RAILROADS MUST PAY VALUE AT DESTINATION FOR DAMAGES ON LOST LUMBER.
Question.—Should the railroad in settling claims for shortage of lumber pay for it at our cost price or at the current market price?
Reply: Unless the contract between the shipper and carrier provides for some other measure of damages, the principal amount to be paid by the carrier when the lumber is lost or destroyed is the market value at destination. If the freight has not been paid in advance it is to be deducted from market value. There is to be added, on the other hand, interest at the legal rate from the day on which delivery should have been made to the day of settlement; and there is to be added also any incidental expense to which the consignee may have been put as a direct result of the carrier’s failure to do his duty. This is the only way in which the consignee can be placed in as favorable a position as he would have occupied if the carrier had done his duty, the only way in which the whole of the loss can be placed upon the carrier, who has caused it; and this is what the law aims to do in every case.
Opinion No. 59.