CHAP. 291.-An ACT to amend and re-enact an act entitled “an act im-
pesirg upon railivad corporations liability for injury to their employ-
ees in certain cases,” approved March 27, 1902,

Approved March 14, 1912.

1. Fe it enacted by the general assembly of Virginia, That an
act entitled “an act imposing upon railroad corporations ability
for injury to their employees in certain cases,” approved March
twenty-seventh, nineteen hundred and two, being section one
thousand two hundred ‘and ninety-four-k of Pollard’s code of
Virginia, be amended and re-enacted so as to read as follows:

£1294-k. That every corporation operating a railroad in this
State, whether such corporation be created under the laws of this
State or otherwise, shall be liable in damages for any and all in-
jury sustained by any employee of such corporation, as follows:

When such injury results from the wrongful act, neglect or
default of an agent or officer of such corporation superior to the
employee injured, or of a person emploved by such corporation
having the right to control or direct the services of such em-
plovee injured, or the services of the employee by whom he is
injured; and also when such injury results from the wrongful
act, neglect or default of a co-emplovee engaged in another de-
partment of labor from that of the employee injured, or of a co-
employee (notwithstanding the fact that the party injured had
the right to direct the services of the co-employee) in the per-
formance of any duty on or about the same or another train of
cars, or on or about an engine, or of a co-employee who has
charge of any switch, signal point or locomotive engine, or who is
charged with dispatching trains or transmitting telegraphic or
telephonic orders. Knowledge by any emplovee injured of the de-
fective or unsafe character or condition of any machinery, ways,
appliances or structures of such corporation shall not of itself be
a bar to recovery for any injury or death caused thereby. When
death, whether instantaneous or otherwise, results from any
injury to any employee of such corporation received as aforesaid,
the personal representatives of such employee shall have a right
of action therefor against such corporation, and may recover
damages in respect thereof. Any contract or agreement, express
or implied, made by any such employee to waive the benefit of
this section or any part thereof shall be null and void, and this
section shall not be construed to deprive any such employee, or
his personal representative, of any right or remedy to which he
is now entitled under the laws of this State.

2. The rules and principles of law as to contributory negli-
gence which apply to other cases shall apply to cases arising
under this act, except in so far as the same are herein modified or
changed.

3. The provisions of this act shall always be so restricted in
their application as not to conflict with any of the provisions of
the constitution or laws of the United States, and as if the neces-
sary limitations upon their interpretation had been herein ex-
pressed in each case.