Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 2.djvu/294

 KO. BIV. PKT. CO. V. H. * ST. J. B. 00. 387 �On motion for new trial. �Gage dt Ladd, for plaintiff. �Geo. W. Easley, for defendant. �MoCbaet, C. J. This case was tried at the last term, and, ai the request of Judge Krekel, the motion for a new trial lias been heard before a fuU bench. �The plaintiff was, on the twenty-seventh of March, 1876, the owner of the steamboat Joe Kinney, and engaged in navi- gating the Missouri river with said vessel. The defendant ia the proprietor of a railroad bridge across the Missouri river at Kansas City, which was constructed under the act of con- gress approved July 25, 1866. On the day above mentioned the said steamboat was damaged, in attempting to pass said bridge, in the course of one of her voyages, by being driven by the current against one of the piers thereof. Plaintiff claims to have exercised due diligence, and charges that the piers of said bridge, as well as certain pontoons connected therewith, were obstructions to the navigation of said river, and wrongfully maintained therein. �The act of congress under which the said bridge was con- structed provides as follows : �"Section 2. And be it f urther enacted, that any bridge built nnder the provision of this act may, at the option of the Com- pany building the same, be built as a draw-bridge, with a pivot or other form of draw, or with unbroken or continu- ous spans : Provided, that if said bridge shall be made with unbroken and continuous spans, it shall not be of less eleva- tion, in any case, than 50 feet above extreme high-water mark, as understood at the point of location, to the bottom chord of the bridge ; nor shaU the spans of said bridge be less than 250 feet in length, and the piers of said bridge shall be parallel with the current of the river, and the main span shall be over the main channel of the river, and not less than 300 feet in length; and provided, also, that if any bridge built under this act shall be constructed as a pivot draw- bridge, with a draw over the main channel of the river at an accessible and navigable point, and with spans of not less than 160 feet in length, in the clear, on each side of the cen- ����