Harris v. Salem School District

A school district is not liable at common law for injuries to a pupil which result from improper means of transportation negligently provided for the accommodation of scholars at the public expense.

Case, for personal injuries, brought by the plaintiff, a minor, by his father and next friend. The defendants moved to dismiss the action, on the ground that they were not. liable as matter of law; and the question of law arising on the motion was transferred from the. April term, 1903, of the superior court by Young, J. The declaration is as follows: “That the defendants, at Salem, in the county of Rockingham, on the first day of September, A. D. 1901, being a town school-district for the maintenance of a public school in said town, for the education of the children of school age residing in said district, did establish and maintain a public school at the center of.said town, .and abolished and discontinued the school in the district where the plaintiff resided; and in place of said school in said district, undertook to transport, and did transport, the scholars of said district, including the plaintiff, a distance of over two miles to said school at the center of the town; and it was the duty, and the said district was legally bound in the transportation of said scholars to furnish proper, safe, and convenient transportation to and from the homes and residences of said scholars and said school, and to so care, protect, and provide .for their1 comfort in such transportation as not to endanger the lives or health of said scholars thus transported. Yet the defendants, well knowing their -duty and though often requested, did not provide safe, convenient, and suitable conveyance of said scholars, and so unlawfully, unreasonably, and negligently transported and conveyed said scholars as to endanger their health; and the said plaintiff, being of legal school age and being desirous of attending the public schools of said town, where he had the legal right to attend, and being required by the school board of said town district to attend the school kept and maintained at the center of said Salem, and having the right to be carried from his home to and from said school in a safe, suitable, and convenient manner, yet the defendants so transported, carried, and conveyed the said plaintiff from his home to said school and from said school to his home, a distance of more than two miles, and so negligently provided for his safety and comfort, and so exposed him to the cold and storms, that in the month of November, 1901, while being so carried by said defendants, and being by their neglect and want of care exposed to the inclemency of the weather, that he became sick and suffered with congestion of the lungs and other lung troubles, and remained so for a long time, to wit, from that date until the date of this writ, and has been deprived of his education which he was entitled to receive, and by reason of said defendants’ neglect his health has become permanently impaired.”