duly allowed by the said Honorable Addison Brown, District Judge for the Southern District of New York, an appeal from his said decree to the United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, and it was ordered that a certified transcript of the record and all proceedings in the said case be forthwith transmitted to the said United States Circuit Court of Appeals. X. A certified transcript of the record and of all proceedings in the case was duly so transmitted to the said United States Circuit Court of Appeals; and on or about the 21st day of April, 1899, the appeal by your petitioners from so much of the aforesaid decree which does not award to each of your petitioners severally damages in the sum of two thousand dollars, and from that part of said decree which limits the recovery of each of your petitioners for damages to the sum of forty-eight and dollars, came on to be heard, and together with a cross-appeal by the claimants was argued by counsel for all parties before Judges Wallace, Lacombe and Shipman. And thereafter, and on the 25th day of May, 1899, said Circuit Court of Appeals rendered and filed an opinion and decisions written by Judge Lacombe, which, among other things, held that the provisions of Section 2 of the Harter Act as to the limiting of liability by bills of lading or shipping documents does not apply to passenger tickets; that a stipulation in a passenger ticket which limits the liability of the carrier for loss of baggage to two hundred and fifty francs, unless the passenger declares the value of his baggage in excess of such amount, pays for the transpor tation of the excess and takes a bill of lading therefor, is not so unreasonable as to be void as against public policy; and that such a stipulation, though in terms limiting the liability of the "shipowner or agent" only, inures to the benefit of the ship itself. Said opinion and decision affirmed said decree of said District Court; and a mandate issued accordingly from said Circuit Court of Appeals to said District Court. XI. On or about the 6th day of July, 1899, an order was made by the District Court of the United States fo. the Southern District of New York and entered in the office of the Clerk of said Court on the same day, which order directed that the libelants file with the Clerk of said Court on or before the 12th day of July, 1899, the mandate issued herein by the United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit; which mandate ordered, adjudged and decreed that the decree of said District Court be, and it thereby was, affirmed without interest or costs; and said order further directed that all proceedings upon the decree to be entered upon the said mandate be, and they thereby were, stayed until the 14th day of November, 1899. XII. In accordance with said order, on the 10th day of July, 1899, the said mandate was duly filed in the office of the Clerk of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. XIII. On or about the 20th day of July, 1899, without prejudice to the rights of your petitioners to apply to this Court for a writ of certiorari, an order was duly made by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York and entered in the office of the Clerk of said Court on the same day, which, among other things, ordered, adjudged and decreed: that the decree of the said Circuit Court of Appeals be, and it thereby was, made the decree of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York; and that the decree of said District Court entered herein on the 10th day of October, 1898, be, and it thereby was, affirmed. XIV. The questions and propositions of law involved in this case are substantially as follows: I. Is the following clause, in a ticket purchased in Paris, France, for the transport of a passenger from Antwerp, Belgium, to the City, County and State of New York, upon an ocean steamship, reasonable, valid and enforceable in a court of the United States assuming the Belgian law does not forbid such a contract? "The shipowner or agent shall not, under any circumstances, be liable for any loss or delay of or injury to passengers' baggage carried under this ticket beyond the sum of two hundred and fifty francs, at which such baggage is hereby valued, unless a bill of lading or receipt be given therefor, and freight paid in advance on the excess value at the rate of one per cent., or its equivalent, in which case the shipowner shall only be responsible according to the terms of the shipowner's form of cargo, bill of lading, in use from the port of departure. All questions arising hereunder are to be settled according to the Belgian law." II. Does the following language, in a ticket purchased in Paris, France, for the transport of a passenger from Antwerp, Belgium, to the City. County and State of New York, upon an ocean steamship release the steamship from liability in a suit in admiralty in rem brought by the passenger, assuming that the Belgian law does not forbid such a contract? "The shipowner, or agent, shall not, under any circumstances, be liable for any loss or delay of or injury to passengers' baggage carried under this ticket beyond the sum of two hundred and fifty francs, at which such baggage is hereby valued, unless a bill of lading or receipt be given therefor, and freight paid in advance on the excess value at the rate of one per cent., or its equivalent, in which case the shipowner shall only be responsible according to the terms of the shipowner's form of cargo, bill of lading, in use from the port of departure. All questions arising hereunder are to be settled according to the Belgian law." III. Does the Harter Act-viz., Chapter 105 of the laws passed by the fifty-second Congress at its twentieth session, which is published in volume 27 of the statutes at large at page 445-apply to and regulate the liability in admiralty of an ocean steamship which transports from Antwerp, Belgium, to the City, County and State of New York, trunks, which are the property of a passenger upon said steamship when the contract between the passenger and the steamship, its owner and agent is embraced in a document called a ticket, in print and manuscript form, signed by the agents of the owners of the steamships and also in a receipt for said ticket in the following language: "Total fr. "Weight, contents and value unknown and shipped by the Red Star Line steamer, subject to the conditions contained in the Co.'s ticket and bill of lading. RED STAR LINE. CAISSE" "Antwerp, Dec. 97. All of said questions were duly raised and argued by your petitioners in said District Court and in said Circuit Court of Appeals. XV. Concerning the clause in said ticket limiting the liability of the carrier, Judge Lacombe said in his opinion, which is reported in Volume 94 of the Federal Reporter at page 888: 66 'However unreasonable would be a 'condition' attempting to relieve the carrier entirely from liability in excess of some named amount, there seems to be no impropriety in the carrier's requiring the passenger to declare the value of the baggage in excess of such named amount, to take regular bill of lading therefor, and to pay for its transportation in proportion to its value, with the proviso that, if he fails so to do, the carrier will not be liable. As to the question whether the sum named (two hundred and fifty francs) is too small, the supreme court, in The Majestic, supra, intimated some doubt as to the reasonableness of ten pounds in the case of a first-cabin passenger's baggage, but rendered no decision thereon. In view of the circumstance that the condition complained of contained an offer to carry the excess value under a regular bill of lading, we are not prepared, in the absence of authority, to hold that two hundred and fifty francs is an unreasonable valuation for personal baggage of a second-cabin passenger not thus carried." XVI. In The Majestic, 166 U. S. 375, 386, this Court, speaking through the Chief Justice of the United States, said concerning the following clause: "Neither the shipowner nor the passage broker or agent is in any case liable for loss or injury to or delay in delivery of luggage or personal effects of the passenger beyond the amount of ten pounds unless the value of the same be declared at or before the issue of this contract ticket, and freight at current rates for every kind of property," with certain exceptions, "is paid; " that it was a "limitation which we must say does not strike us as reasonable, in view of the 'twenty cubical feet' of baggage for each which the company had expressly contracted to carry." In the case of Glovinsky v. Cunard Steamship Co. (4 N. Y. Miscellaneous Reports, 266), the General Term of the City Court of New York held that the same limitation, to the amount of fifty dollars ($50), upon the liability of a transatlantic steamship company for damage to the baggage of a steerage passenger, when it was contained in a passenger ticket, was unreasonable and void. The sum of one hundred dollars ($100) is the usual limitation for such damage in railroad tickets for short journeys in the United States. XVII. And your petitioners further aver that the present case is one in which it is proper for this Court to issue a writ of certiorari, for the following reasons, among others: 1. Because, in the case of The Majestic, supra, this Court intimated that a provision in a passenger ticket exempting the carrier from all liability for loss of baggage beyond ten pounds is unreasonable. 2. Because the Circuit Court of Appeals held that there is no authority as to what is a reasonable limitation of liability for baggage in a passenger ticket. 3. Because the questions of law involved herein have not been passed upon by this Court. 4. Because the public interests and the interests of jurisprudence require the decision of this Court upon the questions of law involved herein. 5. Because, in view of the large number of persons using similar steamship tickets, said questions are of sufficient general, national and material importance and interest as to make it necessary that they should be determined by the Court of last resort. 6. Because there is a conflict in this respect between the law as expounded by said Circuit Court of Appeals and the rule observed in the State Courts held in the same district and circuit. Wherefore your petitioners pray that this Honorable Court will be pleased to grant a writ of certiorari in this case to the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit to bring up this case to this Honorable Court for such proceedings therein as to this Honorable Court may seem just. LIZZIE STEARNS BLEECKER ELSIE L. BLEECKER. ROGER FOSTER, Petitioners' Attorney. STATE OF NEW YORK, Southern District of New York. } SS. LIZZIE STEARNS BLEECKER and ELSIE L. BLEECKER, being duly sworn, say, and each for herself says: I have read the foregoing petition. The same is true to my own knowledge, information and belief; my knowledge is derived from the record in this case and from what has taken place in my presence and hearing in the court in which this action has been heard. LIZZIE STEARNS BLEECKER. ELSIE L. BLEECKER. Sworn to before me this 20th day of September, 1899. [SEAL] GEORGE E. HAMMOND, Notary Public. I hereby certify that I have examined the foregoing petition, and in my opinion the petition is well founded, and that the case is one in which the prayer of the petitioners should be granted by this Court. ROGER FOSTER, Of Counsel for Petitioners. Supreme Court of the United States of America. In the Matter of the Petition of LIZZIE STEARNS BLEECKER and ELSIE L THE STEAMSHIP "KENSINGTON," her NATIONAL NAVIGATION COMPANY, Claimants and Appellants. SIRS - Please take notice that upon a certified copy of the transcript of the record herein and upon the annexed petition of Lizzie Stearns Bleecker and Elsie L. Bleecker, sworn to the 20th day of September, 1899, I shall move the motion hereto annexed before the Supreme Court of the United States at the Capitol in the City of Washington, District of Columbia, on Monday, the 16th day of October, 1899, at the opening of the Court on that day, or as soon thereafter as counsel can be heard, and that I shall then and there move for such further relief in the premises as may be just. Dated New York, September 21, 1899. Proctor, Attorney and Counsel for Libelants, Appellants, 35 Wall Street, New York. TO MESSRS. BIDDLE & WARD, Proctors and Counsel for Claimants, and TO THE INTERNATIONAL NAVIGATION COMPANY. Supreme Court of the United States of America. In the Matter of the Petition of LIZZIE THE STEAMSHIP "KENSINGTON," her Claimants and Appellants. And now come the libelants, appellants aboved named, by Roger Foster, their counsel, attorney and proctor, and move this Court, upon a certified copy of the transcript of the record herein, and upon the annexed petition sworn to the 20th day of September, 1899, for a writ of certiorari, directed to the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and to the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York, to bring before this Honorable Court the case of Lizzie Stearns Bleecker and Elsie L. Bleecker, libelants and appellants, against the steamship "Kensing ton," her boilers, engines, etc., The International Navigation Company, claimants and appellants, recently decided by the Circuit Court of Appeals of the United States for the Second Circuit, and by the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York, for such proceedings therein as to this Court may seem just; and for such other and further relief in the premises as may be just. |