Appellee sued the Phillips Petroleum Company and J. H. Myers in an Arkansas court to recover damages for injuries suffered by him while working fr that company. There was a trial by jury. It gave plaintiff a verdict in accordance with which the court entered judgment against both defendants for $50,000. On appeal to the State Supreme Court, the guaranty company became surety on a supersedeas bond. That court reduced the judgment to $30,000 and held plaintiff entitled to recover that amount from the petroleum company and the surety.
The petroleum company is a Delaware corporation authorized to do business in Arkansas and engaged in that state in the production and transportation of oil. Crawford and Moses' Digest of the Arkansas Statutes, § 7137, enacted March 8, 1907, declares that all corporations shall be liable for injuries sustained by any employee resulting from negligence of any other employee. The Arkansas Constitution, art. 12, § 6, provides: 'Corporations may be formed under general laws, which laws may, from time to time, be altered or repealed. The General Assembly shall have the power to alter, revoke or annul any charter of incorporation now existing and revocable at the adoption of this Constitution, or any that may hereafter be created, whenever, in their opinion, it may be injurious to the citizens of the State, in such manner, however, that no injustice shall be done to the corporators.' As to domestic corporations the Supreme Court has repeatedly held section 7137 to be a reasonable exertion of the state's power to prescribe the terms of charters of corporations organized under its laws. The State Constitution authorizes admission of foreign corporations to do business in the state and declares that, as to contracts made or business there done, they shall be subject to the same regulations and liabilities as like corporations of that state. Article 12, § 11. In this case the state court, in harmony with earlier decisions, held that section 7137 applies to a foreign corporation carrying on business in Arkansas.
The substance of the cause of action alleged is this: April 5, 1934, plaintiff and Myers were fellow servants in the service of the petroleum company. They and other employees were engaged in laying pipe. Plaintiff was injured while he and Myers were carrying a length of pipe. Plaintiff, his back toward Myers, had the forward end upon his shoulder; Myers had the other end and, while shifting the pipe from one shoulder to the other, negligently jerked it and threw plaintiff to the ground and injured him. The court charged that, if plaintiff's injuries were caused by the negligence of Myers, the verdict should be for plaintiff against both defendants. That instruction was in accordance with section 7137 and the verdict and judgment depend upon it. The sole question is whether by that section the state denies to the petroleum company the equal protection of the laws in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Appellant does not suggest discrimination between foreign and domestic corporations or between it and any other corporation. The section by its terms extends to all corporations whether organized in Arkansas or elsewhere. Undoubtedly the power of the state to prescribe the rule of liability as one of the conditions for the admission of foreign corporations is not less than its power to include the rule in the charters of domestic corporations. Appellant's position is the same as, in like circumstances, would be that of an Arkansas corporation. Its complaint is that the state makes corporations liable for personal injuries sustained by an employee through negligence of any other employee while as to individual employers it leaves in force the common-law rule that every servant assumes the risk of injuries through the negligence of his fellow servants.