Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 8.djvu/297

 THE ALOPBNA. �I am clearly of opinion that the casualties or Iossgb of different voyages cannot be aggregated or grouped together, eay at the end of a season, or when a unal catastrophe ensnes, and all the loeers be cited in to share what bas been saved from shipwreck or other disas- ter, together with the pending freight, and have a decree entered exonerating the owners from personal liability. It seems to me that each voyage or trip, each separate journey, which the ship makes from one port to another, muet be treated as a separate venture, in- volving its own particular hazards, losses, and eamings ; and that vrhen each such voyage is ended it is for the owner to decide whether the loBses have been such as to make it expedient for him to invoke the protection giveu by this act of congres». If he does not decide to do this, butsends bis ship upon a new voyage, he thereby concedes bis Personal liability for the^mages incurred on the past voyage. �The owner, freighters, and passeugers on any particular voyage may be said to have a common interest for that voyage. They may be compelled to contribute for jettisons made for the common safety under certain circumstances. But there is nothing in common be- tween the freighters and passengers of different voyages, Each shipper or passenger may perhaps be held to have had some personal knowledge or information as to the seaworthiness of the ship, Or the skill of ber officers or crew,on the voyage in which hewas interested, and to have aoted on that knowledge to such an extent as in some degree to affect bis and the owner's relative rights; but no such knowledge can be predieated of any other voyage, and it would certainly seem to have been beyond the intended scope of this law, that after a series of losses happening on different trips or voyages, no one of which was of sufficient consequence to induce the owner to seek the benefits of this law, he can be allowed to combine them and obtain immunity from personal liability. The language as well as the evident reason of the statute shows that this proceeding can only be had for the purpose of apportioning the owner's interest between several persons who have suffered "losses on the same voyage." I am, therefore, of opinion that the petitioner cannot by this petition obtain relief as against the suit for collision with the schooner Stockbridge. �As to the second question, it is objected that under admiralty rules 54, 55, 56, and 57, promulgated by the supreme court for the purpose of prescribing and regulating the procedure under this law, the court cannot entertain a petition by the owner for an apportion- ment of his interest in the vessel among the several sufferers and for ��� �