowner made two arguments to the Supreme Court: (1)
that in the process of specifically authorizing negligence suits
against shipowners through the LHWCA's 1972 amendments, Congress
limited a shipowner's liability to only that proportion of the
plaintiff's damages which the shipowner actually caused -- in this
case, 20%; and (2) that even if Congress did not decree
proportionate liability, the Supreme Court should, using its
29
authority to fashion the general maritime law, limit the
shipowner's liability to its proportionate share of the
longshoreman's damages.
The Supreme Court began its examination of the arguments by
remarking that "[a]dmiralty law is judge-made law to a great
extent," and by commenting that prior to 1972, a longshoreman's
negligence action against a shipowner was recognized by general
maritime law, not by statute. See id. at 259-60. As the Court
explained, prior to 1972, the general maritime law fashioned an
injured plaintiff's recovery pursuant to the principles of joint
and several liability. See id. at 260 & n.7. Importantly, the
Court made it clear that the contributory negligence of a plaintiff
had never changed the traditional rule:
As [admiralty law] had evolved by 1972, a longshoreman's
award in a suit against a negligent shipowner would be
reduced by that portion of the damages assignable to the
longshoreman's own negligence; but, as a matter of
maritime tort law, the shipowner would be responsible to
the longshoreman in full for the remainder, even if the
stevedore's negligence contributed to the injuries. This
latter rule is in accord with the common law, which
allows an injured party to sue a tortfeasor for the full
amount of damages for an indivisible injury that the
tortfeasor's negligence was a substantial factor in
causing, even if the concurrent negligence of others
contributed to the incident.
Id. at 259-60.
After establishing the state of the law prior to the LHWCA's
1972 amendments, the Court turned its attention to the amendments
themselves and to their effect on the judicially-created doctrine
of joint and several liability. An analysis of the amendments led
the Court to conclude that Congress had not upset the "long-
30
established and familiar principl[e] of maritime law by imposing a
proportionate-fault rule." Id. at 263 (internal quotation
omitted). The Court moved, therefore, to the remaining issue of
whether it should make the vessel liable only for the damages in
proportion to its own negligence when a longshoreman sues the
vessel owner for negligence under the LHWCA. See id. at 271. To
this question, the Court answered "no":
[W]e are mindful that here we deal with an interface of
statutory and judge-made law. . . . By now changing what
we have already established that Congress understood to
be the law, and did not itself wish to modify, we might
knock out of kilter this delicate balance. As our cases
advise, we should stay our hand in these circumstances.
Once Congress has relied upon conditions that the courts
have created, we are not as free as we would otherwise be
to change them. A change in the conditions would
effectively alter the statute by causing it to reach
different results than Congress envisioned.
Id. at 271-73 (citations omitted) (footnote omitted).16
16
Penrod and Judge Garwood's dissent claim that Edmonds does
not preclude the adoption of modified joint liability in this
case because Edmonds was a LHWCA statutory construction case,
whereas in the pure maritime context, the federal courts write on
a cleaner slate. See McDermott, Inc. v. AmClyde, 114 S. Ct.
1461, 1471 (1994) (stating that Edmonds "primarily" involved
interpretations of the LHWCA).
Of course, the McDermott Court did not intend to limit the
import of Edmonds to LHWCA cases because, as will be explained,
it specifically took the time to reconcile Edmonds' reaffirmation
of "the well-established principle of joint and several
liability" with the general maritime rule of proportionate
settlement credit. See id. at 1471-72. Moreover, while it is
true that Edmonds primarily focuses on the LHWCA and perhaps does
not preclude a change in the pure maritime context, the Court
clearly refers to joint and several liability, in a situation
involving a contributorily-negligent plaintiff, as the rule of
the "maritime tort law," and the Court's message, at a minimum,
appears to be that joint and several liability is still the rule
in admiralty.
More importantly, even if Edmonds is given the contended for
31
Furthermore, the Court's more recent decision in McDermott,
Inc. v. AmClyde, 114 S. Ct. 1461 (1994), again recognized the
continued application of joint and several liability in the general
maritime law. At issue in McDermott was the proper method of
accounting for a settlement with certain defendants in the
calculation of the amount of a plaintiff's injuries for which non-
settling defendants could be held liable at trial. See id. at
1463. The Court adopted a "proportionate share" settlement rule
that would diminish the claim of the injured party against the
remaining defendants in proportion to the settling defendant's
share of fault, as found by the trier-of-fact. See id. at 1470-72.
The Court was persuaded that the proportionate share approach was
superior to other options, in part because it was consistent with
the Court's previous decision in United States v. Reliable Transfer
Co., 421 U.S. 397 (1975). In Reliable Transfer, the Supreme Court
adopted a rule requiring the assessment of damages on the basis of
proportionate fault, and the Court abandoned a century-old "divided
damages" rule, whereby property damages were divided equally among
co-defendants, primarily in collision cases, without regard to
their relative degrees of fault. See id. at 410-11.
narrow construction, the Edmonds Court reaffirmed traditional
joint and several liability in the LHWCA context. As will be
explained in Part III(C)(1), when considering an analogous rule
for the general maritime law, the Supreme Court has expressed a
desire for harmony with statutes such as the LHWCA. Thus, even
when given a narrow construction, Edmonds' embrace of traditional
joint and several liability in the LHWCA context counsels us to
maintain traditional joint and several liability in the general
maritime law.
32
The respondents in McDermott argued that the proportionate
share approach was inconsistent with the Court's earlier decision
in Edmonds, as joint and several liability was applied in Edmonds,
and no reduction in the shipowner's judgment was made for the
proportionate fault attributed to the stevedore. See McDermott,
114 S. Ct. at 1471. In rejecting the argument, the McDermott Court
noted that Edmonds was "primarily" a LHWCA statutory construction
case, but the Court also observed that:
one can read [Edmonds] as merely reaffirming the well-
established principle of joint and several liability. As
the Court pointed out, that principle was in no way
abrogated by Reliable Transfer's proportionate fault
approach. . . . [T]here is no tension between joint and
several liability and a proportionate share approach to
settlements. Joint and several liability . . . can
result in one defendant's paying more than its
apportioned share of liability when the plaintiff's
recovery from other defendants is limited by factors
beyond the plaintiff's control, such as a defendant's
insolvency. . . . Unlike the rule in Edmonds, the
proportionate share rule announced in this opinion only
applies when there has been a settlement. In such cases,
the plaintiff's recovery against the settling defendants
has been limited not by outside forces, but by its own
agreement to settle. There is no reason to allocate the
shortfall to the other defendants, who were not parties
to the settlement.
114 S. Ct. at 1471-72 (footnotes omitted) (emphasis added). It is
worth repeating that the Court specifically recited that the
principle of joint and several liability "was in no way abrogated
by Reliable Transfer's proportionate fault approach," thus treating
joint and several liability and proportionate fault as compatible
in admiralty. Id. at 1471.
Numerous lower court decisions also recognize that joint and
several liability is the maritime rule, even when the case involves
33
a contributorily-negligent plaintiff. See, e.g., Drake Towing Co.
v. Meisner Marine Constr. Co., 765 F.2d 1060, 1063, 1067 (11th Cir.
1985) (stating, in a maritime tort case involving the Suits in
Admiralty Act, that a contributorily-negligent plaintiff "may
recover its entire damages, less that proportion attributable to
its own fault, from the United States," even though the United
States was only 20% at fault while another defendant was 60% at
fault); Gele v. Chevron Oil Co., 574 F.2d 243, 245, 250-51 (5th
Cir. 1978) (stating, in a general maritime lawsuit, that the
plaintiff's own negligence "would not bar recovery of damages" and
that the plaintiff has a "right to collect all his damages from one
party in the event he is unable to obtain the relative portion of
damages from each party at fault"); see also Maritime Comparative
Responsibility Act as Referred to House Committee on Judiciary,
§ 2, H.R. 3318, 102d Cong., 1st Sess. (1992) comments, reprinted in
2 Benedict on Admiralty § 7, at 1-35 (7th ed. 1994) ("The existing
maritime rule of joint-and-several liability of joint tortfeasors
continues to apply under this Act. This is true whether the
claimant was contributorily negligent or not."); 1 Thomas J.
Schoenbaum, Admiralty and Maritime Law § 5-5, at 167 (2d ed. 1994)
("The adoption of comparative fault has not affected the well
established rule that there is joint and several liability in
admiralty tort actions."); cf. Empire Seafoods, Inc. v. Anderson,
398 F.2d 204, 217 & n.21 (5th Cir.) (observing that with regard to
the divided damages rule for mutual fault, "[t]he authorities state
the rule in terms of `innocent third parties.'. . . [W]e are
34
convinced that the reduction of [the contributorily-negligent
plaintiffs'] respective recoveries under the comparative negligence
doctrine is to be considered full penalty for their fault and that
they must, thereafter, be treated in the same manner as `innocent
third parties.'"), cert. denied, 393 U.S. 983 (1968).17
17
We note that substantially all of Judge Garwood's dissent
is directed to supporting the startling proposition that joint
and several liability is not the existing rule in maritime
personal injury cases. The dissent admits that its efforts are
directed to making the simple point "that the issue is
essentially open," and it argues that the "longstanding general
maritime rule" is that even an innocent plaintiff who is
"personally injured in an accident . . . recovers judgment
initially from each defendant for only half his damages, and can
go beyond that as to each only by first showing his (plaintiff's)
inability to collect from the other defendant the latter's half."
Despite the dissent's heroic efforts to distinguish
precedent, its position simply defies reality. The dissent
focuses on nineteenth century collision settings rather than
maritime personal injury cases, and it is beyond dispute that
joint and several liability is the rule in maritime personal
injury cases. See Edmonds, 443 U.S. at 259-60 ("As [admiralty
law] had evolved by 1972, a longshoreman's award in a suit
against a negligent shipowner would be reduced by that portion of
the damages assignable to the longshoreman's own negligence; but,
as a matter of maritime tort law, the shipowner would be
responsible to the longshoreman in full for the remainder, even
if the stevedore's negligence contributed to the injuries."
(emphasis added)); id. at 271 ("Congress did not intend to change
the judicially-created rule that the shipowner can be made to pay
all the damages not due to the plaintiff's own negligence . . . .
" (emphasis added)); McDermott, 114 S. Ct. at 1471 ("[O]ne can
read that opinion [Edmonds] as merely reaffirming the well-
established principle of joint and several liability." (emphasis
added)); see also Maritime Comparative Responsibility Act as
Referred to House Committee on Judiciary, § 2, H.R. 3318, 102d
Cong., 1st Sess. (1992) comments, reprinted in 2 Benedict on
Admiralty § 7, at 1-35 (7th ed. 1994) ("The existing maritime
rule of joint-and-several liability of joint tortfeasors
continues to apply under this Act. This is true whether the
claimant was contributorily negligent or not." (emphasis added));
1 Thomas J. Schoenbaum, Admiralty and Maritime Law § 5-5, at 167
(2d ed. 1994) ("The adoption of comparative fault has not
affected the well established rule that there is joint and
several liability in admiralty tort actions." (emphasis added)).
35
In addition, Penrod's characterization of the contributory
negligence bar and joint and several liability as a couplet ignores
the important fact that the principles of contribution and
indemnity were also developed as a procedural means to counteract
the danger that one defendant would be unduly burdened. See Marie
R. Yeates et al., Contribution and Indemnity in Maritime
Litigation, 30 S. Tex. L. Rev. 215, 217 (1989). Contribution
principles distribute a loss "by requiring each tortfeasor to pay
that proportion of the damages attributable to his actions." Id.
Indemnity "permits one tortfeasor to shift all of the loss onto
another tortfeasor if it is determined that the latter should
rightfully answer for all of the plaintiff's damages." Id. Both
contribution and indemnity provide a mechanism for apportioning the
plaintiff's damages among the tortfeasors themselves. See id.
This apportionment is designed to alleviate any unfairness
resulting from joint and several liability because the tortfeasor
paying the entire judgment can recoup some or all of the payments
from the other tortfeasors. In short, Penrod's argument that joint
Even Penrod acknowledges that joint and several liability is
the existing rule of maritime personal injury law. Penrod asks
us to change the general maritime law to "replace" joint and
several liability with "modified joint liability." Indeed, it
frames its first issue as "[w]hether the doctrine of joint and
several liability should be retained in maritime law" (emphasis
added). Simply put, as recognized by the Supreme Court, maritime
lawyers, commentators in the field, and the appellant itself, the
issue is not open: joint and several liability is the rule in
maritime personal injury cases.
Thus, Penrod and the dissent ask us to change the existing
law of maritime personal injury to adopt a proposal that no
jurisdiction has yet to adopt. As we explain, granting such a
request is neither authorized nor prudent.
36
and several liability is reserved only for innocent plaintiffs is
plainly inconsistent with the accepted practice of the maritime
law.
2. Signals from the states
Admiralty courts have historically been responsive to common-
law developments and to legislative enactments. See, e.g., Moragne
v. States Marine Lines, 398 U.S. 375, 392 (1970). In Moragne, for
example, the Supreme Court created a general maritime wrongful
death cause of action after observing that federal and state law
had changed to allow recovery for wrongful death. See id. at 390-
93, 401.
It is also true that the Supreme Court has been willing to
forge a general maritime position when no wholesale consensus has
developed. In McDermott, the Court noted that no uniform consensus
had developed for an approach to the issue of settlement credits,
but the Court went on to evaluate and to choose from the three
"principal" alternatives identified by the American Law Institute.
See McDermott, 114 S. Ct. at 1465-67. Nevertheless, on more than
one occasion, the Supreme Court has counseled against the adoption
of a distinctly minority view. See id. at 1466 n.8 ("We are
unwilling to consider a rule that has yet to be applied in any
jurisdiction."); Miles v. Apex Marine Corp., 498 U.S. 19, 35 (1990)
(noting the Court's discomfort with "adopting a distinctly minority
view," and implying that the Court prefers a more "wholesale" and
"uniform" policy judgment).
37
With these principles in mind, an examination of the state law
and model law changes to traditional joint and several liability is
striking, as the wide variety of alternatives reveals a
fragmentation in approaches far greater than the Court was
presented with in McDermott. To begin with, approximately twenty
years ago, joint and several liability was the rule in every state.
See Pressler & Schieffer, supra, at 656.18 Since that time, a
majority of the states have modified the concept, either by
substantial limitation or by outright elimination. See id. at 656-
57. Thirteen states, however, still adhere to traditional joint
and several liability.
The 1977 Uniform Comparative Fault Act adopted an approach
that begins with a joint and several judgment, but permits a
defendant to return to the court that entered the judgment to
request the court to reallocate a defendant's equitable share of
18
The Restatement (Second) of Torts incorporates traditional
principles of joint and several liability:
Each of two or more persons whose tortious conduct is a
legal cause of a single and indivisible harm to the
injured party is subject to liability to the injured
party for the entire harm.
Restatement (Second) of Torts § 875 (1979). Section 879 further
elaborates:
If the tortious conduct of each of two or more persons
is a legal cause of harm that cannot be apportioned,
each is subject to liability for the entire harm,
irrespective of whether their conduct is concurring or
consecutive.
Id. § 879. The Restatement (Second) is the latest edition, as
the Restatement (Third) on apportionment issues is presently in
the initial drafting stage.
38
the judgment -- after it is established to be uncollectible --
among the remaining tortfeasors and the contributorily-negligent
plaintiff:
Upon motion made not later than [one year] after judgment
is entered, the court shall determine whether all or part
of a party's equitable share of the obligation is
uncollectible from that party, and shall reallocate any
uncollectible amount among the other parties, including
a claimant at fault, according to their respective
percentages of fault.
Uniform Comparative Fault Act § 2(d), 12 U.L.A. 50 (Supp. 1993).
The Maritime Law Association also adopted this court-ordered
reallocation approach in the legislation that it proposed to
Congress in 1992.19 See Maritime Comparative Responsibility Act as
19
The Maritime Law Association's proposed reform appears to
have been spurred by a desire to resolve -- in a more
satisfactory manner than some courts had done -- the settlement
of claims among joint tortfeasors issue. As Benedict on
Admiralty explains:
Prior to the grant of certiorari in McDermott and
Boca Grande Club, it appeared that no uniform rule
would develop in the law relating to the settlement of
claims among joint tortfeasors in maritime personal
injury claims. Absent a ruling by the Supreme Court,
new legislation by Congress appeared the most practical
way to settle the law in this area.
The Maritime Law Association of the United States
accordingly developed a proposal in an attempt to
resolve this complicated issue. . . . The Bill died
with the end of the 1992 term. . . .
Ultimately, either Congress or the Supreme Court
will have to address the matter and resolve the
conflicting holdings of the district courts. If
McDermott and Boca Grande Club do not prove
dispositive, when decided, the proposed legislation may
be revived.
2 Benedict on Admiralty § 6, at 1-27 (7th ed. 1994) (emphasis
added).
39
Referred to House Committee on Judiciary, § 3(d), H.R. 3318, 102d
Cong., 1st Sess. (1992) comments, reprinted in 2 Benedict on
Admiralty § 8, at 1-46, 1-47 (7th ed. 1994).20 Four states employ
this post-judgment reallocation approach. See Mich. Comp. Laws
Ann. § 600.6304; Minn. Stat. Ann. § 604.02; Mo. Ann. Stat.
§ 537.067; see also Conn. Gen. Stat. Ann. § 52-572h(g) (allowing
the reallocation of uncollectible non-economic damages among all
parties and uncollectible economic damages among the remaining
defendants).
The operation of these reallocation schemes, however, differs
in crucial respects from the modified joint liability proposal
urged upon us by Penrod. Under the Uniform Comparative Fault Act,
for example, traditional joint and several liability is maintained:
The common law rule of joint-and-several liability of
joint tortfeasors continues to apply under this Act.
This is true whether the claimant was contributorily
negligen[t] or not. The plaintiff can recover the total
amount of his judgment against any defendant who is
liable.
Uniform Comparative Fault Act § 2, 12 U.L.A. 50 (Supp. 1993)
(comment). The Maritime Law Association's proposed legislation
uses similar language:
The existing maritime rule of joint-and-several liability
of joint tortfeasors continues to apply under this Act.
This is true whether the claimant was contributorily
negligent or not. The plaintiff can recover the total
Now that McDermott has explicitly resolved the settlement of
claims issue by adopting a proportionate share settlement rule,
the impetus behind the proposed legislation may have waned.
20
Although this bill died in the committee, its proposed
operation is relevant to our analysis.
40
amount of his judgment against any defendant who is
liable.
Maritime Comparative Responsibility Act as Referred to House
Committee on Judiciary, supra, § 7, at 1-35; see also Minn. Stat.
Ann. § 604.02(1) ("When two or more persons are jointly liable,
contributions to awards shall be in proportion to the percentage of
fault attributable to each, except that each is jointly and
severally liable for the whole award."); Mo. Ann. Stat.
§ 537.067(3) ("This section shall not be construed to expand or
restrict the doctrine of joint and several liability except for
reallocation as provided in subsection 2.").
More importantly, even though these schemes reallocate an
insolvent defendant's share of liability, reallocation applies only
after a party's share is determined to be uncollectible. See
Uniform Comparative Fault Act § 2(d), 12 U.L.A. 50 (Supp. 1993);
Maritime Comparative Responsibility Act as Referred to House
Committee on Judiciary, supra, § 8, at 1-46, 1-47; Conn. Gen. Stat.
Ann. § 52-572h(g); Mich. Comp. Laws Ann. § 600.6304; Minn. Stat.
Ann. § 604.02; Mo. Ann. Stat. § 537.067. In contrast, Penrod's
modified joint liability proposal would "reallocate" as part of the
initial judgment -- before it is determined that a defendant's
share is uncollectible. Thus, Penrod's proposal builds the risk of
noncollection (and the expense and delay of collection) into the
judgment, disadvantaging the plaintiff regardless of whether a
defendant's share actually proves to be uncollectible.21 This is
21
Judge Garwood's dissent states that Arizona and New
Hampshire have also adopted similar reallocation approaches. We
41
particularly noteworthy in the instant case, where no evidence of
insolvency or uncollectibility is present in the record. The rule
proposed by Penrod severs the principle of joint and several
liability from its collectibility moorings in a manner that no
state, uniform law, or even the Maritime Law Association, has
embraced.22
note, however, that these states reallocate only after a party's
share is determined to be uncollectible, and, at least in New
Hampshire, such reallocation occurs only among defendants. See
N.H. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 507:7-E (III) ("Upon motion filed not
later than 60 days after final judgment is entered, the court
shall determine whether all or part of a defendant's
proportionate share of the obligation is uncollectible from that
defendant and shall reallocate any uncollectible amount among the
other defendants according to their proportionate shares."
(emphasis added)); cf. Ariz. Rev. Stat. § 12-2508 ("If a
contribution share is totally or partially uncollectible, the
court shall redetermine the contribution shares of the other
tortfeasors . . . . " (emphasis added)).
22
It is argued that footnotes thirty-one and thirty-two of
the Supreme Court's McDermott opinion cite, with apparent
approval, § 2 of the Uniform Comparative Fault Act --
specifically, the provision of § 2 relating to "reallocation of
[an] insolvent defendant's equitable share." McDermott, 114
S. Ct. at 1471 nn.31 & 32. These references are claimed to
indicate the Supreme Court's potential willingness to embrace a
rule that places a proportionate share of the risk of one
defendant's insolvency upon the contributorily-negligent
plaintiff.
These footnote references, however, do not support the
adoption of Penrod's proposal because, under the Uniform
Comparative Fault Act, joint and several liability is maintained,
and reallocation can only occur on the motion of a party after
the initial judgment. Most importantly, however, Judge Garwood's
proposal reaches different substantive results than the Uniform
Comparative Fault Act when there are more than two defendants, at
least two of which are solvent and at least one of which is
insolvent (e.g., three defendants, one of which is insolvent).
This is because Judge Garwood's approach calculates a defendant's
share of liability based on a comparison of the responsibility of
that defendant to the combined responsibility of that defendant
and the plaintiff, while the Uniform Comparative Fault Act
calculates a defendant's reallocated share based on a comparison
42
As mentioned, aside from the reallocation schemes, there are
further approaches to the modification of joint and several
liability. Colorado, Idaho, and North Dakota, for example, have
suspended the joint and several liability principle except where
the co-defendants were "acting in concert" (or were vicariously
liable). See Colo. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 13-21-111.5; Idaho Code § 6-
803(5); N.D. Cent. Code § 32-03.2-02.
As a third approach, several states have preserved joint and
several liability only when the plaintiff is determined to be
wholly without fault. See, e.g., Ga. Code Ann. §§ 51-12-31 to -33;
Wash. Rev. Code Ann. § 4.22.070; see also Boyles v. Oklahoma
Natural Gas Co., 619 P.2d 613, 616-17 (Okla. 1980). A fourth
approach limits the application of the traditional rule to
situations where the defendant from whom satisfaction is sought
bears at least a minimum percentage of the responsibility. See,
e.g., Fla. Stat. Ann. § 768.81 (permitting the plaintiff to recover
economic damages jointly and severally only from those defendants
whose negligence is equal to or exceeds that of the plaintiff);
Iowa Code Ann. § 668.4 (allowing joint and several liability only
where a defendant's negligence exceeds 50% of the total
of the responsibility of that defendant to the combined
responsibility of that defendant, the plaintiff, and the
remaining solvent defendants.
Because of these critical distinctions, Judge Garwood's
description of his proposal as an "essentially procedural
modification to the [Uniform Comparative Fault Act] approach" is
a strained description at best. Support for the Uniform
Comparative Fault Act cannot be construed as support for modified
joint liability. The differences between them are fundamental.
43
responsibility); Mont. Code Ann. § 27-1-703 (same); Tex. Civ. Prac.
& Rem. Code Ann. § 33.013 (measuring a defendant's negligence
against total liability for some actions and against the
plaintiff's percentage responsibility for others, and permitting
joint and several liability only where a defendant's negligence
exceeds the enumerated percentages).
A fifth approach eliminates joint and several liability with
respect to non-economic damages, but maintains joint and several
liability for economic damages. See, e.g., Cal. Civ. Code
§ 1431.2; Fla. Stat. Ann. § 768.81; Ohio Rev. Code Ann. § 2315.19;
Or. Rev. Stat. § 18.485; cf. Ill. Rev. Stat., ch. 735, para. 5/2-
1117 (permitting joint and several liability for medical and
medically-related services). Due to public policy concerns, a
sixth approach preserves joint and several liability with respect
to certain enumerated causes of action. See, e.g., Ariz. Rev.
Stat. Ann. § 12-2506(D) (permitting joint and several liability
when the cause of action involves hazardous wastes); Nev. Rev.
Stat. § 41.141(5) (retaining joint and several liability for strict
liability, intentional tort, hazardous substances, and products
liability cases); N.M. Stat. Ann. § 41-3A-1 (stating that joint and
several liability is available for strict liability claims,
intentional torts, and situations "having a sound basis in public
policy"). A seventh approach eliminates joint and several
liability altogether, instead imposing pure several liability.
See, e.g., Alaska Stat. § 09.17.080(d) ("The court shall enter
judgment against each party liable on the basis of several
44
liability in accordance with that party's percentage of fault.");
Utah Code Ann. § 78-27-38(3) ("[N]o defendant is liable to any
person seeking recovery for any amount in excess of the proportion
of fault attributable to that defendant."); Wyo. Stat. § 1-1-
109(e).
Significantly, however, most of the states that modify joint
and several liability have adopted a hybrid approach by enacting
statutory schemes that incorporate more than one of the above-
mentioned trends. See, e.g., Haw. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 663-10.9
(combining limitations relating to causes of action, types of
damages, and a defendant's percentage of responsibility); Ill. Rev.
Stat., ch. 735, para. 5/2-1117 (same); Minn. Stat. Ann. § 604.02
(combining claims-related, percentage liability, and reallocation
schemes); Wash. Rev. Code Ann. § 4.22.070 (preserving joint and
several liability for tortfeasors "acting in concert" and for
wholly-innocent plaintiffs). Each scheme represents a unique blend
of policy considerations weighed by the respective state
legislatures.23
23
There are also differences in how the modifications are
accomplished among the states. For example, four states have
judicially changed or eliminated joint and several liability.
See Brown v. Keill, 580 P.2d 867, 874 (Kan. 1978); Prudential
Life Ins. Co. v. Moody, 696 S.W.2d 503, 504 (Ky. 1985); Laubach
v. Morgan, 588 P.2d 1071, 1075 (Okla. 1978); McIntyre v.
Balentine, 833 S.W.2d 52, 58 (Tenn. 1992). But see Boyles v.
Oklahoma Natural Gas Co., 619 P.2d 613, 616-17 (Okla. 1980)
(reaffirming joint and several liability when the plaintiff is
wholly innocent). The other state changes to joint and several
liability, however, have been made through the respective
legislatures.
45
From this examination, we make one important observation: no
state has adopted a modified joint liability scheme that functions
in the manner proposed by Penrod. It bears repeating that the
Supreme Court has been willing to consider positions where no
uniform consensus has developed, see McDermott, 114 S. Ct. at 1465-
67, but the Supreme Court has explicitly stated that it is
"unwilling to consider a rule that has yet to be applied in any
jurisdiction." See id. at 1466 n.8. We too are unwilling, and we
may be unauthorized, to adopt the modified joint liability proposal
urged upon us by Penrod.24
C. Other Factors Informing Our Ability to
Change General Maritime Law
1. Uniformity and "harmonization"
As noted, the general maritime law applies the century-old
doctrine of joint and several liability. Similarly, the two
principal federal maritime statutes, the LHWCA and the Jones Act,
apply joint and several liability principles as well. After
recognizing the origins of joint and several liability in the
common law and in the general maritime law, the Edmonds Court
approved the application of joint and several liability in the
context of § 905(b) actions under the LHWCA. See Edmonds, 443 U.S.
at 260 & n.7, 271-73.
24
Penrod has urged us only to adopt the previously-described
modified joint liability proposal. It has not asked us to
consider any other modifications or approaches. In addition,
although Judge Garwood's dissent argues that no decision has
explicitly considered and rejected modified joint liability, such
a widespread lack of consideration, if true, further convinces us
that adopting modified joint liability, and creating a wholesale
change in the admiralty, is unwise.
46
The doctrine of joint and several liability is crystallized in
the Jones Act context as well, although it stems from a different
source. By incorporating the remedies afforded to railway
employees under the Federal Employers' Liability Act -- with
attendant judicial glosses25 -- Congress evidenced its intention
that joint and several liability apply in Jones Act cases. See
Simeon, 852 F.2d at 1450-51 (King, J., specially concurring); see
also Cox v. Roth, 348 U.S. 207, 209 (1955) (explaining that in
drafting the Jones Act to refer to the FELA, Congress effectively
declared that "those contingencies against which Congress has
provided to ensure recovery to railroad employees should also be
met in the admiralty setting"). Specifically, section 53 of the
FELA provides that a plaintiff may recover the total amount of his
judgment less that part representing his own contributory
negligence. See 45 U.S.C. § 53. There is no exception in the Act
for cases in which one or more of the defendants fails to pay its
share. Congress, therefore, provided seamen the remedy of joint
and several liability that was prevalent at the time that the Jones
Act was adopted. See Simeon, 852 F.2d at 1450 (King, J., specially
concurring). Indeed, Penrod concedes that Congress has statutorily
declared that an injured Jones Act seaman is entitled to be made
whole with the benefit of joint and several liability. As Penrod
notes:
25
See, e.g., Gaulden v. Burlington Northern, Inc., 654 P.2d
383, 391 (Kan. 1982) ("A railroad or other carrier, under FELA,
must bear all of the loss sustained by an employee which is
caused jointly by the fault of the carrier and third persons.").
47
We do not suggest that the proposed "modified joint
liability" apply in any case where Congress has declared
that a particular class of litigant, such as the Jones
Act seaman or the Longshoremen's Act employee, is
entitled to special consideration . . . . Statutorily,
Congress has declared that injured Jones Act seam[e]n and
longshoremen with claims under 33 U.S.C. § 905(b) are to
be made whole. . . . [T]he policy established by Congress
for dealing with injured Jones Act seamen was given
controlling weight in the majority opinion in Simeon, as
well it should have been . . . .
(emphasis added).
Penrod's concession is realistic. Numerous cases have
recognized joint and several liability for Jones Act violations.
See, e.g., Joia v. Jo-Ja Serv. Corp., 817 F.2d 908, 917 (1st Cir.
1987) ("The joint and several loss allocating mechanism which
serves to provide an injured seaman his full judgment is consonant
with the policy behind the Jones Act . . . ."), cert. denied, 484
U.S. 1008 (1988); Dicola v. American Steamship Owners Mut.
Protection and Indem. Ass'n, Inc. (In re Prudential Lines, Inc.),
170 B.R. 222, 235 (S.D.N.Y. 1994) ("[U]nder the Jones Act, . . . a
tortfeasor can be held jointly and severally liable for the
entirety of the damages a seaman sustains, even if [the
tortfeasor's] negligence was minimal."); Johnson v. National Steel
& Shipbuilding Co., 742 F. Supp. 1062, 1065 (S.D. Cal. 1990)
(noting that a defendant "can be adjudged jointly and severally
liable with the cross-claimants in the cases where plaintiffs or
their decedents were seamen pursuant to the Jones Act"); Texaco,
Inc. v. Addison, 613 So.2d 1193, 1202 (Miss. 1993) (stating that
plaintiff "was a Jones Act seaman at the time of his injury and
48
[is] thus entitled to collect damages . . . from [defendants], who
are jointly and severally liable.") (emphasis added).26
Penrod's proposal would sanction a form of recovery for
general maritime law that is different from the form of recovery
under the LHWCA and the Jones Act. The present uniformity would be
replaced by a lack of uniformity among the legislative and the
judicial schemes. Such dissonance has concerned the Supreme Court
in many cases. See, e.g., Miles, 498 U.S. at 27, 33 (observing
that applicable statutes "both direct and delimit our actions" in
shaping the general maritime law, and taking action to "restore a
uniform rule applicable to all actions for the wrongful death of a
seaman, whether under DOHSA, the Jones Act, or general maritime
law" (emphasis added)); Mobil Oil Corp. v. Higginbotham, 436 U.S.
618, 624 (1978) (noting that "[a]s Moragne itself implied, DOHSA
should be the courts' primary guide as they refine the nonstatutory
death remedy, both because of the interest in uniformity and
26
Judge Garwood's dissent disagrees with our contention that
the Jones Act has been applied, in a multi-defendant context, to
incorporate traditional joint and several liability principles.
Nevertheless, Judge Garwood concedes that in Joia, a 5%
contributorily-negligent plaintiff who sued his employer under
the Jones Act and a third party under the general maritime law
was held to be entitled to judgment against the two defendants,
jointly and severally, for the remaining 95% of the plaintiff's
damages. Moreover, the dissent concedes that Gaulden stated, in
a case involving a contributorily-negligent plaintiff, that the
FELA incorporated traditional principles of joint and several
liability. Finally, the dissent dispatches as irrelevant three
other lower court cases that clearly applied principles of joint
and several liability under the Jones Act by claiming that they
did not involve a negligent plaintiff. The dissent, of course,
is unable to cite any authority to indicate that the Jones Act
applies its proposal or some other system of fault distribution
and collection.
49
because Congress' considered judgment has great force in its own
right," and allowing a coastal waters / high seas distinction in
remedies to remain in the general maritime law because "a desire
for uniformity cannot override the statute" (emphasis added)
(footnote omitted)); Moragne, 398 U.S. at 395, 401 (creating a
maritime wrongful death action to remedy "the present nonuniformity
in the effectuation of the duty to provide a seaworthy ship" that
existed between federal statutory schemes and the general maritime
law); see also American Dredging Co. v. Miller, 114 S. Ct. 981, 989
(1994) ("While there is an established and continuing tradition of
federal common lawmaking in admiralty, that law is to be developed,
insofar as possible, to harmonize with the enactments of Congress
in the field." (emphasis added)). We need not decide precisely how
far the uniformity principle extends because, given the Supreme
Court's concern with differences between the legislative and
judicial maritime law, it would be problematic, to say the least,
to accept Penrod's proposal and thereby create a lack of uniformity
among the legislative and judicial schemes in an area where
uniformity currently exists.
A different concern, namely, the concern for uniformity within
the general maritime law, produces a further complication.
Penrod's change in the general maritime law would directly affect
not only Coats-like brown water seamen who are not covered by any
federal maritime statute, but also blue water seamen -- the general
maritime law's most common plaintiff. We are therefore compelled
to address the "special solicitude" afforded to seamen and their
50
families.27 See Miles, 498 U.S. at 36; Sea-Land Serv. v. Gaudet,
414 U.S. 573, 583 (1974). The law of the sea has developed
principles unknown to the common law -- specifically, a special
solicitude for seamen, as they are considered to be the "wards of
admiralty." See, e.g., O'Donnell v. Great Lakes Dredge and Dock
Co., 318 U.S. 36, 40 (1943); Garrett v. Moore-McCormack Co., 317
U.S. 239, 246-47 (1942) (quoting Harden v. Gordon, 11 F. Cas. 480,
485 (C.C.D. Me. 1823) (No. 6047) (Story, J.)). Justice Jackson
eloquently described the rationale for affording special concern to
seamen:
From ancient times admiralty has given to seamen rights
which the common law did not give to landsmen, because
the conditions of sea service were different from
conditions of any other service, even harbor
service. . . . While his lot has been ameliorated, even
under modern conditions, the seagoing laborer suffers an
entirely different discipline and risk than does the
harbor worker. His fate is still tied to that of the
ship. His freedom is restricted.
27
The special solicitude for seaman is, of course, the
foundation for the Jones Act, perhaps the seaman's most common
form of recovery when he is injured as a result of the negligence
of his employer. See, e.g., Cox, 348 U.S. at 210 ("The extreme
harshness of the old common-law rule abating actions on the death
of the tortfeasor flies in the face of the expressed
congressional purpose to provide for `the welfare of seamen.'
The Jones Act `As welfare legislation . . . is entitled to a
liberal construction to accomplish its beneficent purposes.'").
The same solicitude applies under the general maritime law to a
seaman who may be unable to establish the predicate for a Jones
Act recovery, i.e., that his employer was negligent, but is able
to establish that his employer's vessel was unseaworthy.
Similarly, it applies under the general maritime law when the
Jones Act is inapplicable, such as when a seaman is injured
through the fault of a third party. See, e.g., Simeon, 852 F.2d
at 1423, 1454-55 (King, J., specially concurring) (recognizing
the general policy under maritime law to favor and to protect
seamen in the context of a seaman's general maritime negligence
claim against a third-party tug owner).
51
Pope & Talbot, 346 U.S. at 423-24 (Jackson, J., dissenting).
Traditional joint and several liability offers protection for
seamen. One of the realities of a complex and international
commercial maritime system is that seamen come into contact with
multi-national entities who may be difficult to find, pursue, and
collect from in the event of an injury. The ability to recover the
judgment from any one defendant, however, as provided by joint and
several liability, helps to alleviate this concern. The abolition
of joint and several liability for seamen plaintiffs travels
against the powerful current of a special protection for seamen.
Cf. Edmonds, 443 U.S. at 270 (stating that although "[s]ome
inequity appears inevitable in the present statutory scheme, [] we
find nothing to indicate and should not presume that Congress
intended to place the burden of inequity on the longshoreman whom
the [LHWCA] seeks to protect.").28 Preserving joint and several
liability for seamen plaintiffs, while modifying joint liability
for other general maritime plaintiffs, would introduce a new
disuniformity within the general maritime law.
Finally, it would be difficult to cabin Penrod's proposal for
the general maritime law in the manner suggested by Penrod -- that
its proposal would not apply to a LHWCA employee suing under §
28
Judge Garwood, in dissent, gives short-shrift to this
solicitude for plaintiff seamen, as he repeatedly asserts that
the question merely boils down to choosing the "fairest"
approach. Our response in Simeon applies equally as well today:
"[t]here exists . . . no unequivocal measure of what is
reasonable, fair, and just. Consequently, a statement that a
rule of law is reasonable, fair, or just is simply a reflection
that the rule advances a policy that the person judging the rule
advocates." 852 F.2d at 1454 (King, J., specially concurring).
52
905(b). When the Edmonds Court considered changing maritime law
applying joint and several liability in § 905(b) actions, the Court
noted that such a change "would effectively alter the [LHWCA] by
causing it to reach different results than Congress envisioned."
Edmonds, 443 U.S. at 271-73. In short, Penrod's proposal would
affect an "interface of statutory and judge-made law" -- that is,
a statute (the LHWCA) whose provisions are defined in part by
Congress and in part by the common law of admiralty. Id. at 272.
Given Edmonds, it is no answer that this case does not involve the
interface between the LHWCA and the general maritime law because
accepting Penrod's proposal will have some effect on this
interface. If the developing case law under the LHWCA does not
incorporate a change to modified joint liability, the LHWCA and the
general maritime law will be out of step. If the LHWCA does evolve
with our change, the LHWCA and the Jones Act will differ in their
recovery schemes, as the Jones Act is built upon the FELA -- not
upon the general maritime law. In either case, the proposed change
would engender uncertainty and frustrate the principles of Edmonds.
See Edmonds, 443 U.S. at 273 ("By now changing what we have already
established that Congress understood to be the law, and did not
wish itself to modify, we might knock out of kilter this delicate
balance. As our cases advise, we should stay our hand in these
circumstances." (footnote omitted)). In short, given our
uniformity and harmonization concerns, we are not inclined to adopt
53
Penrod's modified joint liability proposal for the general maritime
law.29
2. Stare decisis
Uniformity and predictability are important in admiralty, and
Moragne counsels that "[v]ery weighty considerations underlie the
principle that courts should not lightly overrule past decisions."
398 U.S. at 403.
In Moragne, the Court enunciated three factors in the stare
decisis analysis which must be weighed prior to rejection of a
longstanding rule:
[1] the desirability that the law furnish a clear guide
for the conduct of individuals, to enable them to plan
their affairs with assurance against untoward surprise;
[2] the importance of furthering fair and expeditious
adjudication by eliminating the need to relitigate every
relevant proposition in every case; and [3] the necessity
29
The McDermott Court reiterated that "`the Judiciary has
traditionally taken the lead in formulating flexible and fair
remedies in the law maritime.'" McDermott, 114 S. Ct. at 1465
(quoting Reliable Transfer, 421 U.S. at 409). It is important to
note, however, that the McDermott Court commenced its discussion
with the observation that none of the federal admiralty statutes
"imposes any limit on our authority to fashion the rules that
will best answer the question presented by this case." In
contrast, as we have explained, the federal admiralty statutes
and our concerns for uniformity and harmonization do provide some
limits on our authority to adopt modified joint liability in this
case as a new rule of the general maritime law.
Moreover, the Court's opinion in Reliable Transfer supports
the Supreme Court's "harmonization" concern by acknowledging that
"[n]o statutory or judicial precept precludes a change in the
rule of divided damages, and indeed a proportional fault rule
would simply bring recovery for property damage in maritime
collision cases into line with the rule of admiralty law long
since established by Congress . . . ." Reliable Transfer, 421
U.S. at 409 (citing the Jones Act, 46 U.S.C. § 688) (emphasis
added).
54
of maintaining public faith in the judiciary as a source
of impersonal and reasoned judgments.
398 U.S. at 403. With respect to the first factor, considered to
be "the mainstay of stare decisis," id., we recognize that the need
for predictability in the commercial maritime arena is arguably
greater than in other areas of law and commerce. This is true
because there are already numerous and inherently unpredictable
factors stemming from the perils of the sea and the continual --
and frequently fortuitous -- interaction with enterprises of other
nations. It is axiomatic that when the rules of law are clear,
parties may contract within or around their boundaries, and the
commercial system is facilitated in many ways, including reduced
litigation, more favorable insurance coverage, and overall ease of
application. This factor therefore counsels against the proposed
change. See Lewis v. Timco, 716 F.2d 1425, 1428 (5th Cir. 1983)
("The [maritime law's] values of uniformity, with their companion
quality of predictability, a prized value in the extensive
underwriting of marine risks, are best preserved by declining to
recognize a new and distinct doctrine without assuring the
completeness of its fit.").
The second factor similarly points away from the proposed
change. Our adoption of modified joint liability in this case
would promote forum shopping and would add another level of
complication to maritime litigation. Modified joint liability
would apply only to general maritime law claims, whereas
traditional joint and several liability would apply to certain
statutory claims.
55
The final strand of the Moragne inquiry affords an opportunity
for changing "a rule unjustified in reason, which produces
different results for breaches of duty in situations that cannot be
differentiated in policy." Moragne, 398 U.S. at 405. No such
situation exists here. The traditional doctrine of joint and
several liability, which preserves the right of the injured
maritime worker to recover for his injuries, represents a conscious
policy choice to shift the burden of uncollectibility to
defendants, and it has substantial justification in history. In
addition, the traditional rule currently applies uniformly to
statutory and to general maritime law claims -- producing the same
results for the same breaches of duty often entwined in maritime
litigation. In contrast, adopting modified joint liability for
general maritime law claims, or only for general maritime law
claims of non-seamen, would produce different results than the
statutory schemes for the same "tortious" conduct. Thus, the third
Moragne factor also counsels against change.
3. Deferral to legislative action
The wide spectrum of legislative enactments across the country
demonstrates the various policy objectives attainable by altering
joint and several liability. Most notable are the distinctions
based upon causes of action and types of damages. The Congress is
in a better position than a court to evaluate various policy
objectives. We are persuaded that deferring to congressional
action here is the wiser course. Even here we stand on maritime
56
tradition, for even the earliest jurists appear to have counseled
deference to the legislature:
If, within its proper scope, any change is desired in
[the] rules [of admiralty], other than those of
procedure, it must be made by the legislative department.
It cannot be supposed . . . that the law should forever
remain unalterable. Congress undoubtedly has authority
under the commercial power, if no other, to introduce
such changes as are likely to be needed.
The Lottawanna, 88 U.S. (21 Wall.) 558, 577 (1874). Congress could
evaluate the desirability of modifying joint and several liability
not only for the general maritime law, but also for the many
maritime statutes that it superintends. Congress could, for
example, limit the application of joint and several liability to
situations where a defendant bears either a statutory percentage of
the total fault or at least more than that of the plaintiff. These
precise remedies would be more problematic for a federal court to
enact because our instruments of revision are generally blunt.
Indeed, as mentioned, the vast majority of the states that have
altered traditional joint and several liability have done so
legislatively, while only four states have modified the traditional
rule through the judicial process. See Joia, 817 F.2d at 917
("[T]he decision whether to continue this trend [away from joint
and several recovery] is more properly before a legislature.").
We are keenly aware of the fast-moving political forces now
calling to heel excesses of the tort law. This turn of the
political light upon tort law only stiffens our resolve not to
attempt to run in front of the Congress. Leading a political
57
charge is not an appropriate role for a federal court, not even for
a federal court sitting in admiralty.
4. Private ordering
Furthermore, contractual allocation of risk by private parties
better accomplishes the goal of allocating risk. Private parties,
rather than courts, are better able to assess the risks of
noncollection and to decide who is in the best position to collect
a judgment. Sophisticated maritime parties, intertwined in
contractual relationships, can usually foresee the risk of
insolvency and can allocate or insure against it. For example,
Penrod and MIS were in a position to address the risk of insolvency
when they wrote their contract. Coats had no such "bargaining"
position. Indeed, "where potential co-defendants can contract in
advance regarding their apportionment obligations among themselves,
rules that leave both traditional joint and several liability and
traditional apportionment rights in place might create optimal
incentives and be consistent with equitable concerns." 2 American
Law Institute, Enterprise Responsibility for Personal Injury 156
(1991). The rules now in place are clear and easily administered.
They leave the allocation of the risks of noncollection to the
parties best equipped to evaluate these risks. Absent
congressional intervention, private ordering of the risks is far
superior to the proposed effort. Our ability by definition is
inferior to the market's ability to tailor and allocate these
risks.
58
IV. CONCLUSION
We decline Penrod's proposal to adopt modified joint liability
for the general maritime law. The judgment of the district court
is AFFIRMED.
GARWOOD, Circuit Judge, dissenting, joined by Judges JOLLY, JONES,
SMITH, EMILIO M. GARZA, and DeMOSS (except that Judges JONES,
SMITH, and DeMOSS do not join in the second paragraph of footnote
two):
This case involves an accident on an American-owned jack-up
rig undergoing repairs in a United Arab Emirates (UAE) port in
which the American plaintiff is an employee of the UAE company
hired by the rig's owner to perform the repairs. The plaintiff,
Coats, and the rig owner, Penrod, were each found twenty percent at
fault, and the plaintiff's employer, MIS, sixty percent. The rig
owner, cast in judgment for eighty percent of plaintiff's damages,
contends that its liability to the plaintiff should not exceed
fifty percent of his total damages, as their fault was equal. I
agree, largely for the reasons stated in my dissent in Simeon v. T.
Smith & Son, Inc., 852 F.2d 1421, 1436-38 (5th Cir. 1988), cert.
denied, 490 U.S. 1106 (1989). The subject matter of this suit
plainly is not within the scope of the Longshoremen's and Harbor
Workers' Compensation Act (LHWCA), 33 U.S.C. § 901 et seq., the
Jones Act, 46 U.S.C. App. § 688, or the Death on the High Seas Act
(DOHSA), 46 U.S.C. App. § 761 et seq.30 Accordingly,SQassuming
30
Unlike Simeon, this case does not involve a Jones Act
seaman.
59
United States law applies at all31SQthe governing law is the general
maritime law of the United States.
Overview of the Issue
The archetypal general maritime law tort litigation is the
collision case.
Assume that a shrimper, under the command of its master-owner,
and an Exxon crew boat collide while each is trying to avoid a
suddenly appearing small pleasure craft. Only the crew boat
suffers significant damage.32 Each vessel is under separate
ownership and acting independently of the others, and none is so
related to either of the others as to be vicariously liable for the
other's fault. If only the shrimper and crew boat are causatively
at fault, and their fault is equal, the shrimper is liable for half
the crew boat's damages. Should the amount for which the shrimper
is ultimately liable to the crew boat change if the small pleasure
craft is also found to have been causatively at fault (e.g.,
31
For the reasons stated by Judge DeMoss, in my view the
choice of law issue should be resolved in favor of UAE law.
While I find much to agree with in Judge DeMoss's comments
regarding Seas Shipping Co. v. Sieracki, 66 S.Ct. 872 (1946), I do
not believe that issue is before us. Penrod was found guilty of
negligence, as well as of unseaworthiness, and while those faults
were combined in an "and/or" form in the percentage of fault
determination, no complaint of the form of that submission appears
to have been made on this appeal. Moreover, both the negligence
and the unseaworthiness related to the same condition. Finally, it
is undisputed that a defendant liable for unseaworthiness is as
much entitled to a reduction of plaintiff's recovery for
plaintiff's negligence as is a defendant liable only for
negligence. See, e.g., Fontenot v. Teledyne Movible Offshore,
Inc., 714 F.2d 17, 19-20 (5th Cir. 1983); Scot v. Fluor Ocean
Services, Inc., 501 F.2d 983, 984 (5th Cir. 1974).
32
This opinion addresses only instances of indivisible
damages, where the fault of each of the parties is a proximate
cause of all the damages.
lacking adequate lights) equally with the other two vessels?
Simple logic tells us it should not. The crew boat's damages
remain the very same, the fault of the shrimper and of the crew
boat are each still a proximate cause of all such damage, and the
causative fault of the crew boat and shrimper remain equal to each
other. As the pleasure craft has acted independently of the crew
boat and shrimper, neither of which is vicariously liable for the
pleasure craft's wrongs, there is no basis on which to charge the
pleasure craft's fault to either the shrimper or the crew boat, and
hence, for purposes of the shrimper's ultimate responsibility to
the damaged crew boat, the relevant comparative fault is that as
between those two.
However, this straightforward approach is opposed at two
opposite extremes. At one extreme is that approach generally known
as pure several liability, in which all of the pleasure craft's
fault is charged to the crew boat, so thatSQdespite the crew boat's
damages not having decreased, its share of the total fault having
decreased, and the shrimper remaining equally at fault with itSQthe
shrimper is nevertheless liable for only a thirdSQnot a halfSQof the
crew boat's damages. At the other extreme is the majority's
approach hereSQpure joint liability reflexively, and rather
oxymoronically, applied in a case where recovery depends on
comparative faultSQwhich charges all of the pleasure craft's fault
to the shrimper, so that the shrimper's total exposure to the crew
boat goes up from one-half to two-thirds of the crew boat's
damages, even though the damages remain identical, the relative
61
fault as between the crew boat and shrimper is unchanged, and the
shrimper's percentage of the total negligence has gone down.
The majority's approach leads to the absurdity that in certain
situations a slightly negligent defendant could nevertheless be
liable for ninety percent of the damages of a plaintiff whose
negligence proximately causing all those damages was ten times as
great as the negligence of that particular defendant.33 That is the
very same kind of absurdity that caused most common law
jurisdictions to abandon the doctrine that the plaintiff's
contributory negligence barred all recovery, even though such
negligence was minimal and far less than that of the defendant.
Of course, until the relatively recent arrival of pure several
liability in many jurisdictions, a negligent defendant was
traditionally liable to a non-negligent plaintiff for all the
latter's damages proximately caused by that defendant's negligence,
notwithstanding that an independent third party's fault may also
have proximately caused all those same damages. See Prosser and
Keeton on Torts (West 5th ed. 1984) § 47.34 This rule, however,
33
Similarly, in certain other circumstances under pure
several liability, a plaintiff whose causative negligence was only
a tenth of that of a particular defendant might nevertheless be
able to hold that defendant liable for no more than a tenth of
plaintiff's damages.
34
"Quite apart from any question of
vicarious liability or joinder of defendants,
the common law developed a separate principle,
that a defendant might be liable for the
entire loss sustained by the plaintiff, even
though the defendant's act concurred or
combined with that of another wrongdoer to
produce the resultSQor, as the courts have put
it, that the defendant is liable for all
62
does not afford a principled justification for rejecting the
approach espoused in this dissent. The result in the just-
mentioned instance comes about only because none of the plaintiff's
damages are proximately caused by the plaintiff's fault and all are
proximately caused by the defendant's. The logic of such a regime,
however, dictates that the plaintiff whose contributory negligence
proximately causes all his damages may recover nothing, even though
a defendant's much greater fault may also have been a proximate
cause of all plaintiff's damages. And that indeed was the almost
universal common law rule. Relatively recently, dissatisfaction
with this result led most common law jurisdictions to abandon the
contributory negligence bar in favor of some form of comparative
negligence. Under such an approach, there arises the question of
what the plaintiff's negligence is compared to and how the
comparison is to be made. The question, of course, does not arise
if the plaintiff is not negligent (nor, obviously, does it arise if
no defendant is at fault). If the plaintiff and one defendant are
consequences proximately caused by the
defendant's wrongful act. The rule was first
applied in actions against a single defendant,
where there was no concert of action, and
therefore no joinder would have been possible,
and there was no suggestion of a 'joint tort.'
. . .
In England, such concurrent but independent
wrongdoers were not confused with joint tortfeasors
because there could be no joinder in the absence of
concerted action. They had to be sued separately . . .
. Under the more liberal American rules as to joinder,
defendants whose negligence has concurred to produce a
single result have been joined in one action, and by
loose usage have been called joint tortfeasors." Id. at
328-329 (footnotes omitted).
63
the only ones guilty of causative fault, the obvious and
universally accepted answer is that the fault of each is compared
to that of the other. A question arises if, but only if, both the
plaintiff and a defendant are guilty of causative fault and so also
is at least one other independent actor (whether or not that actor
is likewise a defendant). In that relatively rare setting,
apportioning all of the other (or third) independent actor's fault
to the defendant may not be logically justified by the principle
that every party is responsible for all the proximate results of
his own fault, even though such results are also contributed to by
the fault of another, because that principle equally well justifies
apportioning all the other actor's fault to the contributory
negligent plaintiff, and also because, in any event, where
comparative fault is applied the above-referenced principle has
been abandoned both by allowing the contributorily negligent
plaintiff to recover at all and by limiting his recovery to less
than the full amount of the loss he suffered.35
35
The only other principled justification for assigning to
the defendant all the fault of the other actor would be that the
two had acted in concert, or that for some other reason the
defendant was vicariously liable for the fault of the other actor.
This was
the original basis for common law joint liability. See Prosser and
Keaton on Torts (West 5th ed. 1984) § 46 at 322-323 ("The original
meaning of a 'joint tort' was that of vicarious liability for
concerted action. All persons who acted in concert to commit a
trespass, in pursuance of a common design, were held liable for the
entire result. . . . Each was therefore liable for the entire
damage done. . . . All might be joined as defendants in the same
action at law, and since each was liable for all, the jury would
not be permitted to apportion the damages. . . . This principle,
somewhat extended beyond its original scope, is still law. . . ."
(footnote omitted)).
64
As University of Chicago law professor Charles Gregory
explained nearly sixty years ago:
"At common law joint tortfeasors are virtually guarantors
of each other's solvency so far as concerns the injured
plaintiff's joint judgment for damages; and the
introduction of contribution between joint tortfeasors
does not affect that situation in the slightest degree.
The plaintiff receives his damages at all costs, leaving
the defendants to even up the loss between themselves if
and as they may and can. But under a comparative
negligence statute, where the plaintiff, although
negligent, may still recover, the situation is
fundamentally different. Here absolutely no reason
exists why the defendants, even if they are treated as
joint tortfeasors and thus subjected to joint judgment
liability for certain purposes, should be made to assume
the entire risk of each other's insolvency with respect
to plaintiff's recoverable damages. For when the
plaintiff and the solvent tortfeasor are both negligent,
they share the stigma which at common law seems to have
furnished the justification for the somewhat arbitrary
allocation of this risk on joint judgment debtors.
Furthermore, it is quite possible to have a plaintiff who
is as negligent as, or more negligent than, either of his
defendants, but is still entitled to recover. Under such
circumstances, it seems idle to suppose that a joint
liability to the plaintiff should carry absolutely the
same incidents as the common-law joint judgment; and
distribution of the risk of insolvency of one of the
joint defendants in accordance with the apportionment of
fault would seem to be the only method of administration
consistent with the terms of the comparative negligence
statute." C. Gregory, Legislative Loss Distribution in
Negligence Actions 142 (1936) (footnote omitted).
In an appropriate setting, even under a comparative fault
regime, this principle would justify charging the other actor's
fault all to the defendant, with none being charged to the
contributorily negligent plaintiff. However, in the situations we
are here considering, the defendants (or the defendant and the
third party actor) act independently of each other and the
relationship between them is not such as to otherwise give rise to
vicarious liability (i.e., if one were not at fault there would be
no basis for charging the other's fault to him). Accordingly, the
concerted action or vicarious responsibility principle does not, in
the class of case we are considering, justify the majority's
approach.
65
It is true that, by virtue of the modern availability of
contribution, which was generally not available at common law, see
Prosser and Keeton on Torts (West 5th ed. 1984) § 50, a particular
defendant to whom all an independent third actor's fault is
charged, rather than shared proportionately with the negligent
plaintiff, suffers an ultimate economic injustice only if he is
unable to realize adequate recovery of contribution from the third
actor. Such a recovery would be unavailable if that third actor
were insolvent, enjoyed some legal immunity, or could not be found.
Thus, in one sense, as observed in the above quotation from
Gregory, the issue is how the risk of the third actor's insolvency,
immunity, or lack of amenability to process should be borne:
should it be borne entirely by the defendant, as the majority would
have it; or should it be borne entirely by the negligent plaintiff,
as under pure several liability; or should it be borne by the
negligent plaintiff and defendant in the ratio that their
respective degrees of fault bear to each other, as espoused here
and by Professor Gregory. But in another sense, the question is
why should the defendant ever be liable to the plaintiff for a
greater proportion of plaintiff's damages than the defendant's
negligence (including any for which he is vicariously liable) is of
the total negligence of the plaintiff and that defendant (again,
including any for which he is vicariously liable).
Development in Common Law Jurisdictions
As previously observed, at common law what we now call "joint
liability" was predicated either on concerted action (or vicarious
66
liability) or on the principle that the defendant is liable for all
consequences proximately caused by his own wrongful acts, even
though the wrongful conduct of one other than the plaintiff was
also a proximate cause of the harm (see notes 5 & 6, supra). There
was no occasion to consider the application of these rules to
instances where the plaintiff's negligence was a proximate cause of
his damages, because such a plaintiff was barred from any recovery.
This was the virtually uniform rule in the United States until
1908, when the Federal Employees Liability Act (FELA), 45 U.S.C. §
51 et seq., was enacted. Act of April 22, 1908, c. 149, 35 Stat.
65-66. The FELA provided interstate railroad employees a cause of
action against their employer for injuries in the course of
employment caused by the railroad's negligence and provided that
"the fact that the employee may have been guilty of contributory
negligence should not bar a recovery, but the damages shall be
diminished by the jury in proportion to the amount of negligence
attributable to such employee." 45 U.S.C. § 53. Thereafter, in
1910 Mississippi enacted a "pure" comparative negligence statute.
V. Schwartz, Comparative Negligence (Michie 3rd ed. 1994), § 1-
4(b)(2). In 1913 Georgia, through a combination of judicial
decision and much earlier legislation applicable to those injured
in railroad operations, adopted "a rule that the plaintiff in all
cases may recover an apportioned part of his damages if the
defendant's negligence is greater than the plaintiff's." Id., § 1-
5(a)(2) at 19 (citing Elk Cotton Mills v. Grant, 79 S.E. 836 (Ga.
1913)). Also in 1913, Nebraska by legislation allowed diminished
67
recovery where the plaintiff's negligence was slight in comparison
to the defendant's. Id., § 1-4(b)(4) at 15. So matters stood
until 1920, when Congress enacted the Jones Act, providing "any
seaman" injured "in the course of his employment" an action against
his employer in which the FELA would apply.36 The same year, DOHSA
was enacted, providing a cause of action for death wrongfully
caused "on the high seas," 46 U.S.C. § 761, in which the decedent's
negligence did "not bar recovery" but "the court shall take into
consideration the degree of negligence attributable to the decedent
and reduce the recovery accordingly." 46 U.S.C. § 766. No other
jurisdiction adopted comparative negligence until in 1931 Wisconsin
passed legislation allowing a plaintiff recovery if his negligence
was "not as great at that of the defendant." Schwartz, supra, § 1-
4(b)(3).
Thus, in 1909 all states generally applied the complete bar of
contributory negligence; by 1930 only three states had lifted the
bar to any extent; by 1940 only four had; by 1954 only five ;37 and,
as late as 1968, only seven states and Puerto Rico had any form of
36
46 U.S.C. § 688 ("in such action all statutes of the
United States modifying or extending the common-law right or remedy
in cases of personal injury to railroad employees should apply").
See also Cosmopolitan Shipping Co. v. McAllister, 69 S.Ct. 1317,
1321-22 (1949); Rohde v. Southeastern Drilling Co., Inc., 667 F.2d
1215, 1217 (5th Cir. 1982).
37
Mississippi, Georgia, Nebraska, Wisconsin, and South
Dakota, the latter in 1941 by a statute allowing recovery when a
plaintiff's negligence was "slight and defendant's was gross in
comparison." Schwartz, supra, §§ 1-1 at 2, 1-4(b)(4) at 14-15.
68
comparative negligence.38 Then the rush to some form of comparative
fault began, so that now in only Alabama, Maryland, North Carolina,
Virginia, and the District of Columbia does plaintiff's negligence,
no matter how slight, bar any recovery whatever. Schwartz, supra,
§ 1-1 at 2.4, § 1-5(e)(3); McIntyre v. Balentine, 833 S.W.2d 52, 55
(Tenn. 1992). This was accomplished by judicial decision in twelve
states, and by legislation in thirty-four states. McIntyre at 55,
56 & ns. 3 & 4.
The results are summarized in Kionka, Recent Developments in
the Law of Joint and Several Liability and the Impact of
Plaintiff's Employers' Fault, 54 La. L. Rev. 1619 (1994):
"Four states still do not have comparative fault .
. ., and they retain joint and several liability. Of the
forty-six states that have some form of comparative
fault, ten states still have the pure form of joint and
several liability, and twelve states now have pure
several liability. The remaining twenty-four states, .
. . have some mixture of joint and several and several
liability. These statutory schemes can be quite complex.
The common thread, however, is that they all represent a
compromise position between the two extremesSQpure joint
and several liability on the one hand and pure several
liability on the other." Id. at 1621 (footnotes
omitted).
In other words, eighty percent of the states reject the rule
espoused by the majority, "pure" joint and several liability in a
system of comparative fault. The ten states that follow that
approach are outnumbered by the twelve states at the other extreme,
which follow "pure" several liability. The remaining twenty-four
states have, indeed, adopted a variety of approaches, but, as
38
Schwartz, supra, § 1-1 at 2. Comparative fault
legislation was enacted in Arkansas in 1955, in Puerto Rico in
1956, and in Maine in 1965. Id.
69
Kionka observes, a "common thread" runs through them, as "all
represent a compromise position between the two extremes." Id.
One such position between the two extremes is that of the
Uniform Comparative Fault Act (UCFA) approved by the National
Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws in 1977. 12
U.L.A. at 42-60 (West Supp. 1994).39 Section 1 of the UCFA provides
that "fault chargeable to the claimant diminishes proportionately
the amount awarded as compensatory damages . . . but does not bar
recovery," and section 6 provides that the claimant's recovery is
also reduced by the percentage of fault of any party with whom the
claimant has settled. Sections 3, 4, and 5 deal with set-off and
contribution. Section 2 is the operative section.40 Under it the
39
The committee preparing the UCFA for consideration by the
Commissioners was composed of distinguished legal scholars and
judges, including Judge R. Floyd Gibson and Professor Victor E.
Schwartz, and was chaired by Dean John W. Wade of Vanderbilt
University School of Law. Id. at 42.
40
The relevant portions of section 2 are as follows:
"(a) In all actions involving fault of more than one
party to the action, including third-party defendants and
persons who have been released under Section 6, the
court, unless otherwise agreed by all parties, shall
instruct the jury to answer special interrogatories or,
if there is no jury, shall make findings, indicating:
(1) the amount of damages each claimant
would be entitled to recover if contributory
fault is disregarded; and
(2) the percentage of the total fault of
all of the parties to each claim that is
allocated to each claimant, defendant, third-
party defendant, and person who has been
released from liability under Section 6. For
this purpose the court may determine that two
or more persons are to be treated as a single
party.
70
respective percentages of fault of all concerned are determined,
the judgment sets forth the corresponding "equitable share" of
each, and the plaintiff is awarded the amount of his total damages,
reduced by his and any settling party's percentages of fault,
"against each party liable on the basis of rules of joint-and-
several liability." However, under section 2(d) if any party's
"equitable share" of the judgment is (wholly or partly)
"uncollectible from that party," the court "shall reallocate any
uncollectible amount among the other parties, including a claimant
at fault, according to their respective percentages of fault"
(emphasis added). The reason for this provision is set forth in
the official comments to section 2 as follows:
"Reallocation of the equitable share of the obligation of
a party takes place when his share is uncollectible.
. . . .
(c) The court shall determine the award of damages
to each claimant in accordance with the findings, subject
to any reduction under Section 6, and enter judgment
against each party liable on the basis of rules of joint-
and-several liability. For purposes of contribution
under Sections 4 and 5, the court also shall determine
and state in the judgment each party's equitable share of
the obligation to each claimant in accordance with the
respective percentages of fault.
(d) Upon motion made not later than [one year] after
judgment is entered, the court shall determine whether
all or part of a party's equitable share of the
obligation is uncollectible from that party, and shall
reallocate any uncollectible amount among the other
parties, including a claimant at fault, according to
their respective percentages of fault. The party whose
liability is reallocated is nonetheless subject to
contribution and to any continuing liability to the
claimant on the judgment." (Emphasis added).
71
Reallocation takes place among all parties at fault.
This includes a claimant who is contributorily at fault.
It avoids the unfairness both of the common law rule of
joint-and-several liability, which would cast the total
risk of uncollectibility upon the solvent defendants, and
of a rule abolishing joint-and-several liability, which
would cast the total risk of uncollectibility upon the
claimant." (Emphasis added).41
That is precisely the rationale and effect of the position here
espoused. The official comments likewise illustrate the
application of the reallocation rule by an example in which the
plaintiff, whose total damages are $10,000, is forty percent
negligent and two defendants are each thirty percent negligent. If
one defendant is insolvent, the plaintiff's recovery from the other
is ultimately $4,286, which is 3/7ths of the $10,000, the exact
result here advocated.42 This dissent, however, would, in the
41
12 U.L.A. West Supp. 1994 at 50.
42
The relevant illustrations given in the comments are as
follows:
"Illustration No. 2. (Multiple-party situation).
A sues B, C and D. A's damages are $10,000.
A is found 40% at fault.
B is found 30% at fault.
C is found 30% at fault.
D is found 0% at fault.
A is awarded judgment jointly and severally against
B & C for $6,000. The court also states in the judgment
the equitable share of the obligation of each party:
A's equitable share is $4,000 (40% of
$10,000).
B's equitable share is $3,000 (30% of
$10,000).
C's equitable share is $3,000 (30% of
$10,000).
Illustration No. 3. (Reallocation computation under
Subsection (d)).
72
example given, initially limit each of the defendants' liability to
$4,286. For the reasons stated below, this essentially procedural
modification to the UCFA approach is practically fair and analogous
to traditional admiralty practice.43
Same facts as in Illustration No. 2.
On proper motion to the court, C shows that B's
share is uncollectible. The court orders that B's
equitable share be reallocated between A and C. . . .
A's equitable share is increased by $1,714
(4/7 of $3,000).
C's equitable share is increased by $1,286
(3/7 of $3,000)." 12 U.L.A. West. Supp. 199
at 51.
43
It is also to be noted that section 2 of the UCFA limits
allocation of fault to those who are parties to the action, it
being "assumed that state procedure provides for bringing in third-
party defendants as parties." Comment to § 2, 12 U.L.A. West Supp.
1994 at 50. The comment explains:
"The limitation to parties to the action means
ignoring other persons who may have been at fault with
regard to the particular injury but who have not been
joined as parties. This is a deliberate decision. . . .
The more parties joined whose fault contributed to the
injury, the smaller the percentage of fault allocated to
each of the other parties, whether plaintiff or
defendant." Id.
Because the fault of those not parties is not ascertained, it
cannot be allocated to any party, plaintiff or defendant, and this
means that the ultimate result is controlled by the comparison of
fault only as between the parties. In our earlier example of the
collision involving the shrimper, the crew boat, and the pleasure
craft, if the pleasure craft is not a party, the crew boat, if
equally at fault with the shrimper, may recover from the shrimper
only half its damages, notwithstanding the facts might show that
pleasure craft was also equally at fault with the other two
vessels. In essence, whatever fault is attributable to the
pleasure craft is allocated between the other two vessels in the
same proportion as the fault of each bears to the total fault of
both.
73
The UCFA was judicially adopted by the Supreme Court of
Missouri when it eliminated the common law contributory negligence
bar. Gustafson v. Benda, 661 S.W.2d 11, 15-16 (Mo. 1983) (en
banc).44 Later, this was legislatively ratified, and similar
legislation has also been adopted in Arizona, Minnesota, Montana,
Connecticut, and New Hampshire. Schwartz, supra, § 3-5(c)(5),
citing Mo. Rev. Stat. § 537.067(2); Ariz. Rev. Stat. § 12-2508;
Minn. Stat. § 604.02(2); Mont. Code Ann. § 27-1-703(3); N.H. Rev.
Stat. Ann. § 507:7-e (III).45
44
". . . [T]his and future cases shall apply the doctrine
of pure comparative fault in accordance with the Uniform
Comparative Fault Act §§ 1-6, 12 U.L.A. Supp. 35-45 (1983), a copy
of which, with commissioners' comments, is appended to this opinion
as Appendix A." Id. (footnote omitted).
In a footnote, the court noted that it did not adopt the
proportionate settlement credit approach of section 6 of the UCFA
only because that conflicted with the express provisions of a
Missouri statute calling for dollar for dollar credit; the court
invited the legislature to reconsider the settlement credit
provision and adopt section 6 of the UCFA. Id. at n.10.
45
The Maritime Law Association has recommended a model
Maritime Comparative Responsibility Act, which is almost the same
as the UCFA, and which, with but slight modification, was
introduced in Congress September 12, 1991, as H.R. 3318, 102d
Congress, 1st sess. See 7 Benedict on Admiralty (7th ed.) §§ 7 &
8. Both the Maritime Law Association proposal and H.R. 3318
contain reallocation provisions identical to section 2(d) of the
UCFA (section 2(3) of the Maritime Law Association proposal and
section 3(d) of H.R. 3318). Id., § 7 at 1-29; § 8 at 1-46, 1-47.
The comments to this section of the Maritime Law Association
proposal include the following:
"Reallocation. Reallocation of the equitable share
of the obligation of a party takes place when his share
is uncollectible. Reallocation takes place among all
parties at fault. This includes a claimant who is
contributorily at fault. It avoids the unfairness both
of the common law rule of joint-and-several liability,
which would cast the total risk of uncollectibility upon
the solvent defendants, and of a rule abolishing joint-
74
Similarly, the Restatement (Second) of Torts § 886A, comment
i (1977), states in pertinent part:
"In determining equitable shares of the obligation,
it seems wise, particularly in comparative-negligence
states, to confine the determination to parties to the
action rather than to attempt to calculate the equitable
shares for alleged tortfeasors who are not parties and
not bound by the decisions. If one tortfeasor's
equitable share turns out to be uncollectible it should
be spread proportionately among the other parties at
fault." (Emphasis added).
Essentially the present approach was adopted in Haney Electric
Co. v. Hurst, 624 S.W.2d 602 (Tex. Civ. App.SQDallas 1981, writ
dismissed as moot). That case involved a three-car collision. In
separate actions, two of the driversSQeach later found to be thirty
percent negligentSQsued the third driverSQlater found to be forty
percent negligent. The cases were consolidated, and one question
was whether the defendant (the third driver, found forty percent at
fault) should be liable to a particular plaintiff for forty percent
of the harm (that is, only the defendant's share) or seventy
percent (that is, the defendant's share added to the entire thirty
percent share of the other plaintiff/tortfeasor, neither of the
plaintiffs being also a defendant). The court adopted neither
and-several liability, which would cast the total risk of
uncollectibility upon the claimant." Id. § 7 at 1-35
(emphasis added)
These comments also include an illustration 3, which is the same as
illustration 3 in the comments to section 2 of the UCFA, as set out
in note 13 above. Id. § 7 at 1-36, 1-37. Again, this illustration
involves a 40% negligent plaintiff suffering $10,000 damages, and
two 30% negligent defendants, from one of whom nothing can be
collected. The ultimate result is that the plaintiff's recovery
against the other defendant is $4,286, which is 3/7ths of
plaintiff's total damages.
75
approach and chose instead to hold the defendant third driver
liable to each plaintiff for 40/70ths of total damages. That
fraction represented the ratio of the defendant's negligence (forty
percent) to the total of his negligence and the negligence of the
party seeking recovery (thirty percent). The court thus placed on
the defendant a portion of the unsued tortfeasor's share of fault,
but only that portion represented by the ratio of the defendant's
fault (forty percent) to the combined fault of the defendant and
plaintiff (seventy percent). The court considered this result
mandated not only by the Texas comparative negligence scheme, Tex.
Rev. Civ. Stat. art. 2212a (codified as amended at Tex. Civ. Proc.
& Rem. Code § 33.001), but also by "[e]lementary fairness." 624
S.W. 2d at 612.
An analogous approach has been taken under the Louisiana
statute, LSA-C.C. art. 2324, in respect to employer fault in an
employee's suit against a third party. Thus, in Prestenbach v.
Rains, 4 F.3d 358 (5th Cir. 1993), the Louisiana employer, immune
by virtue of the worker's compensation law, was found seventy-five
percent at fault, the plaintiff-employee fifteen percent, and the
defendant-third party ten percent. The plaintiff appealed the
judgment which awarded him only ten percent of his damages against
the third party. We applied the "'ratio approach'" of Guidry v.
Frank Guidry Oil Co., 579 So.2d 947 (La. 1991), as carried forward
by Gauthier v. O'Brien, 618 So.2d 825, 832-33 (La. 1993), and held
that plaintiff was entitled to recover forty percent of his damages
from the defendant because the defendant's percentage of negligence
76
(ten percent) was forty percent of the combined negligence (twenty-
five percent) of the plaintiff (fifteen percent) and the defendant
(ten percent). Prestenbach at 360-61. Similarly, in Davis v.
Commercial Union Ins. Co., 892 F.2d 378 (5th Cir. 1990), the
plaintiff-employee was found sixty percent at fault, his immune
Louisiana employer thirty percent, and the defendant third party
ten percent. The plaintiff appealed the judgment, which awarded
him only ten percent of his damages against the third party. We
held that the employer's fault should be allocated between the
plaintiff and the defendant "in proportion to their previously
determined degrees of fault," with the result that plaintiff was to
be granted judgment against the defendant for 1/7th (14.29%) of his
total damages. Id. at 384-385.46
A thorough review and analysis of the relevant decisions,
legislation, and scholarly writing is contained in the American Law
Institute's Restatement of the Law (Third) Torts: Apportionment of
Liability, Preliminary Draft No. 1 (May 31, 1995) (Reporter,
Professor William C. Powers, Jr., University of Texas School of
Law; Associate Reporter, Professor Michael D. Green, University of
Iowa College of Law) (hereafter "Apportionment of Liability"). The
recommendations made there include provisions in substance the same
46
It may also be noted that Texas has held that the
employer's or co-employee's "negligence should not be considered in
a third party products liability action when the plaintiff's
injuries were covered by workers' compensation." Magro v. Ragsdale
Bros., Inc., 721 S.W.2d 832, 836 (Tex. 1986). This necessarily
means that if the plaintiff is guilty of contributory fault, his
recovery will be based on a comparison of his fault with that only
of the defendant third party, precisely the general approach
suggested here.
77
as those of the UCFA.47 The reporters' notes to section 25A (see
47
The principally relevant proposals (which have not been
officially presented to the Council or membership of the American
Law Institute) are as follows;
"§ 24A Liability of Multiple Tortfeasors for Indivisible
Harm
If two or more persons' independent tortious conduct
is a legal cause of an indivisible injury, each person is
jointly and severally liable for the recoverable damages
caused by the tortious conduct, subject to the
reallocation provision of § 25A." Id. at 231.
"25A Reallocation of Damages Based on Unenforceability of
Judgment
A defendant who is or may be held jointly and
severally liable pursuant to § 24A may move to reallocate
the liability of another defendant because a judgment for
contribution against the latter defendant will be or is
unenforceable, in whole or in part. If the moving
defendant establishes that a judgment for contribution
against another defendant will be or is unenforceable,
the court shall reallocate liability for the damage
award. The portion of the defendant's share of liability
for which a judgment is not or will not be enforceable
shall be reallocated to the remaining parties, including
the plaintiff, in proportion to the percentages of
responsibility assigned to the other defendants and the
plaintiff." Id. at 237 (emphasis added).
Comment a to section 25A states in relevant part:
"The justification for requiring one defendant to bear
the burden of an insolvent defendant's negligence was
that as between a culpable defendant and an innocent
plaintiff, the culpable defendant should bear the full
burden of the plaintiff's injuries. With the advent of
comparative responsibility, in which plaintiffs who are
at fault may still recover a portion of their damages,
the justification for requiring defendants to bear the
entire share of insolvent defendants no longer exists."
Id. at 238 (emphasis added).
Comment b to section 25A provides in part:
"Ordinarily, a motion to reallocate a party's share of
liability due to the unenforceability of the judgment
should be made within a year of the entry of judgment.
78
note 18, supra) explain the rationale for these recommendations as
follows:
"The critical question is who should bear the risk
of insolvent parties. The advent of comparative fault,
at least when some fault is attributed to the plaintiff,
removes the traditional justification for imposing that
risk on defendants. See Pearson, Apportionment of Losses
Under Comparative Fault Laws--An Analysis of the
Alternatives, 40 La. L. Rev. 343, 362 (1980) ('When the
plaintiff himself has been negligent, the logical support
for joint and several liability evaporates.').
Nevertheless, even with the plaintiff sharing some fault,
each defendant is still the legal cause of all of
plaintiff's damages. Shifting the entire risk of
insolvency to plaintiff 'merely transform[s] the inequity
of imposing that risk entirely on solvent defendants into
the equal and opposite inequity of imposing the risk
entirely on the plaintiff.' II AMERICAN LAW INSTITUTE
REPORTERS' STUDY, ENTERPRISE LIABILITY FOR PERSONAL INJURY 147
(1991); see also Wade, Should Joint and Several Liability
In those instances in which the unenforceability of any
judgment is established before entry of judgment, the
judgment should reflect the reallocation of the
defendant's share for which a judgment would be
unenforceable." Id. at 238-239 (emphasis added).
Proposed section 27A treats the effect of settlement in the
same manner as section 6 of the UCFA. Apportionment of Liability
at 265. Proposed section 28A(2) provides that in an employee-
plaintiff's suit against a third party, the employer's fault is not
inquired into if local law does not permit either any reduction in
plaintiff's recovery on that account or a contribution claim by the
defendant against the employer (section 28A(1) addresses employer
fault where those conditions do not obtain). Id. at 281.
Proposed section 29A provides:
"§ 29A Effect of Responsibility Assigned to Other Immune
Persons
If a person other than the plaintiff's employer is
immune from suit by the plaintiff and immune from a
contribution claim by any defendant pursuant to the
applicable law of the jurisdiction, the fact finder
should assign a percentage of responsibility to the
immune party and the immune party's share of
responsibility should be treated the same as provided in
§ 25A for a defendant whose share of responsibility is
uncollectible." Id. at 290.
79
of Multiple Tortfeasors be Abolished?, 10 AM.J. TRIAL ADV.
193, 197 (1986).
Professor Charles O. Gregory made this point quite
eloquently many years ago:
. . .[W]hen the plaintiff and the solvent
tortfeasor are both negligent, they share the stigma
which at common law seems to have furnished the
justification for the somewhat arbitrary allocation of
this risk on joint judgment debtors. . . .
[D]istribution of the risk of insolvency of one of the
joint defendants in accordance with the apportionment of
fault would seem to be the only method of administration
consistent with the terms of the comparative negligence
statute.
GREGORY, LEGISLATIVE LOSS DISTRIBUTION IN NEGLIGENCE ACTIONS 142
(1936).
Numerous commentators have advocated reallocating
the share of an insolvent or immune party to the
remaining responsible parties in proportion to their
responsibility for plaintiff's injuries. See . . .
Wade, Should Joint and Several Liability of Multiple
Tortfeasors be Abolished?, 10 AM. J. TRIAL ADV. 193, 198
(1986); UNIFORM COMPARATIVE FAULT ACT§ 2(d) (1977); II AMERICAN
LAW INSTITUTE REPORTERS' STUDY, ENTERPRISE LIABILITY FOR PERSONAL
INJURY 127-57 (1991) (advocating reallocation of insolvent
party's share when defendants are independent tortfeasors
without a prior relationship); Zavos, Comparative Fault
and the Insolvent Defendant: A Critique and
Amplification of American Motorcycle Ass'n v. Superior
Court, 14 LOY. L.A. L. REV. 775 (1980-81); WILLIAMS, JOINT
TORTS AND CONTRIBUTORY NEGLIGENCE § 110, at 414-20 (1951);
Sobelsohn, Comparing Fault, 60 IND. L.J. 413, 456 (1985);
Miller, Extending the Fairness Principle of Li and
American Motorcycle: Adoption of the Uniform Comparative
Fault Act, 14 PAC. L.J. 835, 861-63 (1983); Boyette,
Note, Reconciling Comparative Negligence, Contribution,
and Joint and Several Liability, 34 WASH. & LEE L. REV.
1159, 1174-76 (1977); see also Steenson, Recent
Legislative Responses to the Rule of Joint and Several
Liability, 23 TORT & INS. L.J. 482 (1988) (describing the
variety of reallocation schemes that exist in a number of
states).
The reallocation provision in § 25A also comports
with provisions in a number of states that have abolished
joint and several liability for independent tortfeasors,
except where the plaintiff is attributed no
responsibility for the injury. . . . Of course, this
80
exception reflects the common law rule before the
adoption of comparative fault, which made independent
tortfeasors jointly and severally liable for a
plaintiff's indivisible injury. Section 25A results in
the same outcome in those instances in which the
plaintiff is found free of responsibility." Id. at 248-
251.
In sum, pure joint and several liability was an incidental and
logical application of a regime in which the plaintiff's causative
fault, no matter how slight in comparison to that of a defendant,
barred any recovery whatever. Until the late 1960s, that was the
almost universal rule in common law jurisdictions. Since then, the
vast majority of jurisdictions that have abandoned the common law
ban on any recovery for a plaintiff whose negligence is to any
extent a cause of the accident in question have likewise abandoned
across-the-board pure joint and several liability. Where the
plaintiff and a defendant are both guilty of causative fault, and
so also is a third actor, there is no justification for allocating,
as between that plaintiff and defendant, ultimate responsibility
for the fault of the third actor on any basis other than on the
ratios which the fault of the plaintiff and the defendant
respectively bear to the total fault of them both.
Under the UCFA and Apportionment of Liability, this allocation
will frequentlySQthough by no means alwaysSQnot be made until after
judgment. For that reason, it has been subject to the justifiable
criticism that it may be somewhat unwieldy, administratively
burdensome, and may tend to undermine the finality of judgments.48
48
In rejecting the reallocation approach in strict
liability in tort cases, the Texas Supreme Court stated in Duncan
v. Cessna Aircraft Co., 665 S.W.2d 414, 429 n.9 (Tex. 1984):
81
However, these criticisms are not applicable to the position taken
by this opinion, which is that the allocation will always be made
in the judgment, and that there is no reason to make any defendant
the plaintiff's collection agent for any portion of the damages for
which plaintiff bears the ultimate responsibility. We turn now
briefly to the mechanics of allocation in the judgment.
Mechanics of Judgment Damages Allocation
Let us revert to our collision involving Exxon's crew boat,
the shrimper, and the small pleasure craft. Exxon sues one or both
of the other two vessels for the damages to its crew boat. There
is no problem if Exxon is not at fault, for then the fault of any
defendant (no matter how many are at fault) will necessarily be one
hundred percent of the combined fault of Exxon and that defendant,
so that defendant is liable for one hundred percent of Exxon's
damages. Likewise, there is no problem if Exxon is at fault, but
of the other two vessels only the shrimper is found at fault, the
pleasure craft either being found not at fault or no finding being
made as to its fault (as might often be the case if it were not a
party). In that situation, all agree that Exxon recovers from the
"An alternative would be to reallocate the insolvent
tortfeasor's share of liability among all parties whose
actions or products were a cause of the injuries,
including the negligent plaintiff. This suggestion is
attractive and was endorsed by a distinguished Special
Committee of the Tort and Compensation Section of the
State Bar. As a judicial rule, however, reallocating the
insolvent's share would create problems of post-trial
jurisdiction and finality of judgments."
No such problems of post-trial jurisdiction and judgment finality
are implicated in the approach taken by this dissent.
82
shrimper the same fraction of its total damages as its fault is of
the total fault of itself and the shrimper. A problem arises only
if Exxon, the shrimper, and the pleasure craft are all three found
to be guilty of causative fault. Assume each is assessed one-third
of the fault and that Exxon's total damages are $100,000. The
judgment should award Exxon a total recovery of $66,666.67 (2/3rds
of $100,000),49 with provision that no more than $50,000 (1/3 ÷ 2/3
x $100,000) thereof may be collected from the shrimper and no more
than $50,000 (1/3 ÷ 2/3 x $100,000) thereof may be collected from
the pleasure craft.50 If the causative fault percentages are
changed somewhat, to correspond to those in this case, so that
Exxon's percentage of fault is 20%, the shrimper's is 20%, and the
pleasure craft's is 60%, then the judgment should award Exxon a
total recovery of $80,000 (80% of $100,000), with provision that no
more than $50,000 (20/40 x $100,000) thereof may be collected from
the shrimper and no more than $75,000 (60/80 x $100,000) thereof
from the pleasure craft.51 In other words, in such a situation the
49
No one contends that the total judgment should be for
other than $66,666.67. And, all would agree that a plaintiff
suffering total damages of $100,000 and found 20% at fault, with
each of the two defendants being 40% at fault, may not recover
$66,666.67 (40/60 x 100,000) from each of the two defendants for a
total of $133,333.33.
50
The judgment would further provide that if a defendant
paid more on the judgment than $33,333.33 (1/3 x $100,000), such
defendant would be entitled to contribution from the other
defendant in the amount of the excess so paid.
51
In this instance the judgment would also provide that if
the shrimper paid more than $20,000 (20% of $100,000) on the
judgment it would be entitled to contribution from the pleasure
craft for the excess, and that if the pleasure craft paid more than
$60,000 (60% of $100,000) on the judgment it would be entitled to
83
total judgment is for the amount which equals the same fraction of
plaintiff's total damages as the total fault of all except the
plaintiff is of the total fault of all including the plaintiff; but
the judgment will provide that the plaintiff may not recover more
of said sum from any particular defendant than the amount which
equals the same fraction of plaintiff's total damages as that
particular defendant's fault is of the total fault of both
plaintiff and that particular defendant. For example, if plaintiff
suffers total damages of $100,000 and is 10% at fault, defendant A
is 40%, defendant B is 30%, and defendant C is 20% at fault, then
plaintiff's total judgment is for $90,000, but provides that no
more than $80,000 (40/50 x $100,000) thereof may be collected from
defendant A, no more than $75,000 (30/40 x $100,000) thereof may be
collected from defendant B, and no more than $66,666.67 (20/30 x
$100,000) thereof may be collected from defendant C.52
This simple system will work in all cases and serve to
authorize appropriate recovery, while at the same time limiting any
contribution from the shrimper for the excess.
52
The judgment would also provide that any defendant who
paid more on the judgment than his percentage of the total fault of
all parties multiplied by plaintiff's total damages ($40,000 for
defendant A) would be entitled to contribution from any other
defendant who paid less than his percentage of the total fault of
all parties multiplied by plaintiff's total damages ($30,000 for
defendant B; $20,000 for defendant C) to the extent of the lesser
of the excess or the deficiency. Thus if A paid $45,000 on the
judgment, B paid only $27,000, and C paid only $18,000, A would be
entitled to $3,000 in contribution from B, and $2,000 in
contribution from C. Of course, complications could arise if
contribution were uncollectible from one defendant, but no more so
than in any case in which there are three or more liable defendants
and the plaintiff is not negligent.
84
particular defendant's ultimate potential liability to an amount no
greater than the fraction of plaintiff's damages which is that
defendant's percentage of fault divided by the total of the
percentages of fault of the plaintiff and that defendant.
If it is desired that the expression of this result in the
judgment be in terms of some several liability and some joint and
several liability, then that, too, can be accomplished, although in
some cases an algebraic formula must be employed. A case such as
this, with only the plaintiff and two defendants at fault, will be
by far the most frequent instance in which any allocation question
arises, and in such an instance a fairly simple set of steps may
also be utilized to arrive at the appropriate several and joint and
several liability figures to be set forth in the judgment. Assume
plaintiff's total damages are $100,000, and, as here, causative
fault is distributed 20% to the plaintiff, 60% to defendant A, and
20% to defendant B. First plaintiff's maximum recovery is
calculated at $80,000 (80% of $100,000); then the maximum liability
of defendant A is calculated at $75,000 (60/80 x $100,000) and the
maximum liability of defendant B is calculated at $50,000 (20/40 x
$100,000), all as above explained. Next, the amount of A's maximum
liability ($75,000) is subtracted from plaintiff's maximum recovery
($80,000), the result being $5,000 ($80,000 - $75,000 = $5,000),
which is the several liability of B. Next, the amount of B's
maximum liability ($50,000) is likewise subtracted from plaintiff's
maximum recovery ($80,000), the result being $30,000 ($80,000 -
$50,000 = $30,000), which is the several liability of A. Then, the
85
several liability of B ($5,000) and the several liability of A
($30,000) are added together, and the total of $35,000 ($30,000 +
$5,000 = $35,000) is subtracted from plaintiff's maximum recovery
($80,000), the result being $45,000, which is the joint and several
liability of A and B. Cast in this form, plaintiff would have
judgment against A alone for $30,000, and also against B alone for
$5,000, and further against A and B jointly and severally for an
additional $45,000. These figures total $80,000 ($45,000 + $30,000
+ $5,000 = $80,000). B's exposure is limited to $50,000 ($45,000
+ $5,000 = $50,000); and A's exposure is limited to $75,000
($45,000 + $30,000 = $75,000). Contribution would also be provided
for as between B and C (see note 22, supra).
In certain circumstances where three or more defendants and
the plaintiff are each found guilty of causative faultSQsurely an
extremely rare occurrenceSQan algebraic formula must be employed to
arrive at the appropriate amounts of the several liability of each
defendant and of the joint liability. Appropriate formulas are set
out in the appendix to this dissent. It is important to recall,
however, that it will always suffice to simply provide in the
judgment a maximum amount which may be collected from each
particular defendant, which is easily arrived at merely by
multiplying the plaintiff's total damages by the fraction whose
numerator is that particular defendant's percentage of the total
fault of all parties and whose denominator is the total of that
particular defendant's and the plaintiff's respective percentages
of the total fault of all parties. As previously noted, a judgment
86
in that form, with appropriate provisions for contribution (see
notes 22 and 23, supra) will be wholly adequate.53
53
The majority (majority op. fn. 13) mistakenly suggests
that a judgment in the simple form suggested (limiting a
negligent plaintiff's recovery from any one defendant to the
fraction of plaintiff's damages represented by that defendant's
percentage of the total negligence of all parties at fault
divided by the total of that defendant's and the plaintiff's
respective percentages of the total fault of all parties)
produces an ultimately different result from that produced by the
algebraic formula (providing for some several and some joint and
several liability) in situations involving three (or more)
defendants, only one of whom is insolvent. That is simply wrong.
Take the case of a plaintiff, sustaining $100,000 total damages,
who is 25% at fault, and three defendants (D1, D2, and D3), each
of whom is likewise 25% at fault. The simple form judgment here
recommended would provide plaintiff a total recovery of $75,000,
not more than $50,000 of which could be collected from any one
defendant, and with provision that any defendant paying less than
$25,000 would be subject to contribution from any defendant
paying more than that. The judgment formulated in terms of both
several and joint liability would similarly award plaintiff a
total recovery of $75,000, composed of $12,500 several liability
of each of the three defendants plus $37,500 joint and several
liability of the three together (see appendix par. 1(d), example
2), and would likewise provide that any defendant paying less
than $25,000 would be subject to contribution from any defendant
paying more than that. In each instance the maximum amount
plaintiff can recover in total ($75,000) and the maximum he can
recover from any one defendant ($50,000) are the same.
The majority posits the situation where (as it eventuates
after judgment) nothing is collectible from D3, so that plaintiff
might then choose to collect $50,000 from D1 and $25,000 from D2
(instead of $37,500 from each), which is unfair to D1, because
contribution is not collectible from D3 (who is insolvent) and is
not provided for in the judgment as to D2 (as D2 has paid
$25,000). But this is a fault shared by both forms of judgment.
Importantly, it is also a fault in the form of judgment the
majority espouses, namely an award to the plaintiff of $75,000
against all three defendants jointly and severally, with
provision for contribution in favor of any defendant paying more
than $25,000 against any paying less. In that situation,
plaintiff may also choose to collect $50,000 from D1 and $25,000
from D2, and D1 is then in the exact same fix. To the extent the
majority understands the matterSQand it is by no means clear that
it doesSQit is simply the pot calling the kettle black.
Of course, in any case it could be further provided that to
the extent any defendant was unable to pay its full equitable
share ($25,000 in our above three-defendant example) the level at
87
General Maritime Law
The majority concludes that it has always been a clearly
established rule of United States general maritime law that in our
hypothetical collision involving the three vessels, if all three
were equally at fault the crew boat could recover two-thirds of its
damages from the shrimper even though the shrimper was no more at
fault than the crew boat. Not surprisingly, however, the majority
cites no Supreme Court opinion so holding or stating, and only some
general language in a few scattered lower court decisions, the
earliest being in 1968, which do not directly address the question.
First, some background.
In The Catherine, 58 U.S. [17 How.] 170, 15 L.Ed. 233 (1855),
two vessels collided, each being at fault. The Supreme Court held
that the total loss should be divided equally, thus allowing a
party to recover despite its own negligence, albeit only half of
its loss. The Court stated:
which the remaining two defendants became obligated for or
entitled to contribution would increase by their relative share
(here 50% for D1 and D2 each, as they are equally at fault) of
the deficiency, so that in the example if D3 could pay none of
his $25,000 equitable share, then D1 (who paid plaintiff $50,000)
could collect $12,500 in contribution from D2 (who paid $25,000
but is exposed to an additional $12,500 in contribution liability
by being allocated for this purpose 50% of the $25,000
uncollectible from D3). The merits or demerits of such an
approach to contribution do not vary as between the judgment
espoused by the majority ($75,000 for plaintiff as against all
three defendants jointly and severally) and either of the forms
espoused by this dissent ($75,000 for plaintiff but not more than
$50,000 from any one defendant, or $12,500 from each of three
defendants severally plus $37,500 from all three jointly).
The majority's example of a negligent plaintiff and three
negligent defendants, only one being insolvent, is simply a red
herring, whether in its plain vanilla form or with its
contribution problem overlay.
88
". . . [I]t becomes necessary to settle the rule of
damages in a case where both vessels are in fault.
The question, we believe, has never until now come
distinctly before this court for decision. The rule that
prevails in the District and Circuit Courts, we
understand, has been to divide the loss. . . .
This seems to be the well-settled rule in the
English admiralty. . . .
Under the circumstances usually attending these
disasters, we think the rule deviding [sic] the loss the
most just and equitable, and as best tending to induce
care and vigilance on both sides in the navigation."
Id., 58 U.S. at 177-178.
Thereafter, in The Washington, 76 U.S. [9 Wall] 513, 19 L.Ed. 787
(1869), a passenger on a ferry, who sustained serious personal
injury when the ferry and the steamboat Washington collided,
libeled both vessels, each of which was found at fault. The
libelant-passenger, of course, was not at fault. The Supreme Court
stated:
"Both vessels being in fault, both were liable to
the libelant, and both could be proceeded against in the
same libel. The damages were properly apportioned
equally between the two vessels, the right being reserved
to the libelant to collect the entire amount of either of
them in case of the inability of the other to respond for
her portion." Id., 76 U.S. at 516.
The same result obtained in The Alabama, 92 U.S. 695, 23 L.Ed. 763
(1876), where the bark Ninfa, in tow of the tug Game-Cock, collided
with the Alabama. The Ninfa libeled both The Game-Cock and The
Alabama. "[B]oth The Alabama and The Game-Cock were in fault, and
. . . The Ninfa, which was in tow of The Game-Cock, and suffered
the loss, was not in fault." 92 U.S. at 695-96. "The district
court rendered a decree against both [The Alabama and The Game-
Cock] for the whole [of The Ninfa's loss], regarding them as liable
89
in solido. The circuit court, on appeal reversed this decree, and
divided the loss between them, rendering a decree against each for
one half the amount." Id. at 696. The Ninfa appealed to the
Supreme Court, which held:
"Conceding, therefore, that a vessel in tow, and
without fault, is to be regarded as sustaining the same
relation to the collision which is sustained by cargo
(and it seems fair thus to consider it), we think that
the decree of the circuit court was erroneous, and that
a decree ought to be made against The Alabama and The
Game-Cock, and the respective stipulators, severally,
each for one moiety of the entire damage, interest, and
costs, so far as the stipulated value of said vessel
shall extend; and any balance of such moiety, over and
above such stipulated value of either vessel, or which
the libelant shall be unable to collect or enforce, shall
be paid by the other vessel or her stipulators to the
extent of the stipulated value thereof, beyond the moiety
due from said vessel.
This is substantially the form of decree sanctioned
by this court in The Washington and The Gregory, 9 Wall.
516, 19 L. ed. 788, a case involving similar principles,
although the particular point was not fully discussed in
that case." Id. at 697-98 (emphasis added).
Next came The Atlas, 93 U.S. 302, 23 L.Ed. 863 (1876), so
heavily relied on, and evidently misunderstood, by the majority.
There, a canal boat laden with cargo was under tow by The Kate when
the canal boat and The Atlas collided, and as a result the canal
boat sank and its cargo was lost. The subrogated insurers of the
cargo libeled The Atlas alone, and it was the only vessel before
the court, as The Kate was not brought in. Id. at 308-309. The
district court found that the cargo loss was "caused by the mutual
fault of the steam-tug Kate and the steamboat Atlas, and that the
libelants do recover against the steamboat Atlas one half of the
damages by them sustained . . . ." Id. at 309. The libelants
90
appealed, and the Supreme Court held that, as The Kate was not a
party to the suit and The Atlas had not attempted to bring it in,
the libelants, innocent of any wrongdoing, were entitled to recover
their full damages against The Atlas, not simply one half. The
Court cites The Washington with full approval and states that
"[m]uch care was taken in framing the decree in that case." The
Atlas at 318. The Court explains its holding as follows:
"Contributory negligence on the part of the libelant
cannot defeat a recovery in collision cases . . . .
Proof of the kind will defeat a recovery at common law;
but the rule in the admiralty is, that the loss in such
a case must be apportioned between the offending vessels,
as having been occasioned by the fault of both; but the
rule of the common law and of the admiralty is the same
where the suit is promoted by an innocent party, except
that the moiety rule may be applied in the admiralty, if
all the parties are before the court, and each of the
wrong-doers is liable to respond for his share of the
damage. Subject to that qualification, the remedy of the
innocent party is substantially the same in the admiralty
as in an action at law, the rule being, that in both he
is entitled to an entire compensation from the wrong-doer
for the injury suffered by the collision. . . .
Goods shipped as cargo, and their owners, as in the
case before the court, are innocent of all wrong; and the
owners of the cargo may sue the owners of one of the
ships, or both, and they may sue at law or go into the
admiralty, at their election, and having proved their
case, they are as much entitled to full compensation in
the admiralty as they would have been if they had elected
to pursue their common law remedy, saved to them by the
proviso contained in the 9th section of the Judiciary
Act. 1 Stat. at L., 77.
Co-wrong-doers, not parties to the suit, cannot be
decreed to pay any portion of the damage adjudged to the
libelant, nor is it a question in this case whether the
party served may have process to compel the other wrong-
doers to appear and respond to the alleged wrongful act.
. . . .
Parties without fault, such as shippers and
consignees, bear no part of the loss in collision suits,
91
and are entitled to full compensation for the damage
which they suffer from the wrong-doers, and they may
pursue their remedy in personam, either at common law or
in the admiralty, against the wrong-doers or any one or
more of them, whether they elect to proceed at law or in
the admiralty courts." Id. at 316-319 (emphasis added).
Plainly, The Atlas intended no departure from the moiety rule
of The Washington and The Alabama, but did not apply it solely
because the other vessel at fault, The Kate, was not before the
Court, and no one had tried to bring her in. Just as plainly, the
majority errs in suggesting that The Atlas' numerous references to
plaintiffs who are "without fault" or "innocent of all wrong" are
explainable as having been made fourteen years before the bar of
contributory negligence was lifted by The Max Morris, 11 S.Ct. 29
(1890). However, at least since the 1855 decision in The
Catherine, contributory negligence had been no bar. Moreover, The
Atlas was a collision case, its remarks were directed to such
cases, and it openly recognized that "[c]ontributory negligence on
the part of the libelant cannot defeat a recovery in collision
cases" although "[p]roof of the kind will defeat a recovery at
common law; but the rule in the admiralty is, that the loss in such
a case must be apportioned between the offending vessels." Id. at
316-317. The majority has clearly misread The Atlas.
The Juniata, 93 U.S. 337, 23 L.Ed. 930 (1876), follows the
same principles as The Atlas.54
54
The Juniata involved a collision between the steam tug
Neafie, towing a flatboat belonging to the United States, and the
steamship Juniata, as a result of which the flatboat and The Neafie
were lost and The Neafie's owner, Pursglove, suffered serious
personal injuries. Pursglove and the United States each filed
separate libels against The Juniata, which were tried together.
92
However, where both vessels at fault are before the court, the
proper decree in favor of an innocent third party (such as a
passenger, a tow, or cargo) continued to be the "moiety" rule,
granting judgment for half the innocent party's damages against
each of the two offending vessels, with provision that if the
libelant should be unable to collect from one vessel its moiety,
the other vessel would then be responsible for the deficiency. In
such a case, it was reversible error to enter a judgment for the
innocent plaintiff's damages against both vessels at fault jointly.
See, e.g., The Sterling, 1 S.Ct. 89 (1882), where the Court stated:
"This was a suit in admiralty against the ship Sterling
and tow-boat Equator, for damages sustained by the bark
Sif in a collision. Both the ship and tow-boat were
found to be in fault, and they were condemned in solido
for the whole amount of the loss. From a decree to that
effect this appeal was taken.
The district court found both The Neafie and The Juniata at fault
and held The Juniata liable to the United States and to Pursglove
for half their respective total damages (Pursglove's being
primarily for personal injuries). In Pursglove's case this
judgment was affirmed, "fault on both sides being established, an
apportionment of the damages necessarily followed." Id. at 339.
But it was held that the United States was entitled to all its
damages against The Juniata because the United States was not at
fault and The Neafie (and Pursglove) were not parties to the United
States' libel:
"The branch of the case relative to the United
States is upon a different footing. Their flatboat is
neither alleged nor proved to have been in anywise in
fault. The principle of apportionment has, therefore, no
application to them. Their boat not being inculpated,
they are entitled to full damages. The decree of the
circuit court is erroneous in not giving it to them.
We should adjudge that half the amount should be
paid by the tug [The Neafie], and the other half by the
steamer [The Juniata], but that the libel of the United
States is against the steamer alone. The tug, therefore,
cannot be reached in this proceeding." Id. at 340.
93
It is conceded that upon the facts found the owners
of the Sif are entitled to a decree against the ship and
the tow-boat, as both were in fault. The well-
established rule in such cases is to apportion the
damages equally between the two offending vessels, the
right being reserved to the libelant to collect the
entire amount from either of them in case of the
inability of the other to respond for her portion. . . .
[citations] As in this case the decree was against both
vessels for the full amount of the loss, it should be
modified so as to be against the Sterling and the
Equator, and their respective stipulators, severally,
each for one-half of the entire damage and costs; any
balance of such half which the libelant shall not be able
to enforce against either vessel to be paid by the other
vessel or her stipulators." Id. at 89-90.55
55
See also, e.g., The Hudson, 15 Fed. 162, 164 (S.D.N.Y.
1883):
"This decision [referring to The Atlas], however,
was not designed to affect, and does not affect in any
degree, the right of the owners of the several vessels
liable to have among themselves an apportionment of the
damages whenever all the parties are before the court.
The rule in the admiralty in cases of negligence, as is
well known, is in direct opposition to the rule of the
common law. By the latter, if the plaintiff be guilty of
negligence, he recovers nothing; while in admiralty the
damages, whether to the libelant's vessel or to the
claimant's, or to the cargo of either, are apportioned
equally between the vessels in fault. And where the
innocent owner of the cargo, or of a tow in charge of one
vessel, sues and recovers against both vessels, the
libelant cannot recover a judgment in solido against both
for his whole damage, with a right to levy his execution
in full against either alone, as at common law, but only
a judgment for a moiety of the damages against each
vessel, with an alternative right or recourse against
either for so much of the moiety adjudged to be paid by
the other as he is unable to collect from the latter.
This principle, first sanctioned by the judgment of the
supreme court in the case of The Washington and the
Gregory, 9 Wall. 513, 126, was afterwards, upon full
deliberation, reaffirmed in the case of The Alabama and
the Gamecock, 92 U.S. 695, and has been repeatedly
asserted in subsequent cases. The Virginia Ehrman, 97
U.S. 317; The City of Hartford, 97 U.S. 329, 330; The
Atlas, supra; The Civilta, 103 U.S. 699." (Emphasis
added).
94
And this rule continued to be enforced. Thus in Crain Brothers,
Inc. v. Wirman and Ward Company, 223 F.2d 256 (3d Cir. 1955), a
suit by innocent cargo against the barge charterer, Union, and
barge owner, Crain, who were both at fault, the Court stated:
"We disagree, however, with the manner in which
damages were awarded. Judgment was entered against both
Union and Crane in the full amount. In admiralty, we
have the rule of divided damages. . . . Where two
parties are jointly responsible for injury to a third,
each is primarily liable for only one-half the damages.
the charterer and owner of the barge should each be
assessed with one-half the cargo loss with a provision
that if the libellant cannot collect any part from one,
that amount should be assessed against the other in
addition to the one-half for which it is primarily
liable." Id. at 258.
See also Gilmore & Black, Admiralty (2d ed. 1975) at 528 ("Where a
third party is damaged, and sues two ships that are at fault, he is
not prejudiced by the half-damages rule, but may collect his full
damages from one if the other is unable to respond in damages, or
may collect any deficiency if one cannot pay its full half"
[footnote omitted]).56
56
When two vessels were at fault, but only one was sued, to
avoid being held liable to an innocent third party for that party's
entire loss, as in The Atlas and The Juniata, and to invoke the
"moiety" rule, the vessel sued would seek to bring in the other
vessel. This was originally allowed under the court's inherent
power. The Hudson, 15 Fed. 162, 172-176 (S.D.N.Y. 1883). This
practice was soon confirmed by the Supreme Court rule. See The Max
Morris, 11 S.Ct. 29 (1890), where, immediately after observing that
in The Atlas "the libelant was entitled to recover the entire
amount of its damages from The Atlas, the tug not having been
brought in as a party to the suit," the Court goes on to state:
"By rule 59 in admiralty, promulgated by this court March 26, 1883
. . . the claimant or respondent in a suit for damage by collision
may compel the libelant to bring in another vessel or party alleged
to have been in fault." The Max Morris, 11 S.Ct. at 31. See also
The Beaconsfield, 15 S.Ct. 860, 862-863 (1895). Although Rule 59
technically applied only in collision cases, admiralty courts soon
began to follow the same practice in non-collision cases and thus
95
in both types of cases this was the practice "for over 30 years,
sanctioned by rule in collision cases and by judicial decision in
non-collision cases. Finally, in 1921, the Admiralty Rules
expressly broadened the third-party practice to all maritime cases,
providing for it in new Admiralty Rule 56." 3 Moore's Federal
Practice (2d ed.) ¶ 14.31[2] at 14-161. When the Admiralty Rules
were merged with the Rules of Civil Procedure in 1966, this feature
of admiralty practice was recognized in Fed. R. Civ. P. 14(c),
allowing the defendant in admiralty cases to "bring in a third
party defendant who may be wholly or partly liable . . . to the
plaintiff." See 3 Moore's Federal Practice (2d ed.) ¶ 14.31[1], ¶
14.31[3]. The Advisory Committee Notes to the 1966 amendments to
Rule 14 explain this aspect of Rule 14(c) as follows:
"Rule 14 was modeled on Admiralty Rule 56. An
important feature of Admiralty Rule 56 was that it
allowed impleader not only of a person who might be
liable to the defendant by way of remedy over, but also
of any person who might be liable to the plaintiff. The
importance of this provision was that the defendant was
entitled to insist that the plaintiff proceed to judgment
against the third-party defendant. In certain cases this
was a valuable implementation of a substantive right.
For example, in a case of ship collision where a finding
of mutual fault is possible, one shipowner, if sued
alone, faces the prospect of an absolute judgment for the
full amount of the damage suffered by an innocent third-
party; but if he can implead the owner of the other
vessel, and if mutual fault is found, the judgment
against the original defendant will be in the first
instance only for a moiety of the damages; liability for
the remainder will be conditioned on the plaintiff's
inability to collect from the third-party defendant."
(Emphasis added).
The majority suggests (majority op. fn. 18) that these
principles have no application to "maritime personal injury cases."
However, The Washington was solely a "maritime personal injury"
case, and the Supreme Court held that "[t]he damages were properly
apportioned equally between the two vessels, the right being
reserved to the [innocent] libelant to collect the entire amount of
either of them in case of the inability of the other to respond for
her portion." Id., 76 U.S. at 516. See also The Juniata (personal
injury). The majority's unsupported suggestion (fn. 18) that these
principles went out with the "nineteenth century" is similarly
misguided, as the above quotation from the Advisory Committee Notes
to the 1966 Rule 14 amendments reflect. See also, e.g., Crain
Brothers, Inc., 223 F.2d at 258; Empire Seafoods, Inc. v. Anderson,
398 F.2d 204, 217 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 89 S.Ct. 449 (1968).
Nor were these principles restricted to collision cases, as
96
The Max Morris was a personal injury suit by a longshoreman
against the vessel he was loading, and both parties having been
found at fault the question certified to the Supreme Court was
whether "the libelant . . . is entitled to a decree for divided
damages," which the Supreme Court "answered in the affirmative."
Id. at 31, 33. The Court noted that under The Catherine fault did
not bar all recovery in collision cases, and, after discussing,
among other decisions, The Washington, The Alabama, The Juniata,
and Atlee v. Packett Co., 21 Wall. 389, 22 L.Ed. 619 (1875) (where
a vessel struck a pier), observed that "this court has extended the
rule of the division of damages to claims other than those for
damages to the vessels which were in fault in a collision." Id. at
32. The court then reviewed several lower court decisions
concerning damage to cargo or tows, caused by mutual fault but not
involving any collision, where the divided damages rule was applied
to allow some recovery despite the plaintiff's fault.57 The Court
reflected by the adoption in 1921 of Admiralty Rule 56, blessing
the line of judicial decisions which had extended The Hudson
principles to noncollision cases, and the carry forward of these
principles to Rule 14(c) in 1966.
57
See also Cooper Stevedoring Co., Inc. v. Fritz Kopke,
Inc., 94 S.Ct. 2174, 2176-2177 (1974), where the Court similarly
remarked on the breadth of the divided damages principle:
". . . [T]he principle of division of damages in
admiralty has, over the years, been liberally extended by
this Court in directions deemed just and proper. In one
line of cases, for example, the Court expanded the
doctrine to encompass not only damage to the vessels
involved in a collision, but personal injuries and
property damage caused innocent third parties as well. .
. . In other cases, the Court has recognized the
application of the rule of divided damages in
circumstances not involving a collision between two
97
concluded that these cases had properly held that the libelant's
fault should only diminish recovery, not completely bar it, and
that such a rule was appropriate "as in harmony with the rule for
the division of damages in cases of collision." Id. at 33.
Accordingly, it held that the libelant "is entitled to a decree for
divided damages." Id.58
There are basically two things that one can say about all
these cases. First, none of them involved a situation in which the
instant question could have ever been presented; that is, none
involved a negligent plaintiff and at least two negligent other
parties or actors. Second, the general maritime law did not
slavishly follow the common law. Nor was the only difference that
admiralty allowed the negligent plaintiff some (albeit diminished)
recovery, for the innocent plaintiff's rights were also somewhat
different, as Judge Addison Brown explained in The Hudson, 15 F.
162, 164 (S.D.N.Y. 1883):
vessels, as where a ship strikes a pier due to the fault
of both the shipowner and the pier owner, . . . or where
a vessel goes aground in a canal due to the negligence of
both the shipowner and the canal company. . . ."
58
The Court further remarked:
"Whether in a case like this the decree should be
for exactly one-half of the damages sustained, or might,
in the discretion of the court, be for a greater or less
proportion of such damages, is a question not presented
for our determination upon this record, and we express no
opinion upon it." Id.
Cf. The Lackawanna, 151 Fed. 491, 496 (S.D.N.Y. 1907)
(awarding injured negligent ferryboat passenger 1/3 recovery
against ferryboat, as his conduct "constituted negligence . . . to
a greater degree than that of the ferryboat.").
98
"And where the innocent owner of the cargo, or of a tow
in charge of one vessel, sues and recovers against both
vessels, the libelant cannot recover a judgment in solido
against both for his whole damage, with a right to levy
his execution in full against either alone, as at common
law, but only a judgment for a moiety of the damages
against each vessel, with an alternative right of
recourse against either for so much of the moiety
adjudged to be paid by the other as he is unable to
collect from the latter." (Emphasis added).
Of course, United States v. Reliable Transfer Co., 95 S.Ct.
1708 (1975), abandoned the rule that loss was always to be divided
equallySQor per vesselSQamong vessels at fault, and held that
instead the allocation was to be based on the actual comparative
fault of each.59 However, there is nothing to indicate that the
divided damages rule or its operation was changed otherwise than by
replacing automatic equal per vessel at fault allocation with
allocation by actual comparative degree of fault. The allocation
was merely made more precise, so as to be fairer.60
Suppose in The Juniata (see note 25, supra) the libelant
United States had also been at fault equally with The Juniata.
Would it have recovered two-thirds of its loss from The Juniata
59
Reliable Transfer states its holding as follows:
"We hold that when two or more parties have contributed
by their fault to cause property damage in a maritime
collision or stranding, liability for such damage is to
be allocated among the parties proportionately to the
comparative degree of their fault, and that liability for
such damages is to be allocated equally only when the
parties are equally at fault or when it is not possible
fairly to measure the comparative degree of their fault."
Id. at 1715-16.
60
See, e.g., Edmonds v. Compagnie Generale
Transatlantique, 99 S.Ct. 2753, 2762 n.30 (1979) ("Reliable
Transfer merely changed the apportionment from equal division to
division on the basis of relative fault.").
99
because the proof showed that The Neafie also was guilty of equal
fault, even though the United States libeled only The Juniata (and
The Neafie was not brought in)? No authority suggests such a
perverse result. Suppose that the United States libeled both The
Juniata and The Neafie, and all three were found equally at fault.
The United States would then presumably have recovery for one-third
of its damages against The Juniata and The Neafie each, but what
would the United States' alternative right of recovery be if, for
example, the full third could not be collected from The Neafie?
Could the United States then collect all of that shortfall from The
Juniata, or only half of it? The only decision we have found
addressing this question is Petition of Kinsman Transit Company,
338 F.2d 708 (2d Cir. 1964), cert. denied, 85 S.Ct. 1026 (1965),
decided by a distinguished panel of the Second Circuit. There
three parties, the City of Buffalo, Continental Grain Company, and
Kinsman Transit Company, were each at fault and each suffered
damages. Kinsman, however, was held entitled to limit its
liability under the Limitations of Vessel Owner's Liability Act, 46
U.S.C. §§ 181-188. Judge Friendly, writing for himself and Judges
Waterman and Moore,61 held as follows:
"A separate problem is how to deal, among the
negligent parties, with that part of Kinsman's
responsibility of which its limitation frees it. We
think the fair solution is to divide that deficiency
equally between Buffalo and Continental, rather than to
hold Continental liable to Buffalo for the entire
unsatisfied portion of Kinsman's share and vice versa. .
. .
61
Judge Moore dissented in part as to other aspects of the
case. 338 F.2d at 727-728.
100
The decree is modified so that the City of Buffalo
may recover two-thirds of the damages to its property
from Continental and Kinsman subject to limitation by the
latter but with Continental bearing only half of
Kinsman's deficiency, that Continental may recover two-
thirds of the damages to its property from the City and
Kinsman subject to limitation by the latter but with the
City bearing only half of Kinsman's deficiency, and that
Kinsman, which made no claim against Continental, may
recover half of the damages suffered by [Kinsman's
vessel] the Shiras at the bridge from the City of
Buffalo, which may then obtain contribution of half that
amount from Continental." Id. at 726.
KinsmanSQwhich is squarely contrary to the majority's approach
SQis directly on point and should control. We are aware of no
contrary authority.
The few decisions cited by the majority are not persuasive of
a contrary result. The only relevant issue in Empire Seafoods,
Inc. v. Anderson, 398 F.2d 204 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 89 S.Ct.
449 (1968), was whether Anderson and Gates, two employees of
Cleary, a contractor working on a bridge, should have been awarded
recovery directly against Cleary, as well as against Empire, whose
vessel struck the bridge and who was awarded recovery over against
Cleary for half of what the judgment required it to pay Anderson
and Gates. All parties were at fault. There was no issue on
appeal as to how much Anderson and Gates should recover from either
Cleary or Empire, but only whether their recovery could be directly
against Cleary at all or, if not, whether whatever they were
awarded against Empire could be included as Empire's damages in
Empire's action against Cleary. In our initial opinion, we held
Anderson and Gates could recover directly from Cleary, as well as
101
Empire, and supported this by quoting with approval the following
passage from Benedict on Admiralty § 416 (6th ed. 1940), viz:
"'The decree, therefore, should provide that each vessel
. . . pay one-half of the entire damages, interest and
costs, . . . and it should further provide that any part
of the one-half damages assessed against either vessel,
which libelant may not be able to collect from that
vessel, be assessed against the other vessel, in addition
to the one-half which she is in the first instance
compelled to pay.'" Empire at 217.
Recognizing that this text was addressing liability for the damages
of an innocent third party62SQas is obvious from the reference to
the two vessels at fault each being primarily liable for "one-half
of the entire damages"SQour original opinion appended a footnote at
the end of the above quotation, as follows:
"21. The authorities state the rule in terms of 'innocent
third parties.' While it might be argued that these
authorities can have no application to the instant
situation since Anderson and Gates were negligent, we are
convinced that the reduction of their respective
recoveries under the comparative negligence doctrine is
to be considered full penalty for their fault and that
they must, thereafter, be treated in the same manner as
'innocent third parties.'" Empire at 217 n.21.
62
Thus Benedict on Admiralty § 416 (6th ed. 1940),
commences by stating in relevant part:
"Where suit in rem is brought by a party, e.g., a
cargo owner, on a cause of action against two vessels,
for damages caused by a collision between such vessels,
or is brought by an innocent third party on a cause of
action involving more than one vessel . . . [e]ach
vessel, if there be two at fault, is primarily liable for
one-half of the damages . . . [b]ut when one vessel is
not able to respond for one-half of the damages, the
other must make up the deficiency." Id. at 184-85.
Then follows the "[t]he decree, therefore," language which we
quoted in Empire.
102
But, this footnote does not addressSQand there was no issue before
our Empire panel concerningSQwhether the plaintiff, whose
negligence is equal to that of each of the two defendants so that
each defendant is initially liable for a third of damages, if
unable to recover his third from one of the defendants may then
recover it all from the other, or may recover only half of the
deficiency, as in Kinsman. Moreover, on rehearing in Empire we
withdrew our holding that Anderson and Gates could recover directly
from ClearySQthe holding made in that portion of the opinion to
which footnote 21 was appendedSQand stated: "Upon reconsideration,
we are convinced that what we said about the District Court decree
in our original opinion was apropos only to those instances where,
aside from a statutory prohibition, an innocent third party is
injured by the mutual fault of vessels in a collision." Empire at
217.
The majority also relies on Gele v. Chevron Oil Co., 574 F.2d
243 (5th Cir. 1978), involving a collision between a pleasure craft
and a Chevron structure in the Gulf of Mexico in which Gele, a
guest on the pleasure craft, was injured. The district court held
Chevron solely at fault. On appeal, both Gele and Chevron
contended that the pleasure craft, operated by Herr, was also at
fault, and we agreed. We remanded to determine whether or not Gele
also played such a role in the pleasure craft's operation so as to
be chargeable with its fault, and the degrees of comparative fault
as between the pleasure craft and Chevron. We next held that
neither Chevron nor Herr were liable to the other in indemnity.
103
Immediately following this latter holding appears the following
passage relied on by the majority here, viz:
"This decision, of course, does not affect Gele's right
to collect all his damages from one party in the event he
is unable to obtain the relative portion of damages from
each party at fault. Empire Seafoods, Inc. v. Anderson,
5 Cir., 1968, 398 F.2d 204, 217, 1968 A.M.C. 2664, cert.
denied, 393 U.S. 983, 89 S.Ct. 449, 21 L.Ed.2d 444."
Gele at 251 (emphasis added).
This passage appears to address only a situation in which Gele
was not chargeable with any fault, as else he would not be entitled
to "collect all his damages" from anyone (and reference to his
collection "from each party at fault" would likewise be
inappropriate).63 In any event, there is nothing to indicate that
there was any issue before the Gele court concerning how much Gele,
if negligent, could recover from Chevron or Herr in the event that
collection could not be affected from one of them. As to the issue
now before us, the quoted Gele language is no more than a passing
and inapposite remark.
The majority's reliance on Drake Towing Co., Inc. v. Meisner
Marine Const. Co., 765 F.2d 1060 (11th Cir. 1985), is plainly
63
We also observe that while Gele references the portion of
Empire at 398 F.2d 217, it does not specifically reference Empire's
footnote 21, which addresses negligent plaintiffs. The Empire text
at 398 F.2d 217 speaks to a situation where "'two parties are
responsible for injury to a third'" and hence "'each is primarily
liable for one-half the damages,'" the two responsible parties
"'should each pay one-half the damages,'" and if that cannot be
collected from one, the other will be obligated to make up the
deficiency. Such a scenario obviously contemplates a plaintiff not
guilty of any causative fault. Moreover, Empire's text at 398 F.2d
217 likewise includes the rehearing language that what was said in
that part of the original opinion "was apropos only to those
instances where . . . an innocent third party is injured by the
mutual fault of vessels."
104
misplaced. In that case, Drake's vessel was damaged when it struck
a piece of concrete left in the channel by Meisner. Drake sued
Meisner and the United States, the latter for its misplacement of
a marking buoy. However, Drake settled with Meisner prior to
trial. On trial, fault was allocated twenty percent to Drake,
twenty percent to the United States and sixty percent to Meisner,
and the district court awarded Drake judgment against the United
States for twenty percent of Drake's total damages. Drake
appealed, contending "that the district court erred in decreasing
its recovery against the United States by the percentage of
liability attributed to Meisner, a nonparty to the trial of the
case."64 The Eleventh Circuit agreed. Its holding, however, is
plainly contrary to McDermott, Inc. v. Am Clyde, 114 S.Ct. 1461
(1994). Just as the majority does here, the Drake Towing panel
relied on, and misread, Edmonds v. Compagnie General
Transatlantique, 99 S.Ct. 2753 (1979). See Drake Towing, 765 F.2d
at 1067. All that aside, however, the majority here clearly
misreads Drake Towing itself and wholly ignores its actual holding.
The majority relies on the opinion's statement that "Drake may
recover its entire damages, less that portion attributable to its
own fault, from the United States." Id. The majority apparently
believes that this means that the United States was charged with
all Meisner's fault and thus Drake was held entitled to recover
eighty percent of its damages from the United States. But, if that
64
The United States had not impleaded Meisner. Id. at
1068.
105
were so, then the Eleventh Circuit would simply have reformed the
judgment (or ordered the district court to do so) to so reflect
(there being no issue as to the amount of Drake's total damages).
However, that is not what the Eleventh Circuit did. Rather, it
held that "[t]he issue of Meisner's liability is irrelevant to the
determination of that of the United States," id. (emphasis added),
and the court "therefore remand[ed] the case to the district court
to reallocate liability between Drake and the United States without
considering the negligence of Meisner." Id. at 1068 (emphasis
added).65 In other words, Drake Towing held that the relevant
comparison was not, as the majority here would have it, that
between the negligence of Drake, on the one hand, and the combined
negligence of Meisner and the United States, on the other hand, but
rather was simply that between the negligence of Drake and the
negligence of the United States, without considering whether or to
what extent Meisner was negligent. Drake Towing does not support
the majority here; rather, it rejects the very position which the
majority contends for.
These are essentially the general maritime law cases cited by
the majority. They simply do not sustain its assertion of a well-
established general maritime law rule allowing a plaintiff, in an
accident or collision caused by his fault and that of two others
acting independently of each other, with each of the three equally
65
And, this is repeated at the end of the opinion where the
court says: "We vacate his [the district court's] allocation of
liability, however, and remand the case to allow him to reallocate
liability between Drake and the United States without considering
the responsibility of Meisner." Id. (emphasis added).
106
guilty, to hold either one of the other two liable for more than
half his damages. The decision that comes closest to really
addressing this issue is Kinsman, and it plainly supports the
approach advocated in this dissent. It is not contended that that
approach is well established either. The point simply is that the
issue is essentially open. We should choose the fairest and most
logical approach.
LHWCA Cases
The majority also relies on cases involving injuries covered
by the LHWCA, principally Pope & Talbot, Inc. v. Hawn, 74 S.Ct. 202
(1953), and Edmonds. These cases are plainly inapposite, as the
subject matter of the instant case is not within the scope of the
LHWCA, which does not reach injuries or activities within the
territorial waters of foreign nations.
Examination of these decisions likewise reveals not only that
they were driven by their LHWCA setting, as is made plain by
McDermott, but also that they did not purport to address or
consider the issue here presented.
In Pope & Talbot, Hawn, a ship repairman employed by Haenn,
was injured while on board Pope & Talbot's vessel. Hawn began
receiving LHWCA compensation payments from Haenn and then sued Pope
& Talbot for negligence, agreeing with Haenn to refund to it the
LHWCA payments it had made out of any sums Hawn recovered from Pope
& Talbot. Pope & Talbot brought in Haenn, seeking contribution or
indemnity from it. A jury found Pope & Talbot, Haenn, and Hawn
each negligent; seventeen-and-a-half percent negligence was
107
assigned to Hawn, but no percentage was assigned to either Haenn or
to Pope & Talbot, and it does not appear that any complaint was
ever made of this manner of submission. The district court
rendered judgment for Hawn against Pope & Talbot for 87½% of his
total damages and awarded Pope & Talbot contribution against Haenn
in the amount of half of Pope & Talbot's liability to Hawn (but not
more than Haenn's maximum potential LHWCA liability to Hawn). Hawn
v. Pope & Talbot, 99 F.Supp. 226 (E.D. Pa. 1951).66 On appeal, the
Third Circuit affirmed the award against Pope & Talbot, but
reversed the award against Haenn, holding that contribution was not
available. Hawn v. Pope & Talbot, 198 F.2d 800 (3d Cir. 1952).
The Supreme Court granted Pope & Talbot's application for
certiorari, but affirmed the Third Circuit. It held that under
Halcyon Lines v. Haenn Ship Ceiling & Refitting Corp., 72 S.Ct. 277
(1952), contribution against Haenn was barred. Pope & Talbot, 74
S.Ct. at 204.67 It likewise rejected Pope & Talbot's alternative
66
The judgment as finally entered awarded Hawn $29,700
against Pope & Talbot (87½% of Hawn's $36,000 total damages) and
awarded Pope & Talbot $8,331.35 in contribution against Haenn. The
$8,331.35 was calculated as being the sum of all LHWCA compensation
and medical payments previously made by Haenn to Hawn ($5,881.35)
plus the maximum remaining amount which Haenn could owe to Hawn in
the future as LHWCA compensation ($2,450). Id., 100 F.Supp. 338.
67
In Halcyon, Baccile, a ship repairmen employed by Haenn,
sued Halcyon for injuries incurred on its vessel. Halcyon brought
in Haenn; by agreement of all parties, a $65,000 judgment was
rendered for Baccile against Halcyon. A jury found Haenn 75% at
fault and Halcyon 25%, and the district court granted Halcyon
judgment for contribution against Haenn in the amount of $32,500.
Baccile v. Halcyon Lines, 89 F.Supp. 765 (E.D. Pa. 1950). The
Court of Appeals reformed the judgment so that the amount of
contribution awarded Halcyon could not exceed the amount Haenn
could have been compelled to pay Baccile under the LHWCA had he
elected to claim compensation thereunder. Baccile v. Halcyon
108
contention that because Hawn had agreed to refund his LHWCA
payments to Haenn out of his recovery from Pope & Talbot, therefore
"the judgment against it [Pope & Talbot] should be reduced by this
amount." Id. at 206. The Court rejected this contention as being
inconsistent with section 33 of the LHWCA and as in effect allowing
contribution from the employer contrary to Halcyon.68 The Court
Lines, 187 F.2d 403 (3d Cir. 1951). Haenn and Halcyon were both
granted review by the Supreme Court, which held that Halcyon was
not entitled to any contribution. The Court noted that: "Where
two vessels collide due to the fault of both, it is established
admiralty doctrine that the mutual wrongdoers shall share equally
the damages sustained by each, as well as personal injury and
property damage inflicted on innocent third parties." Halcyon, 72
S.Ct. at 279. It went on to observe that it had never expressly
authorized contribution in noncollision cases, but that several
lower courts had. Id. n.5. However, it further noted that "[b]oth
parties claim that the decision below limiting an employer's
liability for compensation to those uncertain amounts recoverable
under the Harbor Workers' Act is impractical and undesirable." Id.
at 279. Although recognizing that "[t]o some extent courts
exercising jurisdiction in maritime affairs have felt freer than
common-law courts in fashioning rules," id. at 280 (footnote
omitted), it declined to fashion a contribution rule in the case
before it. It then called attention to the LHWCA provisions for
liability without fault, scheduled contributions and abolition of
contributory fault and assumption of risk. Id. It noted that were
contribution available, it would be a question whether "the amount
of contribution should be limited by the Harbor Workers' Act." Id.
It concluded by stating, "In view of the foregoing, and because
Congress while acting in the field has stopped short of approving
the rule of contribution here urged, we think it would be
inappropriate for us to do so." Id. at 280-281.
Subsequently, in Cooper Stevedoring Co., Inc. v. Fritz Kopke,
Inc., 94 S.Ct. 2174 (1974), the Court allowed contribution in a
noncollision case, relying on the general maritime law collision
cases, id. at 2176-2177, and in effect holding that Halcyon was
entirely driven by the fact that contribution there was sought from
the LHWCA employer and that Halcyon was limited to that
circumstance. Id. at 2177-2178.
68
The Court stated:
"A weakness in this ingenious argument is that § 33 of
the Act has specific provisions to permit an employer to
109
likewise rejected Pope & Talbot's contention that "contributory
negligence should have been accepted as a complete bar to Hawn's
recovery," stating:
"The harsh rule of the common law under which
contributory negligence wholly barred an injured person
from recovery is completely incompatible with modern
admiralty policy and practice. Exercising its
traditional discretion, admiralty has developed and now
follows its own fairer and more flexible rule which
allows such consideration of contributory negligence in
mitigation of damages as justice requires. Petitioner
presents no persuasive arguments that admiralty should
now adopt a discredited doctrine which automatically
destroys all claims of injured persons who have
contributed to their injuries in any degree, however
slight. Pope & Talbot, 74 S.Ct. at 204-205 (emphasis
added; footnote omitted).69
That is just what this dissent asks for, a "fairer and more
flexible" rule allowing "consideration of contributory negligence
in mitigation of damages as justice requires."
Other than Pope & Talbot's "ingenious argument" that Hawn's
recovery from it should be reduced by what he received under the
LHWCA, which the Court rejected as contrary to LHWCA section 33
recoup his compensation payments out of any recovery from
a third person negligently causing such injuries. Pope
& Talbot's contention if accepted would frustrate this
purpose to protect employers who are subjected to
absolute liability by the Act. Moreover, reduction of
Pope & Talbot's liability at the expense of Haenn would
be the substantial equivalent of contribution which we
declined to require in the Halcyon case." Pope & Talbot,
74 S.Ct. at 206.
69
Pope & Talbot likewise rejected the notion that
Pennsylvania lawSQwhich barred any recovery for any degree of
contributory negligenceSQshould apply. Id. at 205. It further
refused to overrule Seas Shipping Co. v. Sieracki, 66 S.Ct. 872
(1946), and rejected the suggestion that a "Sieracki-seaman" could
not recover for vessel negligence as he was a species of seaman but
was not covered by the Jones Act. Id. at 206-207.
110
(see note 39, supra), Pope & Talbot's position vis-a-vis Hawn was
simply an all or nothing oneSQHawn should not recover at all from
it, not that his recovery was not properly calculated. The point
here in issue was simply not before the Court in Pope & Talbot, nor
did the Court there in any way address it.70 Pope & Talbot was an
LHWCA-driven case, and simply does not speak to the present
question.
We turn now to Edmonds, the majority's lead case. There,
Edmonds, a longshoreman, was injured in 1974 on a vessel in the
course of his employment. He received LHWCA compensation from his
employer, the stevedore, and brought suit against the vessel's
owner for negligence. The jury found Edmonds suffered a total of
$100,000 damages, that he was 10% at fault, that the vessel was 20%
at fault, and that the stevedore, which was not a party to the
suit, was 70% at fault. The district court granted judgment for
Edmonds against the vessel owner for $90,000. The Court of Appeals
held that Edmonds could recover no more than $20,000 from the
vessel owner, its percentage of the total fault of all three actors
times the total damages. Edmonds v. Compagnie General
Transatlantique, 577 F.2d 1153 (4th Cir. 1978). The Supreme Court
reversed, holding that Edmonds was entitled to recover $90,000 from
the vessel owner. Edmonds v. Compagnie General Transatlantique, 99
S.Ct. 2753 (1979).
70
Moreover, as neither Pope & Talbot's nor Haenn's
percentage of fault was found, it was not possible to compare
Hawn's percentage of fault to Pope & Talbot's alone, as
distinguished from Pope & Talbot's and Haenn's together.
111
Two things may be said about Edmonds. First, it was driven by
the LHWCA. Edmonds extensively reviews how the pure several
liability approach of the Court of Appeals would affect the
stevedore's and longshoreman's rights under the LHWCA and
particularly the 1972 amendments thereto. Id. at 2761-62. The
Court concludes by observing "we are mindful that here we deal with
an interface of statutory and judge-made law," id. at 2762, and
expressing reluctance to "knock out of kilter" the "delicate
balance" struck by Congress between the rights of longshoremen,
stevedores, and shipowners in the 1972 amendments to the LHWCA.
Id. at 2763. Any doubt on this score is surely removed by
McDermott where the Court states that "Edmonds was primarily a
statutory construction case and related to special interpretive
questions posed by the 1972 amendments to the Longshoremen's and
Harbor Workers' Compensation Act." McDermott, 114 S.Ct. at 1471.
This was not idle dicta, for in McDermott a principle argument of
respondents was that "the proportionate share rule," which
McDermott ultimately approved, "is inconsistent with Edmonds."
McDermott, 114 S.Ct. at 1471. Moreover, several courts, including
the Eleventh Circuit in Self v. Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co., 832
F.2d 1540, 1548 (11th Cir. 1987) ("bound by the Supreme Court's
guidance and the rule in Edmonds"), and this Court in Hernandez v.
M/V Rajaan, 841 F.2d 582, 591 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 109 S.Ct.
530 (1988) (following reasoning of Self), previously had rejected
the proportionate fault settlement credit rule adopted in McDermott
on the theory that it was inconsistent with Edmonds. We should
112
indeed be wary of again reading Edmonds too broadly. Finally, we
cannot ignore McDermott's express and apparently approving
reference to section 2 of the UCFA (quoted in note 11, supra),
particularly to that section's provision for "reallocation of
insolvent defendant's equitable share." McDermott at 1471 n.32
(see also id. n.31). Seemingly, McDermott considers such an
approach at least an unforeclosed option in the non-LHWCA context.
Second, all the parties and courts involved in Edmonds
considered only two alternatives, namely whether to apply pure
several liability, with the vessel being liable only for its 20%
share and bearing no part of the stevedore's 70%, or whether, on
the other hand, to apply joint and several liability, as would be
the case if the plaintiff had not been negligent, so that the
vessel would be liable for 90% and would bear all of the
stevedore's fault. No consideration was given to, and there was
even no recognition of, the possibility that the stevedore's fault
should simply be ignored or, what is essentially the same thing,
that the stevedore's fault should be allocated between the
longshoreman and the vessel in the same ratio that the negligence
of each bore to that of the other. Apart from its concern with the
LHWCA, the thrust of Edmonds amounts to a questioning of the
proposition that a third party's fault should reduce the liability
which the defendant would otherwise have. Edmonds cites no
authority or general principles addressing how the negligence of a
plaintiff is to be compared where there are two or more other
113
independent actors also guilty of causative fault.71 Edmonds'
approach in this respect is well illustrated by its posing of the
question: "'one is still left to wonder why the longshoreman
injured by the negligence of a third party should recover less when
his employer has also been negligent than when the employer has
been without fault.'" Id. at 2761 n.24 (emphasis added) (quoting
Zapico v. Bucyrus-Erie Co., 579 F.2d 714, 725 (2d Cir. 1978)).
There is no satisfactory answer to that question. This case poses
the flip side of the same question, namely why should negligent A,
injured in a three-person accident also involving B, likewise
negligent, and C, recover more from B if C is negligent than if C
is without fault. There is similarly no satisfactory answer to
this question. The reason in each instance is that the independent
third party's fault is irrelevant to what the plaintiff should
ultimately recover from the other party, just as Drake Towing held.
Certainly, the result in Edmonds is binding on us in suits on
LHWCA-covered injuries. But outside of that class of case, Edmonds
is not a proper basis on which to evaluate an approach it (and the
parties before it) wholly failed to address or consider. See
71
The general maritime law cases cited by Edmonds, 99 S.Ct.
at 2756 n.7, are Cooper Stevedoring Co., Inc. v. Fritz Kopke, Inc.,
94 S.Ct. 2174 (1974); Halcyon; The Atlas; and The Juniata. In the
first three of these, the plaintiff was not at fault. That was
also the situation in The Juniata so far as concerns the libel by
the United States. In the libel by Pursglove in The Juniata, the
plaintiff was at fault, but there was only one other actor at
fault. None of these cases could possibly have presentedSQand none
purported to address, even in dictaSQthe issue now before us. This
is also true as respects the common law authority cited in this
regard by Edmonds. Id. at 2756 & n.8.
114
United States v. Mitchell, 46 S.Ct. 418, 419-20 (1926).72 As
previously observed (see note 38, supra), the Court in Cooper
Stevedoring Co., Inc. v. Fritz Kopke, Inc., 94 S.Ct. 2174 (1924),
refused to extend the Halcyon ban on contribution beyond its
context of a contribution claim against the LHWCA employer of the
injured plaintiff, and McDermott recognized that Edmonds was LHWCA-
driven and refused to extract from it a general principle to govern
the effect of settlement in general maritime law multiple party
cases. In this general maritime law case, we, too, should not
expand Edmonds beyond its LHWCA context to speak to something it
never addressed even in that special context.
FELA, Jones Act, and Miles v. Apex Marine
The majority argues that the Jones Act incorporates the FELA,
that the result it reaches would be reached under the FELA and
hence under the Jones Act, and that therefore under Miles v. Apex
Marine Corp., 111 S.Ct. 317 (1990), should be reached in this
general maritime law case.
72
Mitchell states: "'[i]t is not to be thought that a
question not raised by counsel or discussed in the opinion of the
court has been decided merely because it existed in the record and
might have been raised or considered." Id. See also Webster v.
Fall, 45 S.Ct. 148, 149 (1925), where the Court stated:
"We do not stop to inquire whether all or any of them
[prior Supreme Court decisions cited by appellant] can be
differentiated from the case now under consideration,
since in none of them was the point here at issue
suggested or decided. The most that can be said is that
the point was in the cases if any one had seen fit to
raise it. Questions which merely lurk in the record,
neither brought to the attention of the court nor ruled
upon, are not to be considered as having been so decided
as to constitute precedents."
115
There are several answers to this. Most obviously, the
subject matter of this case is not governed by the Jones Act.
Coats was not a Jones Act seaman, nor was he any sort of employee
of Penrod.73 Miles considered "whether the parent of a seaman who
died from injuries on . . . [the defendant's] vessel may recover
under general maritime law for loss of society, and whether a claim
for the seaman's lost future earnings survives his death." Id. at
319-20. It answered both questions in the negative, because
neither such recovery was available under the Jones Act. Id. at
325-26, 328. The Court stated "we restore a uniform rule
applicable to all actions for the wrongful death of a seaman," id.
at 326, and "[b]cause this case involves the death of a seaman, we
must look to the Jones Act." Id. at 328 (emphasis added). Our
recent en banc opinion in Guevara v. Maritime Overseas Corporation,
F.3d (No. 92-4711, 5th Cir., , 1995), states:
"In order to decide whether (and how) Miles applies to a
case, a court must first evaluate the factual setting of
the case and determine what statutory remedial measures,
if any, apply in that context. If the situation is
covered by a statute like the Jones Act or DOHSA, and the
statute informs and limits the available damages, the
statute directs and delimits the recovery available under
the general maritime law as well." (Emphasis in
original).
Clearly the factual setting of this case is not covered by the
Jones Act.74 Accordingly, the above methodology stated in Guevara
73
Cf. Cosmopolitan Shipping Co. v. McAllister, 69 S.Ct.
1317, 1321-22 (1949); Rohde v. Southeastern Drilling Co., Inc., 667
F.2d 1215, 1217 (5th Cir. 1982).
74
This is also the situation respecting DOHSA, as this case
involves neither a death nor any wrong committed (or injury
suffered) "on the high seas."
116
would appear not to support application of the Miles uniformity
principle here.
But even were the Miles uniformity principle applicable, the
majority has not demonstrated any established or consistent body of
law sustaining the result in this case under either the FELA or the
Jones Act.
Turning first to the FELA, when it was adopted in 1908 none of
the states authorized any recovery whatever by a plaintiff whose
negligence proximately contributed, in even the slightest degree,
to the accident in question. Thus, when the FELA was adopted it
could not possibly have inferentially incorporated any common law
rule on how the recovery of a negligent plaintiff was to be
computed in an instance in which two or more other independent
actors, at least one of whom was a defendant, were also guilty of
causative fault. The common law simply did not address such a
situation. Nor does the wording of the FELA. It provides that
"[e]very common carrier by railroad . . . shall be liable in
damages to any person suffering injury while he is employed by such
carrier . . . resulting in whole or in part from the negligence .
. . of such carrier," 45 U.S.C, § 51, and that "the fact that the
employee may have been guilty of contributory negligence shall not
bar a recovery, but the damages shall be diminished by the jury in
proportion to the amount of negligence attributable to such
employee." 45 U.S.C. § 53. The FELA neither creates nor even
speaks to any cause of action or suit against anyone other than the
117
employer-railroad.75 The facial inference from the wording and
structure of the statute is that the plaintiff's negligence is to
be compared to, and only to, that of the defendant employer-
railroad. In Norfolk & Western Railway Company v. Earnest, 33
S.Ct. 654 (1913), the Court, speaking of what is now section 53,
stated:
". . . [T]he statutory direction that the diminution
shall be 'in proportion to the amount of negligence
attributable to such employee' means, and can only mean,
that, where the causal negligence is partly attributable
to him and partly to the carrier, he shall not recover
full damages, but only a proportional amount, bearing the
same relation to the full amount as the negligence
attributable to the carrier bears to the entire
negligence attributable to both . . . ." Id. at 657
(emphasis added).
Nothing in section 53 suggests that the negligence comparison
thereby called for involves the consideration of the negligence of
anyone other than the plaintiff-employee and the defendant-employer
railroad.
The only FELA case which the majority cites as being to the
contrary is Gaulden v. Burlington Northern, Inc., 654 P.2d 383
(Kan. 1982). There the plaintiff railroad employee, injured in a
crossing collision involving a truck driven by James, a third
75
See, e.g., New Orleans Public Belt R. Co. v. Wallace, 173
F.2d 145 (5th Cir. 1949) (where railroad employee's estate sues
employer railroad and a third party, jurisdiction over plaintiff's
suit against the third party depends on diversity); Ft. Worth
Denver Railway Company v. Threadgill, 228 F.2d 307, 311-312 (5th
Cir. 1956) (state law, not FELA, governs plaintiff's right to
recover
from third party and defendant railroad's right to recover
indemnity or contribution from third party); Kennedy v.
Pennsylvania Railroad Company, 282 F.2d 705, 709 (3d Cir. 1960)
(same).
118
party, sued the employer railroad under the FELA and James under
state law, but settled with James prior to trial. The court held
that the proportionate fault rule to account for the settlement was
applicable, so that the plaintiff's recovery from the railroad
would be reduced by the proportion which the total of plaintiff's
negligence and that of the settling James bore to the total
negligence of all three parties. The court went on in dicta,
however, and without citation of any authority, to state that had
James not settled then the railroad would be liable to the
plaintiff for the same fraction of his total damages as the total
of the fault of the railroad and James was of the total fault of
all three. Id. at 392.
If this dicta in a 1982 Kansas decision is the best the
majority can do, it can hardly be said that there is or was any
well-established and settled FELA rule in this respect.
As previously observed, the Jones Act, passed in 1920, gave
seamen injured in the course of employment an action against their
employer to be governed by the FELA.76 The situation then was
essentially the same as in 1908 when the FELA was adopted, namely
that in all but three statesSQas opposed to in all states in
1908SQany causative negligence on the part of the plaintiff, no
matter how slight, barred any recovery whatever.77 Accordingly,
what has been said about the FELA is applicable to the Jones Act.
76
DOHSA was likewise passed in 1920.
77
The three states were Mississippi, Georgia, and Nebraska.
There was not a fourth until 1931, when Wisconsin joined.
119
When the Jones Act was passed, it could not have impliedly adopted
any general or established common law rule or practice for
computing the recovery of a negligent plaintiff when two (or more)
independently acting defendantsSQor a defendant and one or more
othersSQwere also negligent. That is true because there was no
such rule or practice, as the plaintiff's negligence barred any
recovery. Nor is there any showing that by 1920 there had grown up
under the FELA any such established rule or practice which the
Jones Act could be said to have impliedly adopted.78
The majority cites four cases under the Jones Act which it
claims would support the result here if this were a Jones Act case.
All of these cases were decided within the last decade. In three
of the cases, the court was not presented with, and did not purport
to speak to, a situation involving a negligent plaintiff, so the
cited general language concerning joint and several liability of
the defendants is plainly consistent with the position of this
dissent.79 These three cases tell us absolutely nothing relevant
here.
The fourth and final Jones Act case cited by the majority in
this respect, Joia v. Jo-Ja Service Corp., 817 F.2d 908 (1st Cir.
1987), merits more detailed consideration. There the plaintiff-
78
Indeed, as we have seen, there is no showing that even as
of today there is any such clearly established rule under the FELA.
79
These three cases are Johnson v. National Steel &
Shipbuilding, 742 F.Supp. 1062, 1065 (S.D. Cal. 1990); Texaco v.
Addison, 613 So.2d 1193, 1202 (Miss. 1993); and, Dicola v. American
Steamship Owners Mut. Protection and Indem. Ass'n, Inc., 170 B.R.
222, 235 (S.D.N.Y. 1994).
120
seaman, Joia, sued his employer, Niagra, under the Jones Act, and
in the same action also sued Jo-Ja, the owner of another vessel
contributing to the injury, under the general maritime law. Joia's
total damages were found to be $360,000, and fault was allocated 5%
to plaintiff Joia, 30% to his employer Niagra, and 65% to Jo-Ja.
Niagra alone appealed. The First Circuit held that Joia was
entitled to judgment against Niagra and Jo-Ja, jointly and
severally, for $342,000 (95% of $360,000). Several things are
significant about Joia. First, the only contentions of the parties
in this respect, and all that the First Circuit addressed or
considered, was whether the limit of Niagra's liability should be
$108,000, 30% of the total damages, or $342,000, 95% of the total.
Id. at 914, 917. The court found pure several liability, in which
all of Jo-Ja's fault is charged to Joia, too harsh considering "the
remedial nature of the Jones Act." Id. at 917. In its rejection
of the pure several liability contended for by Niagra, the First
Circuit relied on Edmonds, which plainly likewise rejected such an
approach (as does this dissent). Joia at 916-917.80 The Joia
panelSQlike EdmondsSQsimply never adverted to the possibility that
Niagra's maximum liability should instead be fixed by the ratio of
its percentage of fault (30%) to the total of the percentages of
fault of Joia (5%) and it (30%)SQin other words, on the basis of a
comparison of Niagra's negligence to Joia's. That would have
limited Niagra's exposure to $308,571.42 (30/35SQor 6/7SQof
80
Joia properly recognized, however, that Edmonds was
"not controlling" and that "the narrow holding of Edmonds does
not govern a seaman's action." Joia at 916.
121
$360,000). Further, the Joia panel noted Niagra's reliance on
Leger v. Drilling Well Control, Inc., 592 F.2d 1246 (5th Cir.
1979), but instead chose to follow Ebanks v. Great Lakes Dredge &
Dock Co., 688 F.2d 716 (11th Cir. 1982), cert. denied, 103 S.Ct.
1774 (1983), which rejected the proportionate share credit approach
of Leger as being inconsistent with Edmonds.81 Joia at 915-17. We
now know from McDermottSQwhich the Joia panel did not have the
benefit ofSQthat Leger was right and that Ebanks and its progeny
erred in concluding otherwise and in reading Edmonds overbroadly.
Finally, it is significant that Joia treats the issue before it
essentially as res nova. Joia does not purport to find any settled
or recognized body of Jones Act (or FELA) law, or general maritime
law, addressing how a given defendant's maximum exposure is to be
fixed in a multi-party case involving a negligent plaintiff and two
(or more) independently acting negligent defendants (or one
negligent defendant and one or more negligent, independently acting
others).
In sum, the subject matter of this case is not one covered by
the Jones Act. Moreover, there is no settled body of Jones Act law
addressing the issue now before us, and there certainly was no
settled body of law, either under the FELA or otherwise, addressing
81
On subsequent appeal Ebanks became Self v. Great Lakes
Dredge & Dock Co., 832 F.2d 1540 (1987), which, as previously
noted, led us in Hernandez (and subsequent cases) into an
overbroad reading of Edmonds and consequent erroneous rejection
of the proportionate share settlement credit rule of Leger.
122
the issue at the time the Jones Act was adopted (or when the FELA
was).82 Hence, the Jones Act does not dictate the result here.
Other Considerations
Other than its appeal to authority, which is largely
nonexistent, the majority levels essentially three objections to
the rule espoused by this dissent.
First, the majority seems to suggest that this is a matter
which should be taken care of by contract, or by avoiding doing
business with potential co-defendants who might be or become
insolvent. This is obviously a make-weight, at best. We do not
normally justify adoption of rules that are illogical and unfair on
the basis that parties might often be able to contract around the
illogic or unfairness we are thus creating. Moreover, the
majority's rationale in this respect is inconsistent with the
settled rule that one is not ordinarily liable for the independent
fault of an independent contractor. The majority would have it
that such liability should always be imposed because the owner can
recover in indemnity or contribution from the contractor, and if
that is precluded by the contractor's insolvency or unavailability,
82
The majority takes comfort from the fact that Penrod
does not challenge its interpretation of the Jones Act. But, as
this is not a Jones Act case, we are certainly not bound by what
Penrod may believe to be a tactically wise concession in respect
to a hypothetical case not before us. See, e.g., Equitable Life
Assur. Soc. of U.S. v. MacGill, 551 F.2d 978, 983 (5th Cir. 1977)
("it is well settled that a court is not bound to accept as
controlling stipulations as to questions of law"); Straus v.
United States, 516 F.2d 980, 982 (7th Cir. 1975) ("concessions .
. . do not, at least as to questions of law that are likely to
affect a number of cases . . . beyond the one in which the
concessions are made, relieve this Court of the duty to make its
own resolution of such issues").
123
then the owner has no one but himself to blame, as he should not
have done business with the contractor. Presumably under this
approach, no one would contract with an immune entity such as a
county. Finally, how, in our hypothetical collision involving the
shrimper, the Exxon crew boat, and the pleasure craft, can any of
these partiesSQhaving no prior contact one with the otherSQbe
expected to have contracted with each other in advance of the
accident?
Next, the majority invokes the notion that the plaintiff's
recovery should be maximized. However, if that were the guiding
principle, we could simply disregard, or perhaps give only half
weight to, the plaintiff's contributory negligence. And, again
reverting to our hypothetical collision, why do we want to strain
to make the shrimper's master-owner pay Exxon more than half
Exxon's damages, even though Exxon's crew boat is every bit as much
at fault as the shrimper, just because the little pleasure craft,
acting wholly independently of the shrimper with which it has never
had any contact, was also negligent?
Finally, the majority objects because the dissent's approach,
in contrast to that of the UCFA, does not require the defendant to
first, and after judgment, establish that another defendant or
actor is insolvent or unreachable (or immune) so that full
contribution is unavailable from that other defendant, before that
other defendant's "equitable share" is partially reallocated to the
negligent plaintiff. Of course, under the UCFA and Apportionment
of Liability, if the other defendant is determined to be insolvent
124
before judgment, then the "reallocation" will be in the original
judgment, and the original judgment will give the negligent
plaintiff the same maximum recovery from the solvent defendant as
would be the case under the rule advocated in this dissent. More
importantly, however, the substance of the UCFA and Apportionment
of Liability approach is clearly that the negligent plaintiff
should not be able to cause any one defendant to ultimately bear a
greater fraction of the plaintiff's damages than the fault of that
defendant is of the total of the fault of the plaintiff and that
defendant. In other words, beyond that limit, that defendant is
simply not ultimately liable to the negligent plaintiff.83 Why
83
The majority argues (majority op. fn. 23) that the
approach of the UCFA and Apportionment of Liability is
substantively inconsistent with that of this dissent because
under the former reallocation occurs only if and to the extent
that recovery is unenforceable against one (or more) of multiple
defendants. This analysis, however, ignores the fact that under
the UCFA and Apportionment of Liability a defendant is never made
ultimately responsible to the negligent plaintiff for a greater
amount than this dissent would provide unless the defendant can
actually collect any excess over that amount from co-defendants
under the same judgment. Thus, it necessarily follows that the
only meaningful difference between the UCFA and Apportionment of
Liability, on the one hand, and this dissent, on the other, is
that in the former a defendant is initially assigned the duty of
trying to collect under the judgment from the other defendants;
if he is able to do so, he in effect passes along to the
plaintiff (or he retains for himself and the plaintiff is allowed
to retain from him) any excess over the maximum this dissent
would hold him liable for; if he is not able to do so, the
plaintiff's recovery from him is proportionately diminished (but
not below his maximum liability as calculated by this dissent).
In other words, the only meaningful, bottom-line difference
between the UCFA-Apportionment of Liability approach and that of
this dissent is that under the former the defendant, as to
amounts in excess of his maximum liability as calculated by this
dissent, is made the plaintiff's collection agent for judgment
amounts owed by other defendants.
It should also be noted that under the UCFA and
Apportionment of Liability only the fault of parties to the
125
should that defendant be made the collection agent for the
negligent plaintiff as to sums for which that defendant is not
ultimately liable?84 Why should one party be the collection agent
for another?
Moreover, to say that the approach of this dissent puts an
unfair collection burden on the negligent plaintiff is certainly to
ignore the longstanding general maritime law rule that even the
innocent plaintiff who is personally injured in an accident as to
which two defendants equally at fault are before the court (either
by being sued directly or brought in under Rule 14(c) or its
precursors) recovers judgment initially from each defendant for
only half his damages, and can go beyond that as to each only by
action (and those who have settled with the plaintiff) is
considered. The effect of this is that the fault of nonparties
is allocated in the original judgment between the plaintiff and
each defendant precisely as this dissent would. If the plaintiff
wants an actor to be a party, it is his burden to see to it that
that actor is before the court and subject to its jurisdiction,
and if the plaintiff does not do this, then he alone is his own
collection agent as to any liability of that actor, all just as
under this dissent.
84
Of course, under this dissent's proposal, as applied to
the instant case where plaintiff Coats is twenty percent
negligent, Penrod is twenty percent negligent, and MIS is sixty
percent negligent, Coats would be entitled to recover (and
retain) as much as fifty percent of his total damages from
Penrod, whether or not MIS was (or became) insolvent, and Penrod
would be at total, sole risk and expense to collect contribution
from MIS for amounts Penrod paid in excess of twenty percent of
Coats' total damages. Similarly, Coats would be entitled to
recover (and retain) as much as seventy-five percent of his total
damages from MIS, whether or not Penrod was (or became)
insolvent, and MIS would be at total, sole risk and expense to
collect contribution from Penrod for amounts MIS paid in excess
of sixty percent of Coats' total damages. Coats, however, would
in no event be able to collect from Penrod and MIS together more
in total than eighty percent of all his damages.
126
first showing his (plaintiff's) inability to collect from the other
defendant the latter's half. The majority has simply ignored this
long-standing rule of the general maritime law.85
85
It is recognized that Apportionment of Liability
prefers the UCFA reallocation approach to that of this writer's
dissent in Simeon, principally on the basis that the method of
calculation stated in the Simeon dissent (calculate each
defendant's maximum liability by comparing his percentage of
fault to plaintiff's percentage of fault; subtract first
defendant's maximum liability from plaintiff's maximum recovery,
the result being second defendant's several liability; subtract
second defendant's maximum liability from plaintiff's maximum
recovery, the result being first defendant's several liability;
add the several liability of first defendant and that of second
defendant and subtract the total from plaintiff's maximum
recovery, the result being the joint and several liability of the
two defendants) does not work when there are three or more
defendants. Apportionment of Liability at 254-55. Apportionment
of Liability gives the example of a plaintiff and three
defendants each twenty-five percent at fault. Id. While this is
an accurate criticism of the simplified method of computation set
forth in the Simeon dissentSQwhich was basically designed for use
in two-defendant situationsSQthe formulas set out in the appendix
hereto adequately cover three (and more) defendant situations.
For instance, in paragraph 1(d) of the appendix, example 2
calculates the appropriate form of judgment (using the several
and joint and several liability format) for an instance where the
plaintiff and each of three defendants is twenty-five percent at
fault, and plaintiff's total damages are $100,000, namely each of
the three defendants is severally liable for $12,500 and all
three of them are together also jointly and severally liable for
$37,500. The real point, however, as previously explained in the
text (Mechanics of Judgment Damages Allocation), is that formulas
do not really need to be used at all; it suffices for the
judgment to merely provide that the negligent plaintiff in any
event recover no more from any one of the defendants than the
amount which equals the fraction of plaintiff's total damages
represented by that defendant's percentage of the total fault of
all found at fault divided by the total of that defendant's said
percentage and the plaintiff's percentage of the total fault of
all found at fault. That is simple and easily accomplished.
Apportionment of Liability also notes that the Simeon
dissent approach requires "the plaintiff to pursue enforcement of
the judgment against all solvent defendants in order to recover
the full amount," id. at 254, but does not expressly characterize
this as undesirable. As previously observed, Apportionment of
Liability does provide for "reallocation" (including to the
127
The Judicial Role in the General Maritime Law
As the Supreme Court said in Edmonds, "[a]dmiralty law is
judge-made law to a great extent." Id. at 2756. Indeed, "the
Judiciary has traditionally taken the lead in formulating flexible
and fair remedies in the law maritime." Reliable Transfer at 1715.
And, as the Supreme Court observed on yet another occasion:
"Absent a relevant statute, the general maritime law, as developed
by the judiciary, applies . . . the general maritime law is an
amalgam of traditional common-law rules, modifications of those
rules, and newly created rules." East River Steamship Corp. v.
Transamerica Delaval, Inc., 106 S.Ct. 2295, 2299 (1986) (emphasis
added).
In East River, the Court "join[ed] the Courts of Appeals" in
adopting strict products liability, thus doing away with the
traditional requirement of negligence in such instances. The Court
in both Reliable Transfer and Moragne v. States Marine Lines, Inc.,
90 S.Ct. 1772 (1970), overruled its own long-standing and
consistently and frequently enforced precedents. But, no such
departure from settled and clearly established precedent is
required to adopt the approach taken in this dissent.
Nevertheless, it is appropriate to note that in Reliable Transfer
negligent plaintiff) of any defendant's equitable share in the
original judgment when it is then known that such defendant is
insolvent or immune or the like. And, Apportionment of Liability
does not exhibit any awareness of the above-discussed long-
standing admiralty practice under which the judgment against
multiple defendants at fault is initially against them severally,
as explained in, e.g., The Hudson, 15 F. 162, 164 (S.D.N.Y.
1883).
128
the Supreme Court declined to continue with a rule it considered
"unnecessarily crude and inequitable," despite that rule's lesser
"problems of proof" and "facile application." Id. at 1714.
Reliable Transfer departed from a settled rule that "has continued
to prevail in this country by sheer inertia rather than by reason
of any intrinsic merit." Id. at 1715.
There is no relevant statute here, nor any clearly established
rule, and we should reject an approach based on abstract doctrinal
reflex and inertia rather than intrinsic merit. And, the
majority's approach is one rejected by four-fifths of the states.
To borrow from Pope & Talbot, admiralty should rather employ a
"fairer and more flexible rule which allows such consideration of
contributory negligence in mitigation of damages as justice
requires." Id. at 204 (emphasis added). Justice, it seems to us,
requires that the negligent defendant bear no greaterSQor
lesserSQpart of the negligent plaintiff's total damages than that
fraction which such defendant's negligence is of the total
negligence of the two of them; and that there is no reason to
charge a negligent defendant with all, while charging the negligent
plaintiff with none, of the fault of an independent third party,
just as there is no reason to charge all such third party fault to
the negligent plaintiff. The majority repeats "joint and several
liability" as if it were some kind of magical mantra or totem which
both banishes all dangers of rational analysis and dispenses with
the need for authority dealing with the issue here posed: how does
admiralty compare fault when both the plaintiff and a defendant are
129
at fault and so also is at least one other independent actor
(whether or not likewise a defendant). The majority abjures any
meaningful normative defense of its position, and the best
authority it can come up with is Joia, a 1987 Jones Act case that
treats the matter as res nova and wrongly assumes that the only
alternative to its result is pure several liability that assigns
all the third party's fault to the plaintiff. An approach such as
that taken by Judge Friendly in KinsmanSQwhich is flatly
inconsistent with that of the majoritySQsimply accomplishes a just
result, as does the position of this dissent.
Conclusion
For the foregoing reasons, I respectfully dissent.
130
Appendix
Formula for Calculation of Several Liability of Each
Defendant and Joint Liability of Defendants
1. Three defendants and plaintiff each guilty of causative fault
(a) VARIABLES
Q = Plaintiff's total damages
X = Plaintiff's % of total fault
D1, D2, D3 = each defendant's % of total fault
M1, M2, M3 = each defendant's maximum liability
Y1, Y2, Y3 = each defendant's several liability
Z = Joint liability of defendants
(b) FORMULAS
M1 = D1 Q
D1 + X
M2 = D2 Q
D2 + X
M3 = D3 Q
D3 + X
Y1 = M1 - Z
Y2 = M2 - Z
Y3 = M3 - Z
Z = [(1.00 - X) * Q] - Y1 - Y2 - Y3
i
(c) EXAMPLE 1
Q = $100,000
X = 10
D1 = 20
D2 = 30
D3 = 40
M1 = D1 Q = 20 $100,000 = (2/3) * $100,000 = $66,667
D1 + X 20 + 10
M2 = D2 Q = 30 $100,000 = (3/4) * $100,000 = $75,000
D2 + X 30 + 10
M3 = D3 Q = 40 $100,000 = (4/5) * $100,000 = $80,000
D3 + X 40 + 10
Y1 = M1 - Z = $66,667 - Z
Y2 = M2 - Z = $75,000 - Z
Y3 = M3 - Z = $80,000 - Z
Z = [(1.00 - X) * Q] - Y1 - Y2 - Y3
Z = [(1.00 - .10) * $100,000] - Y1 - Y2 - Y3
Z = (.90 * $100,000) - Y1 - Y2 - Y3
Z = $90,000 - ($66,667 - Z) - ($75,000 - Z) - ($80,000 - Z)
Z = 3Z - $131,667
2Z = $131,667
Z = $65,833
Y1 = $66,667 - $65,833 = $834
Y2 = $75,000 - $65,833 = $9,167
Y3 = $80,000 - $65,833 = $14,167
The judgment thus provides plaintiff a total recovery of
$90,000 composed of the following:
Total
D1 D2 D3 Recovery
Several Liability $ 834 $ 9,167 $14,167 $24,168
Joint Liability 65,833 65,833 65,833 65,833
Total $66,667 $75,000 $80,000 $90,001
ii
(d) EXAMPLE 2
Q = $100,000
X = 25
D1 = 25
D2 = 25
D3 = 25
M1 = D1 Q = 25 $100,000 = (1/2) * $100,000 = $50,000
D1 + X 25 + 25
M2 and M3 are calculated the same as M1
Y1 = M1 - Z = $50,000 - Z
Y2 and Y3 are calculated the same as Y1
Z = [(1.00 - X) * Q] - Y1 - Y2 - Y3
Z = [(1.00 - .25) * $100,000] - Y1 - Y2 - Y3
Z = (.75 * $100,000) - Y1 - Y2 - Y3
Z = $75,000 - ($50,000 - Z) - ($50,000 - Z) - ($50,000 - Z)
Z = 3Z - $75,000
2Z = $75,000
Z = $37,500
Y1 = $50,000 - $37,500 = $12,500
Y2 = $50,000 - $37,500 = $12,500
Y3 = $50,000 - $37,500 = $12,500
The judgment thus provides plaintiff a total recovery of
$75,000 composed of the following:
Total
D1 D2 D3 Recovery
Several Liability $12,500 $12,500 $12,500 $37,500
Joint Liability 37,500 37,500 37,500 37,500
Total $50,000 $50,000 $50,000 $75,000
iii
(e) EXAMPLE 3, FOUR DEFENDANTS
Q = $100,000
X = 20
D1 = 20
D2 = 20
D3 = 20
D4 = 20
M1 = D1 Q = 20 $100,000 = (1/2) * $100,000 = $50,000
D1 + X 20 + 20
M2, M3 and M4 are calculated the same as M1
Y1 = M1 - Z = $50,000 - Z
Y2, Y3, and Y4 are calculated the same as Y1
Z = [(1.00 - X) * Q] - Y1 - Y2 - Y3 - Y4
Z = [(1.00 - .20) * $100,000] - Y1 - Y2 - Y3 - Y4
Z = (.80 * $100,000) - Y1 - Y2 - Y3 - Y4
Z = $80,000-($50,000- Z)-($50,000-Z)-($50,000-Z)-($50,000-Z)
Z = 4Z - $120,000
3Z = $120,000
Z = $40,000
Y1 = $50,000 - $40,000 = $10,000
Y2 = $50,000 - $40,000 = $10,000
Y3 = $50,000 - $40,000 = $10,000
Y4 = $50,000 - $40,000 = $10,000
The judgment thus provides plaintiff a total recovery of
$80,000 composed of the following:
Total
D1 D2 D3 D4 Recovery
Several Liability $10,000 $10,000 $10,000 $10,000 $40,000
Joint Liability 40,000 40,000 40,000 40,000 40,000
Total $50,000 $50,000 $50,000 $50,000 $80,000
iv
(f) EXAMPLE 4, TWO DEFENDANTS
Q = $100,000
X = 20
D1 = 20
D2 = 60
M1 = D1 Q = 20 $100,000 = (1/2) * $100,000 = $50,000
D1 + X 20 + 20
M2 = D2 Q = 60 $100,000 = (3/4) * $100,000 = $75,000
D2 + X 60 + 20
Y1 = M1 - Z = $50,000 - Z
Y2 = M2 - Z = $75,000 - Z
Z = [(1.00 - X) * Q] - Y1 - Y2
Z = [(1.00 - .20) * $100,000] - Y1 - Y2
Z = (.80 * $100,000) - Y1 - Y2
Z = $80,000 - ($50,000 - Z) - ($75,000 - Z)
Z = 2Z - $45,000
Z = $45,000
Y1 = $50,000 - $45,000 = $5,000
Y2 = $75,000 - $45,000 = $30,000
The judgment thus provides plaintiff a total recovery of
$80,000, composed of the following:
Total
D1 D2 Recovery
Several Liability $ 5,000 $30,000 $35,000
Joint Liability 45,000 45,000 45,000
Total $50,000 $75,000 $80,000
v
2. SPECIAL INSTANCES
(a) With as many as four parties (including the plaintiff)
guilty of causative fault, the formula will, in certain instances
of unusual fault distributions, produce a negative several
liability number for a particular defendant (where as many as five
parties, including plaintiff, are guilty of causative fault, as
many as two such negative several liability numbers are possible in
certain instances of unusual fault distributions). In such
instances, additional steps must be added to the formula, resulting
in a lowered joint liability for that particular defendant and an
additional component of joint liability for the remaining
defendants (if there are two defendants with initial negative
several liability numbers, there will be two additional components
of joint liability for other defendants). The additional necessary
steps are set out below.
(b) Formula for three defendants showing additional steps
where under initial steps one defendant's several liability is
a negative number
Q = $100,000
X = 30
D1 = 30
D2 = 30
D3 = 10
M1 = D1 Q = 30 $100,000 = (1/2) * $100,000 = $50,000
D1 + X 30 + 30
M2 = D2 Q = 30 $100,000 = (1/2) * $100,000 = $50,000
D2 + X 30 + 30
M3 = D3 Q = 10 $100,000 = (1/4) * $100,000 = $25,000
D3 + X 10 + 30
Y1 = M1 - Z = $50,000 - Z
Y2 = M2 - Z = $50,000 - Z
Y3 = M3 - Z = $25,000 - Z
Z = [(1.00 - X) * Q] - Y1 - Y2 - Y3
Z = [(1.00 - .30) * $100,000] - Y1 - Y2 - Y3
Z = (.70 * $100,000) - Y1 - Y2 - Y3
Z = $70,000 - ($50,000 - Z) - ($50,000 - Z) - ($25,000 - Z)
Z = 3Z - $55,000
2Z = $55,000
Z = $27,500
vi
Y1 = $50,000 - $27,500 = $22,500
Y2 = $50,000 - $27,500 = $22,500
Y3 = $25,000 - $27,500 = -$2,500
CAVEAT: If Y3 is < 0, then reduce the value of Z to that of M3;
then add Y3 to the value of Y1; then add Y3 to the value of Y2;
then multiply Y3 by -2 and set that number equal to J; then set Y3
equal to zero.
Z = Joint liability of D1, D2, and D3
J = Joint liability of D1 and D2
STEP 1: Z = M3
Z = $25,000
STEP 2: Y1 = Y1 + Y3
Y1 = $20,000
STEP 3: Y2 = Y2 + Y3
Y2 = $20,000
STEP 4: J = Y3 * -2
J = $5,000
STEP 5: Y3 = 0
Y3 = 0
The judgment thus provides the plaintiff a total recovery of
$70,000 composed of the following:
Total
D1 D2 D3 Recovery
Several Liability $20,000 $20,000 $ -0- $40,000
Joint D1 & D2 5,000 5,000 -0- 5,000
Joint D1, D2 & D3 25,000 25,000 25,000 25,000
Total $50,000 $50,000 $25,000 $70,000
(c) Formula for four defendants showing additional steps when
under initial steps one defendant's several liability is a
negative figure
Q = $100,000
X = 25
D1 = 25
D2 = 25
D3 = 20
D4 = 5
M1 = $50,000
M2 = $50,000
M3 = $44,444.44
M4 = $16,666.67
Z = $28,703.70
vii
Y1 = $21,296.30
Y2 = $21,296.30
Y3 = $15,740.74
Y4 = - $12,037.03
CAVEAT: If Y4 is < 0, then reduce the value of Z to that of M4;
then add 1/2 of Y4 to Y1 ; then add 1/2 of Y4 to Y2; then add 1/2
of Y4 to Y3; then add 1/2 of Y4 to Y4 and set this value equal to
J; multiply J by -1; then set Y4 equal to zero.
Z = Joint liability of D1, D2, D3, and D4
J = Joint liability of D1, D2, and D3
STEP 1: Z = M4
Z = $16,666.67
STEP 2: Y1 = 1/2Y4 + Y1
Y1 = $15,277.78
STEP 3: Y2 = 1/2Y4 + Y2
Y2 = $15,277.78
STEP 4: Y3 = 1/2Y4 + Y3
Y3 = $9,722.22
STEP 5: J = 1/2Y4 + Y4
J = -$18,055.55
STEP 6: J = J * -1
J = $18,055.55
STEP 7: Y4 = 0
Y4 = 0
The judgment thus provides the plaintiff a total recovery of
$75,000 composed of the following:
Total
D1 D2 D3 D4 Recovery
Several Liab'y $15,277.78 $15,277.78 $ 9,722.22 $ -0- $40,277.78
Joint All D's 16,666.67 16,666.67 16,666.67 16,666.67 16,666.67
Jnt D1, D2, D3 18,055.55 18,055.55 18,055.55 -0- 18,055.55
Total $50,000.00 $50,000.00 $44,444.44 $16,666.67 $75,000.00
(d) Formula for four defendants showing additional steps when
under initial steps the several liability of each of two
defendants is a negative number
Q = $100,000
X = 30
D1 = 20
D2 = 40
D3 = 6
D4 = 4
viii
M1 = $40,000
M2 = $57,142.86
M3 = $16,666.67
M4 = $11,764.70
Z = $18,524.75
Y1 = $21,475.25
Y2 = $38,618.11
Y3 = - $1,858.08
Y4 = - $6,760.05
CAVEAT: If Y3 and Y4 are < 0, then reduce the value of Z to that
of M4; then subtract Z from M3 and set that value equal to J; then
add Y3 and Y4 to the value of Y1; then add Y3 and Y4 to the value
of Y2; then set Y3 and Y4 equal to zero; then subtract Y1 and Z and
J from M1 and set that value equal to K.
Z = Joint liability of D1, D2, D3, and D4
J = Joint liability of D1, D2, and D3
K = Joint liability of D1 and D2
STEP 1: Z = M4
Z = $11,764.70
STEP 2: J = M3 - Z
J = $4,901.97
STEP 3: Y1 = Y1 + Y3 + Y4
Y1 = $12,857.12
STEP 4: Y2 = Y2 + Y3 + Y4
Y2 = $30,000
STEP 5: Y3,4 = 0
Y3 = 0
Y4 = 0
STEP 6: K = M1 - Y1 - Z - J
K = $10,476.21
The judgment thus provides plaintiff a total recovery of
$70,000 composed of the following:
Total
D1 D2 D3 D4 Recovery
Several Liab'y $12,857.12 $30,000.00 $ -0- $ -0- $42,857.12
Joint All D's 11,764.70 11,764.70 11,764.70 11,764.70 11,764.70
Joint D1,D2,D3 4,901.97 4,901.97 4,901.97 -0- 4,901.97
Jnt D1 & D2 10,476.21 10,476.21 -0- -0- 10,476.21
Total $40,000.00 $57,142.88 $16,666.67 $11,764.70 $70,000.00
ix
DeMOSS, Circuit Judge, dissenting, joined by Judges JONES and
SMITH, and joined by Judges GARWOOD, JOLLY, and EMILIO M. GARZA as
to Part I only:
I am unable to concur with the decision of the majority in
two crucial respects: First, I think proper evaluation of the
Lauritzen-Rhoditis factors requires that the choice of law
determination in this case be made in favor of the law of the
United Arab Emirates ("UAE") rather than that of the United States.
Secondly, if United States law is to be applied, we should apply
United States law as it existed at the time of the casualty in this
case -- not as it existed prior to 1972.
I.
Whether United States Law
My differences with the panel on the Lauritzen-Rhoditis choice
of law factors involve the first factor (place of the wrongful
act); the fourth factor (allegiance of the defendant ship owner);
and the fifth factor (place of the contract). Looking first at the
place of the wrongful act, the majority opinion devotes one
sentence to analysis of this subject. It recognizes that "the
accident occurred in the territorial waters of the United Arab
Emirates" and that since this is a "nontraditional maritime case,"
that factor is entitled to "considerable weight." Coats was
injured while on board the Penrod 69, a jackup drilling rig owned
and operated by Penrod Drilling Corporation ("Penrod"). At the
time of the accident, there is no doubt that the Penrod 69 was
"located in the Port of Mina Saqr in the territorial waters of the
United Arab Emirates." In my judgment, the fact that the rig was
"in port" has crucial significance in this case, because it makes
clear that the vessel was within the boundary recognized for
international law purposes as the boundary of the United Arab
Emirates and within what would be referred to under United States
nomenclature as the "inland waters" of Ra's Al Khaymah, the
particular emirate in which that port is located. The Penrod 69
was within the inland waters of Ra's Al Khaymah just like a jackup
rig in the Port of Galveston is considered to be within the inland
waters of the State of Texas, and like a rig in the Port of Biloxi
is within the inland waters of the State of Mississippi.
Furthermore, the Penrod 69 had been "in port" for some eight or
nine months prior to the date of Coats' injury. The records are
clear that on August 12, 1987, the Penrod 69 was surveyed for its
annual condition certificate, and at that time, the survey report
indicates, the "vessel lay jacked-up" in this port. The Penrod 69
was out of service, deactivated, not operated, and not occupied by
any personnel other than a watchman, up until January 1988, when as
a result of a new contract for the rig's use in a Persian Gulf
drilling activity, Penrod commenced the task of preparing the
Penrod 69 to go back into service. During this interval of
deactivation, the Penrod 69 functioned solely as an artificial
wharf or dock for the purpose of storing the equipment and
facilities thereon, with its legs standing on the bottom of the
port and its hull up out of the water. Substantial repairs,
replacements and refurbishing activities were required to prepare
the Penrod 69 to resume its offshore drilling function. This work
took some four months to accomplish and included the installation
xi
of a new derrick. In performing the refurbishing work, Penrod used
its own personnel (assumptively the crew of the Penrod 69) and
other categories of "contract labor, catering, and service
personnel." Penrod hired MIS to assist in the refurbishing work,
and MIS designated Coats to operate the MIS pump that was brought
on board to provide pressure to test certain pressurized systems of
the rig. The daily reports as to the personnel working on board
the rig, which are in the record, reflect that the total number of
contract labor, catering, and service personnel always exceeded the
number of Penrod personnel. The record does not clearly indicate
whether on the date of the injury, April 12, 1988, the Penrod 69
was still in a "jacked-up" position, or whether its hull had been
lowered into the water. Obviously, if it was still in a jacked-up
position, its categorization as a "vessel" in navigation is in
serious doubt. Even if it had been lowered into the water,
however, the nature and extent of the work going on, and the number
of outside personnel deployed in such work, clearly demonstrate
that the repair and refurbishing activities were beyond the
capacity of the "crew" of the Penrod 69 to accomplish, and that
such work could be accomplished only with the ready availability
and access of shore-based personnel and facilities. In my view,
under these facts, the "place of the wrongful act" element of the
Lauritzen-Rhoditis factors should be given more than just the
"considerable weight" that the majority gave it. It should be the
controlling factor in the choice of law decision. I have looked
for and have been unable to find any Supreme Court decision or
xii
Fifth Circuit decision applying United States law to resolve the
claim of a shore-side worker injured while assisting in the
refurbishing of a jacked-up drilling rig while it was located
within the inland waters of another nation. In my view, the
majority opinion constitutes an unjustifiable extension of United
States law into areas where simple comity among nations requires
that the law of the place of the casualty apply.
My second area of disagreement with the panel regarding the
Lauritzen-Rhoditis factors concerns the factor of "allegiance of
the defendant shipowner." I do not quarrel with the majority's
determination that the allegiance of Penrod, as owner of the Penrod
69, is to the United States. But, in my view, the factor of
"allegiance of the defendant shipowner" has materiality only in the
circumstance where the flag of the vessel and the allegiance of the
defendant shipowner are different (i.e. the vessel's flag is a flag
of convenience), and the law of the nation of allegiance of the
defendant shipowner can appropriately be applied to the
determination of rights between that shipowner and his seaman
employee when that vessel is engaged in international commerce. In
this case, however, the allegiance of the defendant shipowner is an
inconsequential factor for two reasons: First, the Penrod 69 is
documented under the United States flag; Penrod's allegiance is to
the United States and there is no flag of convenience involved.
Secondly, and more importantly, both the district court and the
majority opinion recognize that there was no employment relation-
ship -- as seaman or otherwise -- between Penrod and Coats. The
xiii
majority's use of the allegiance of the defendant shipowner as a
factor in tipping the scales in favor of application of United
States law would, in my judgment, be improvident even if the only
defendant in this case were Penrod, because that factor should be
applied only where there is an employment relationship between the
injured plaintiff and the defendant shipowner. But Penrod is not
the only defendant in this case, and the other defendant, MIS, is
not a shipowner; it is an entity which was created by and whose
allegiance is owed to the laws of the United Arab Emirates, and it
is in fact the employer of Coats. The majority gives no serious
consideration to the key distinctions in this case (1) that Coats
was not an employee of the defendant shipowner, Penrod, but was an
employee of MIS; and (2) that the trial court found that Coats was
not a Jones Act seaman of Penrod. I suggest that the Lauritzen-
Rhoditis factors assume an employment relationship between the
injured seaman-plaintiff and the defendant shipowner, and that when
that relationship does not exist, the allegiance of the shipowner
should be considered less significant than that of the defendant
employer. I have looked and have not found any Supreme Court or
any Fifth Circuit decision applying United States law to determine
the rights and obligations between a United States citizen injured
in a foreign country during the course and scope of his employment
with a corporate entity organized under that foreign country's law.
In my judgment, the panel opinion improvidently extends United
States law to the set of circumstances involved in this case by
xiv
giving greater weight to the allegiance of the defendant shipowner
than to the allegiance of the defendant employer.
Finally, I question the correctness of the panel decision in
evaluating the "place of contract" factor in the Lauritzen-Rhoditis
analysis. Here again, the majority misconstrues the significance
of this factor. I start out with the language used by the Supreme
Court in concluding its discussion of this factor in Lauritzen
itself:
"We do not think the place of contract is a
substantial influence in the choice between
competing laws to govern a maritime tort."
Lauritzen, 345 U.S. at 589 (emphasis added). Furthermore, the
contract referred to in both Lauritzen and Rhoditis is the contract
of employment between the injured seaman plaintiff and the
defendant ship owner. There is no such contract between Coats and
Penrod in this case; whatever contract of employment there was in
this case existed between Coats and MIS, who did not own any vessel
and was essentially a shore-based supplier of services to companies
engaged in exploration and development of oil and gas. I recognize
that Coats was recruited by representatives of MIS at his home in
Mississippi and that the basic terms of his employment agreement
were verbally negotiated and orally agreed upon during this
recruitment visit. However, it is clear beyond doubt that he was
recruited and "employed" to work for MIS, not for Penrod, and to
work in the United Arab Emirates, not aboard any particular vessel.
Furthermore, it is clear that in order for Coats to get the
necessary visa to enter the United Arab Emirates, Coats and MIS
xv
"executed an Arabic contract," and that Coats then applied for and
received the necessary work permit from the UAE which permitted him
to reside ashore there in the UAE during his employment. The
record is clear that Coats performed his duties for MIS at
locations of oil and gas wells on shore in the UAE as well as
offshore in the Persian Gulf, and at warehouses and dockside
facilities in the UAE. This existence of a work permit is a
special factor present in this case which has not been present in
any of the other choice of law cases cited in the majority opinion.
Presence in the UAE and acceptance of a UAE work permit would
unquestionably subject Coats to the criminal laws and civil laws of
the UAE had his injury occurred on land. In my view, Coats'
acceptance of a work permit necessitates a determination that the
law of the UAE should apply to an injury occurring on the waters of
a UAE port during employment under that UAE work permit.
In his original appellee's brief, Coats argued: "U.S. Maritime
Law applies whenever a U.S. citizen is injured on a U.S. flag
drilling vessel anywhere in the world." (p. 52). The cases cited
by Coats for that proposition do not support his assertion. But
the majority opinion in effect arrives at the same conclusion by
misinterpretation and misevaluation of the Lauritzen-Rhoditis
factors. Because I think such a conclusion is bad law under the
facts of this case, and that it will produce undesirable effects
when applied as a precedent, I would reverse the district court's
choice of law determination and remand the case to the district
xvi
court for retrial in accordance with the laws of the United Arab
Emirates.
In arriving at this result, I rely on the following line of
Fifth Circuit cases: Chiazor v. Transworld Drilling Co., Ltd., 648
F.2d 1015 (5th Cir. 1981), cert. denied, 455 U.S. 1019 (1982);
Zekic v. Reading & Bates Drilling Co., 680 F.2d 1107 (5th Cir.
1982); Bailey v. Dolphin Intern., Inc., 697 F.2d 1268 (5th Cir.
1983); Koke v. Phillips Petroleum Co., 730 F.2d 211 (5th Cir.
1984); Schexnider v. McDermott Intern., Inc., 817 F.2d 1159 (5th
Cir. 1987), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 977 (1987); and Fogleman v.
Aramco, 920 F.2d 278 (5th Cir. 1991). All of these cases involve
"nontraditional" vessels similar in nature and function to the
Penrod 69, and all of these determined that the law of another
nation, other than the United States, applied.
II.
What United States Law
Having decided that United States law shall apply, the
district court expressly reached the following conclusions (which
the majority opinion inferentially affirms):
1. That the United States Longshoremen and
Harborworkers Compensation Act ("LHWCA") could not
apply because it applies only to injuries or death
occurring "on navigable waters of the United
States."
2. That the Jones Act was inapplicable (i) because
there was no employment relationship between the
xvii
plaintiff Coats and Penrod, the owner and operator
of the Penrod 69; (ii) because Coats was aboard
the Penrod 69 only for one day, the day he was
injured, and therefore had no permanent connection
to that vessel; and (iii) because there was no
common ownership or control by his employer, MIS,
of any of the six offshore drilling rigs on which
Coats worked during his employment.
3. That the general maritime law of the United States
would be applied, including specifically the
concept of Sieracki seaman status originating in
the case of Seas Shipping Co. v. Sieracki, 328 U.S.
85 (1946), with its concomitant availability of the
warranty of unseaworthiness for the benefit of
Coats.86
The judicially manufactured concept of Sieracki seaman's status
remained a vibrant part of United States law from its creation in
1946 until Congress passed the 1972 amendments to the LHWCA, which
expressly removed the right of recovery under the warranty of
seaworthiness for individuals covered by that Act. The district
86
Penrod's appeal from these choice of law decisions by
the district court clearly raises the propriety of Coats' status
as a "Sieracki seaman" for our determination, even though, as
Judge Garwood notes in his dissent, there was no specific
objection raised by Penrod to the submission of an issue on
unseaworthiness and to the joint submission of negligence and
unseaworthiness in the jury issues as to percentages of fault.
When a party contests and objects to a trial court's choice of
law determination, I can see no need for repetitious and futile
objections to the implementation by the trial court of its choice
of law determinations during the trial.
xviii
court recognized some disagreement in the law as to whether the
1972 amendments to the LHWCA also abolished Sieracki relief for
individuals not covered by the LHWCA. But relying on two Fifth
Circuit cases, Aparicio v. Swan Lake, 643 F.2d 1109 (5th Cir.
1981), and Cormier v. Oceanic Contractors, Inc., 696 F.2d 1112 (5th
Cir.) cert. denied, 464 U.S. 821 (1983), the district court
concluded that, "Coats comes squarely within one of the so-called
`pockets of Sieracki seamen remaining after the 1972 amendments.'
Aparicio, 643 F.2d at 1118 n.17." Accordingly, the district court
allowed Coats to proceed under the general maritime law against
Penrod on both negligence and unseaworthiness theories.
I disagree with the majority's affirmance of the district
court, (1) because I believe the Fifth Circuit precedents relied
upon by the district court can no longer be supported in light of
the policies stated by a unanimous Supreme Court in Miles v. Apex
Marine Corp., 498 U.S. 19 (1990); and (2) because the majority
opinion wholly ignores the impact of Miles v. Apex Marine on the
substantive content of United States general maritime law, even
though we were sitting en banc and were in a position to consider
such impact. For these two reasons, I respectfully register my
dissent. In my view, Miles v. Apex Marine constitutes a major
restatement by a unanimous Supreme Court as to the role to be
played by the federal judiciary in defining the substantive content
of general maritime law. I recognize that the holdings in Miles v.
Apex Marine relate only to the specific issues of whether the cause
of action for wrongful death of a seaman exists under general
xix
maritime law and whether recovery for loss of society in a general
maritime wrongful death action would be permitted. However, the
statements of philosophy and approach as to the role of courts in
eliminating "anomalies" and achieving "uniformity in the exercise
of admiralty jurisdiction" constitute a major redefinition of the
interplay between the role of Congress and the role of the courts
in defining general maritime law.87 Because of their extreme
relevance to the issue before us in this case, I cite four passages
from Miles v. Apex Marine that clearly set forth the new approach
and philosophy:
We no longer live in an era when seamen and
their loved ones must look primarily to the
courts as a source of substantive legal
protection from injury and death; Congress and
the States have legislated extensively in
these areas. In this era, an admiralty court
should look primarily to these legislative
enactments for policy guidance. We may
supplement these statutory remedies where
doing so would achieve the uniform vindication
of such policies consistent with our
constitutional mandate, but we must also keep
strictly within the limits imposed by
Congress. Congress retains superior authority
in these matters, and an admiralty court must
be vigilant not to overstep the well-
considered boundaries imposed by federal
legislation. These statutes both direct and
delimit our actions....
The general maritime claim here alleged that
Torregano had been killed as a result of the
unseaworthiness of the vessel. It would be
inconsistent with our place in the
87
In another en banc case, this court relied upon the
broad policy implications of Miles v. Apex Marine to overturn
prior precedents regarding recovery of punitive damages in cases
involving claims of willful nonpayment of maintenance and cure.
Guevara v. Maritime Overseas Corporation, No. 92-4711, ___ F.3d
___, 1995 WL 437211 (5th Cir. July 26, 1995) (en banc).
xx
constitutional scheme were we to sanction more
expansive remedies in a judicially-created
cause of action in which liability is without
fault than Congress has allowed in cases of
death resulting from negligence....
We sail in occupied waters. Maritime tort law
is now dominated by federal statute, and we
are not free to expand remedies at will simply
because it might work to the benefit of seamen
and those dependent upon them....
Congress has limited the survival right for
seamen's injuries resulting from negligence.
As with loss of society in wrongful death
actions, this forecloses more expansive
remedies in a general maritime action founded
on strict liability. We will not create,
under our admiralty powers, a remedy
disfavored by a clear majority of the States
and that goes well beyond the limits of
Congress' ordered system of recovery for
seamen's injury and death....
Apex, 498 U.S. at 27-36.
The differences in jurisprudential outlook between Aparicio
and Apex are the differences between night and day. Aparicio
considers judge-made maritime law to be paramount and requires
statutory changes to expressly cover all possible circumstances to
be effective; Apex recognizes constitutional limitations to the
scope of judge-made law and requires accommodation of judge-made
law to statutory policy from similar, though not identical, areas
of the law. Aparicio looks for and encourages the recognition of
"pockets" where judge-made maritime law can survive statutory
changes; Apex abhors anomalies and encourages the tailoring and
adjusting of maritime law to promote uniformity of rights and
remedies. Aparicio puts the burdens on Congress to speak to the
intended scope of its 1972 amendments to the LHWCA Act; Apex puts
xxi
the burden on the federal courts to construe the continued vitality
of the Sieracki doctrine in a manner consistent with the 1972
amendments.
I am disappointed that my colleagues in the majority of this
en banc consideration failed to follow the counsel of Apex and to
seize the opportunity to make United States maritime law applicable
to the casualty in this case the same as the law that would have
been applicable had this casualty occurred in United States waters.
What reason in logic or good public policy is there for federal
judges to extend the benefits of the warranty of unseaworthiness to
a United States citizen working as a longshoreman or harborworker
in a foreign port when that same warranty of unseaworthiness was
statutorily removed as a protection for United States citizens
working as longshoremen and harborworkers in United States waters?
The precedential effect of the majority's decision will be truly
dramatic, for once this remedy is established for the benefit of
United States citizens working as longshoremen and harborworkers in
foreign ports, there will not be any logical reason to deny the
extension of the warranty of seaworthiness to citizens of other
nations working in those same foreign ports on United States
vessels. And as a result, the United States courts will become the
preferred forum for every worker who is injured on board a United
States vessel in foreign ports and desires to seek the benefit of
the strict liability of the warranty of unseaworthiness doctrine.
I suggest that Apex requires the conclusion that when Congress
passed the 1972 amendments to LHWCA, it expressly withdrew the
xxii
warranty of seaworthiness as a theory of recovery for longshoremen
and harborworkers in this country and in effect overruled and
reversed the concepts underlying Sieracki seaman status.88 The
federal courts should, therefore, "look primarily to [this]
legislative enactment for policy guidance" and should "not create,
under our admiralty powers a remedy ... that goes well beyond the
limits of Congress's ordered system of recovery for seaman's injury
and death." Apex at 27, 36.
I respectfully dissent, therefore, from the majority opinion,
which affirms the decision of the district court to extend Sieracki
seaman status to Coats with the right of recovery on the warranty
of unseaworthiness against Penrod.
88
See Edmonds v. Compagnie Generale Transatlantique, 443
U.S. 256, 99 S. Ct. 2753, 2757 (1979), where the Court stated:
Against this background, Congress acted in 1972, among
other things, [n.11] to eliminate the shipowner's
liability to the longshoreman for unseaworthiness and
the stevedore's liability to the shipowner for
unworkmanlike service resulting in injury to the
longshoreman--in other words, to overrule Sieracki and
Ryan.
[n.11]The Amendments also increased compensation benefits,
expanded the Act's geographic coverage, and instituted a new means
of adjudicating compensation cases. Robertson, Jurisdiction,
Shipowner Negligence and Stevedore Immunities under the 1972
Amendments to the Longshoremen's Act, 28 Mercer L. Rev. 515, 516
(1977).
xxiii