CARRIER, COMMON. A carrier is a person who carries on the business of transporting goods or passengers, by land or water. A CO/PO/IOU carrier is one who performs that service only for hire and for all persons indifferently. The term is applicable to teamsters, truckmen, and the like, as well as to railroad and steamboat companies, and the owners and masters of vessels of all kinds engaged in the business of transportation. It does not, however, ordinarily include proprietors of shops who deliver goods to purchasers. nor hotel-keepers who maintain conveyances for the purpose of transporting their guests to and from their hotels. In consequence of the peculiar char acter of the common carrier's occupation, the op portunities which it affords for dishonest (healing with another's property, and its importance to the community, the common carrier of goods has been subjected by the common law to two stringent ob ligations. In the first place, his service is com pulsory; i.e. he is compelled to carry for all Nvlio may apply to him, without discrimination; and, in the second place, he is liable for loss or injury to the goods intrusted to him irrespective of any negligence on his part.
It is commonly, though inaccurately, stated that common carriers are responsible for any loss or damage during transportation from whatever cause "except the act of God or of the public enemy." By the weight of authority, the act of God means only such inevitable accident- as oc cur without the intervention of any human agency, although the decisions do not wholly agree in defining the phrase. The term public enemy embraces any de facto or de jure Govern ment engaged in an act of war or public hostility against the Government of the common carrier. Pirates are also public enemies, but the term does not include robbers, bandits, rioters, or rebels against established governmental authority. In addition to these exemptions, the common carrier is not responsible for losses occurring by reason of done by public authority or the default of the shipper, or such as are due to the nature and character or inherent defects of the goods shipped, as, for example. losses by fermentation, evapo ration, the ordinary decay of perishable articles, or the natural wear in the course of transporta tion, provided the carrier exercises reasonable care to make such dangers or the losses resulting therefrom as small as practicable. Railway com
panies, steamboat-owners, and other carriers who allow express companies to carry parcels and packages on their ears, boats, or other vehicles, are liable as common carriers to the owners of the goods for loss or damage without regard to the contract between them and such express car riers. Pdtilways, steamers, etc., carrying passen gers, although not liable for injury to passen gers without the carriers' fault, are responsible for the baggage of such passengers intrusted to them as common carriers, and the responsibility continues until the delivery of the baggage to the owner, or to his order. See BAGGAGE.
The extraordinary common-law liability of a carrier may now generally be qualified by special contract or acceptance. assented to by the ship per. The carrier cannot, however, generally ex empt himself from liability for negligence, though the English and some American courts hold to a different rule. The special contract is usually, though not necessarily, contained in the bill of lading, baggage-cheek, or passenger-ticket. The carrier's common - law liability has also been modified by statute in some juri-dictions, and on February 4, BST. the Congress of the United States passed the "Interstate Commerce Act" (q.v.). which created the Interstate Commerce Commission and also provided for the regulation of commerce between the States ehrried on by carriers by rail or water.
Carriers who undertake general business are bound to accept all freight that is offered, under liability of legal action if they refuse without just excuse: but any carrier may restrict his busi ness to certain goods, in which case he is not bound to accept other classes of goods for car riage. A carrier may require payment of freight in advance, and is entitled to a lien for his freight and for sums which he advances to other carriers in payment of freight. The responsi bility of the carrier, as such, begins upon the delivery of the goods for immediate tran-porta Hon. A delivery at the usual place of receiving freight, or to those employed by the company in the usual course of business, is sufficient. But Nvhere carriers have a warehouse at which they re ceive goods that are not to be forwarded until further order or a later time, they are in the meantime responsible only as warehousemen (see