408
Opinion of the Court
so that they will couple on impact. Johnson v. Southern Pacific Co., 196 U. S. 1, 16-17 (1904). The railroad is liable for an employee's injury or death caused by a violation of the SAA. See St. Louis, I. M. & S. R. Co. v. Taylor, 210 U. S. 281, 295 (1908) ("If the railroad . . . use[s] cars which do not comply with the standard, it violates the plain prohibitions of the law, and there arises from that violation the liability to make compensation to one who is injured by it").11
Early SAA cases involved injuries that occurred when an employee was forced to go between the cars during coupling operations. See, e. g., Johnson, supra, at 2 (hand crushed between cars during coupling); San Antonio & Aransas Pass R. Co. v. Wagner, 241 U. S. 476, 478 (1916) (foot crushed between couplers); Atlantic City R. Co. v. Parker, 242 U. S. 56, 58 (1916) (arm caught in drawhead between cars during coupling). Our later cases extended the reach of SAA liability beyond injuries occurring between cars during coupling to other injuries caused by the failure of cars to automatically couple. Affolder v. New York, C. & St. L. R. Co., 339 U. S. 96, 97 (1950) (railroad employee who ran after a runaway train caused by failure to couple lost a leg when he fell under a car); Carter v. Atlanta & St. Andrews Bay R. Co., 338 U. S. 430, 432-433 (1949) (plaintiff successfully boarded runaway cars that failed to couple, but was injured when the cars collided with another train); O'Donnell v. Elgin, J. & E. R. Co., 338 U. S. 384, 385-386 (1949) (railworker killed when two runaway cars—the result of a broken coupler—collided with cars whose couplers he was adjusting). Liability in each of these cases was predicated on the failure of coupling equipment to perform as required by the SAA, and we held that the SAA creates an absolute duty requiring not only
11 We have held that the Federal Employers' Liability Act (FELA), 45 U. S. C. § 51 et seq., makes railroads liable for a violation of the SAA, see O'Donnell v. Elgin, J. & E. R. Co., 338 U. S. 384, 391 (1949), although early cases, like Johnson, supra, preceded FELA's enactment in 1908. Hiles did not assert a negligence claim under FELA.
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