Subject:  MILES v. APEX MARINE CORP., Syllabus



 
    NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as
is being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is
issued.  The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but
has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the
reader.  See United States v. Detroit Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321, 337.
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES


Syllabus


MILES, individually and as administratrix of the succession of TORREGANO v.
APEX MARINE CORP. et al.

certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the fifth circuit

No. 89-1158.  Argued October 3, 1990 -- Decided November 6, 1990

Petitioner Miles, the mother and administratrix of the estate of a seaman
killed by a fellow crew member aboard the vessel of respondents
(collectively Apex) docked in an American port, sued Apex in District
Court, alleging negligence under the Jones Act for failure to prevent the
assault and breach of the warranty of seaworthiness under general maritime
law for hiring a crew member unfit to serve.  After the court ruled, inter
alia, that the estate could not recover the son's lost future income, the
jury found that the ship was seaworthy but that Apex was negligent.
Although it awarded damages on the negligence claim to Miles for the loss
of her son's support and services and to the estate for pain and suffering,
the jury found that Miles was not financially dependent on her son and was
therefore not entitled to damages for loss of society.  The Court of
Appeals affirmed the judgment of negligence by Apex.  As to the general
maritime claim, the court ruled that the vessel was unseaworthy as a matter
of law, but held that a nondependent parent may not recover for loss of
society in a general maritime wrongful death action and that general
maritime law does not permit a survival action for decedent's lost future
earnings.

Held:

    1. There is a general maritime cause of action for the wrongful death
of a seaman.  The reasoning of Moragne v. States Marine Lines, Inc., 398 U.
S. 375, which created a general maritime wrongful death cause of action,
extends to suits for the death of true seamen despite the fact that Moragne
involved a longshoreman.  Although true seamen, unlike longshoremen, are
covered under the Jones Act provision creating a negligence cause of action
against the seaman's employer for wrongful death, Moragne, supra, at 396,
n. 12, recognized that that provision is preclusive only of state remedies
for death from unseaworthiness and does not pre-empt a general maritime
wrongful death action.  The Jones Act evinces no general hostility to
recovery under maritime law, since it does not disturb seamen's general
maritime claims for injuries resulting from unseaworthiness, and does not
preclude the recovery for wrongful death due to unseaworthiness created by
its companion statute, the Death On the High Seas Act (DOHSA).  Rather, the
Jones Act establishes a uniform system of seamen's tort law.  As the Court
concluded in Moragne, supra, at 396, n. 12, that case's extension of the
DOHSA wrongful death action from the high seas to territorial waters
furthers rather than hinders uniformity in the exercise of admiralty
jurisdiction.  There is also little question that Moragne intended to
create a general maritime wrongful death action applicable beyond the
situation of longshoremen, since it expressly overruled The Harrisburg, 119
U. S. 199, which held that maritime law did not afford a cause of action
for the wrongful death of a seaman, and since each of the "anomalies" to
which the Moragne cause of action was directed -- particularly the fact
that recovery was theretofore available for the wrongful death in
territorial waters of a longshoreman, but not a true seaman -- involved
seamen.  Pp. 7-10.

    2. Damages recoverable in a general maritime cause of action for the
wrongful death of a seaman do not include loss of society.  This case is
controlled by the logic of Mobil Oil Corp. v. Higginbotham, 436 U. S. 618,
625, which held that recovery for nonpecuniary loss, such as loss of
society, is foreclosed in a general maritime action for death on the high
seas because DOHSA, by its terms, limits recoverable damages in suits for
wrongful death on the high seas to "pecuniary loss sustained by the persons
for whose benefit the suit is brought" (emphasis added).  SeaLand Services,
Inc. v. Gaudet, 414 U. S. 573, which allowed recovery for loss of society
in a general maritime wrongful death action, applies only in territorial
waters and only to longshoremen.  The Jones Act, which applies to deaths of
true seamen as a result of negligence, allows recovery only for pecuniary
loss and not for loss of society in a wrongful death action.  See Michigan
Central R. Co. v. Vreeland, 227 U. S. 59, 69-71.  The Jones Act also
precludes recovery for loss of society in this case involving a general
maritime claim for wrongful death resulting from unseaworthiness, since it
would be inconsistent with this Court's place in the constitutional scheme
to sanction more expansive remedies for the judicially-created
unseaworthiness cause of action, in which liability is without fault, than
Congress has allowed in cases of death resulting from negligence.  This
holding restores a uniform rule applicable to all actions for the wrongful
death of a seaman, whether under DOHSA, the Jones Act, or general maritime
law.  Pp. 10-13.

    3. A general maritime survival action cannot include recovery for
decedent's lost future earnings.  Even if a seaman's personal cause of
action survives his death under general maritime law, the income he would
have earned but for his death is not recoverable because the Jones Act's
survival provision limits recovery to losses suffered during the decedent's
lifetime.  See, e. g., Van Beeck v. Sabine Towing Co., 300 U. S. 342, 347.
Since Congress has limited the survival right for seamen's injuries
resulting from negligence, this Court is not free, under its admiralty
powers, to exceed those limits by creating more expansive remedies in a
general maritime action founded on strict liability.  Pp. 13-16.

882 F. 2d 976, affirmed.

O'Connor, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which all other
Members joined, except Souter, J., who took no part in the consideration or
decision of the case.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------




Subject: 89-1158 -- OPINION, MILES v. APEX MARINE CORP.

 


NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in
the preliminary print of the United States Reports.  Readers are requested
to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States,
Washington, D. C. 20543, of any typographical or other formal errors, in
order that corrections may be made before the preliminary print goes to
press.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES


No. 89-1158



MERCEDEL W. MILES, individually and as administratrix of the succession of
LUDWICK ADAM TORREGANO, PETITIONER v. APEX MARINE CORPORATION et al.

on writ of certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the fifth
circuit

[November 6, 1990]



    Justice O'Connor delivered the opinion of the Court.
    We decide whether the parent of a seaman who died from injuries
incurred aboard respondents' vessel may recover under general maritime law
for loss of society, and whether a claim for the seaman's lost future
earnings survives his death.

I
    Ludwick Torregano was a seaman aboard the vessel M/V Archon.  On the
evening of July 18, 1984, Clifford Melrose, a fellow crew member, stabbed
Torregano repeatedly, killing him.  At the time, the ship was docked in the
harbor of Vancouver, Washington.
    Mercedel Miles, Torregano's mother and administratrix of his estate,
sued Apex Marine Corporation and Westchester Marine Shipping Company, the
vessel's operators, Archon Marine Company, the charterer, and Aeron Marine
Company, the Archon's owner (collectively Apex), in United States District
Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana.  Miles alleged negligence
under the Jones Act, 46 U. S. C. App. MDRV 688, for failure to prevent the
assault on her son, and breach of the warranty of seaworthiness under
general maritime law for hiring a crew member unfit to serve.  She sought
compensation for loss of support and services and loss of society resulting
from the death of her son, punitive damages, and compensation to the estate
for Torregano's pain and suffering prior to his death and for his lost
future income.
    At trial, the District Court granted Apex's motion to strike the claim
for punitive damages, ruled that the estate could not recover Torregano's
lost future income, and denied Miles' motion for a directed verdict as to
negligence and unseawor thiness.  The court instructed the jury that Miles
could not recover damages for loss of society if they found that she was
not financially dependent on her son.
    The jury found that Apex was negligent and that Torre gano was 7%
contributorily negligent in causing his death, but that the ship was
seaworthy.  After discounting for Torregano's contributory negligence, the
jury awarded Miles $7,254 for the loss of support and services of her son
and awarded the estate $130,200 for Torregano's pain and suffering.  The
jury also found that Miles was not financially dependent on her son and
therefore not entitled to damages for loss of society.  The District Court
denied both parties' motions for judgment notwithstanding the verdict and
entered judgment accordingly.
    The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed in
part, reversed in part, and remanded.  882 F. 2d 976 (1989).  The court
affirmed the judgment of negligence on the part of Apex, but held that
there was insufficient evidence to support the contributory negligence
finding.  Id., at 983-985.  Miles was therefore entitled to the full
measure of $7,800 for loss of support and services, and the estate entitled
to $140,000 for Torregano's pain and suffering.  The court also found that
Melrose's extraordinarily violent disposition demonstrated that he was
unfit, and therefore that the Archon was unseaworthy as a matter of law.
Id., at 983.  Because this ruling revived Miles' general maritime claim,
the court considered two questions concerning the scope of damages under
general maritime law.  The court reaffirmed its prior decision in Sistrunk
v. Circle Bar Drilling Co., 770 F. 2d 455 (CA5 1985), holding that a
nondependent parent may not recover for loss of society in a general
maritime wrongful death action.  882 F. 2d, at 989.  It also held that
general maritime law does not permit a survival action for decedent's lost
future earnings.  Id., at 987.
    We granted Miles' petition for certiorari on these two issues, 494 U.
S. --- (1990), and now affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.

II
    We rely primarily on Moragne v. States Marine Lines, Inc., 398 U. S.
375 (1970).  Edward Moragne was a longshoreman who had been killed aboard a
vessel in United States and Florida territorial waters.  His widow brought
suit against the shipowner, seeking to recover damages for wrongful death
due to the unseaworthiness of the ship.  The District Court dismissed that
portion of the complaint because neither federal nor Florida statutes
allowed a wrongful death action sounding in unseaworthiness where death
occurred in territorial waters.  General maritime law was also no help; in
The Harrisburg, 119 U. S. 199 (1886), this Court held that maritime law
does not afford a cause of action for wrongful death.  The Court of Appeals
affirmed.
    This Court overruled The Harrisburg.  After questioning whether The
Harrisburg was a proper statement of the law even in 1886, the Court set
aside that issue because a "development of major significance ha[d]
intervened."  Moragne, supra, at 388.  Specifically, the state legislatures
and Congress had rejected wholesale the rule against wrongful death.  Every
State in the Union had enacted a wrongful death statute.  In 1920, Congress
enacted two pieces of legislation creating a wrongful death action for most
maritime deaths.  The Jones Act, 46 U. S. C. App. MDRV 688, through
incorporation of the Federal Employers' Liability Act (FELA), 35 Stat. 65,
as amended, 45 U. S. C. 15 51-59, created a wrongful death action in favor
of the personal representative of a seaman killed in the course of
employment.  The Death on the High Seas Act (DOHSA), 46 U. S. C. App. 15
761, 762, created a similar action for the representative of anyone killed
on the high seas.
    These statutes established an unambiguous policy in abrogation of those
principles that underlay The Harrisburg.  Such a policy is "to be given its
appropriate weight not only in matters of statutory construction but also
in those of decisional law."  Moragne, supra, at 391.  Admiralty is not
created in a vacuum; legislation has always served as an important source
of both common law and admiralty principles.  398 U. S., at 391, 392,
citing Landis, Statutes and the Sources of Law, in Harvard Legal Essays
213, 214, 226-227 (1934).  The unanimous legislative judgment behind the
Jones Act, DOHSA, and the many state statutes created a strong presumption
in favor of a general maritime wrongful death action.
    But legislation sends other signals to which an admiralty court must
attend.  "The legislature does not, of course, merely enact general
policies.  By the terms of a statute, it also indicates its conception of
the sphere within which the policy is to have effect."  Moragne, supra, at
392.  Congress, in the exercise of its legislative powers, is free to say
"this much and no more."  An admiralty court is not free to go beyond those
limits.  The Jones Act and DOHSA established a policy in favor of maritime
wrongful death recovery.  The central issue in Moragne was whether the
limits of those statutes proscribed a more general maritime cause of
action.  398 U. S., at 393.
    The Court found no such proscription.  Rather, the unfortunate
situation of Moragne's widow had been created by a change in the maritime
seascape that Congress could not have anticipated.  At the time Congress
passed the Jones Act and DOHSA, federal courts uniformly applied state
wrongful death statutes for deaths occurring in state territorial waters.
Except in those rare cases where state statutes were also intended to apply
on the high seas, however, there was no recovery for wrongful death outside
territorial waters.  See Moragne, supra, at 393, and n. 10.  DOHSA filled
this void, creating a wrongful death action for all persons killed on the
high seas, sounding in both negligence and unseaworthiness.  Congress did
not extend DOHSA to territorial waters because it believed state statutes
sufficient in those areas.  398 U. S., at 397-398.
    And so they were when DOHSA was passed.  All state statutes allowed for
wrongful death recovery in negligence, and virtually all DOHSA claims
sounded in negligence.  Un seaworthiness was "an obscure and relatively
little used remedy," largely because a shipowner's duty at that time was
only to use due diligence to provide a seaworthy ship.  See G. Gilmore & C.
Black, The Law of Admiralty 383, 375 (2d ed. 1975).  Thus, although DOHSA
permitted actions in both negligence and unseaworthiness, it worked
essentially as did state wrongful death statutes.  DOHSA created a near
uniform system of wrongful death recovery.
    "The revolution in the law began with Mahnich v. Southern S.S. Co.,
[321 U. S. 96 (1944)]", in which this Court transformed the warranty of
seaworthiness into a strict liability obligation.  Gilmore & Black, supra,
at 384, 386.  The shipowner became liable for failure to supply a safe ship
irrespective of fault, and irrespective of the intervening negligence of
crew members.  Mahnich, supra, at 100 ("[T]he exercise of due diligence
does not relieve the owner of his obligation to the seaman to furnish
adequate appliances. . . .  If the owner is liable for furnishing an
unseaworthy appliance, even when he is not negligent, a fortiori his
obligation is unaffected by the fact that the negligence of the officers of
the vessel contributed to the unseaworthiness").  The Court reaffirmed the
rule two years later in Seas Shipping Co. v. Sieracki, 328 U. S. 85, 94-95
(1946) ("[Unseaworthiness] is essentially a species of liability without
fault").  As a consequence of this radical change, unseaworthiness
"[became] the principal vehicle for recovery by seamen for injury or
death."  Moragne, 398 U. S., at 399.  DOHSA claims now sounded largely in
unseaworthiness.  "The resulting discrepancy between the remedies for
deaths covered by [DOHSA] and for deaths that happen to fall within a state
wrongful-death statute not encompassing unseaworthiness could not have been
foreseen by Congress."  Ibid.
    The emergence of unseaworthiness as a widely used theory of liability
made manifest certain anomalies in maritime law that had not previously
caused great hardship.  First, in territorial waters, general maritime law
allowed a remedy for unseaworthiness resulting in injury, but not for
death.  Second, DOHSA allowed a remedy for death resulting from un
seaworthiness on the high seas, but general maritime law did not allow such
recovery for a similar death in territorial waters.  Finally, in what
Moragne called the "strangest" anomaly, in those States whose statutes
allowed a claim for wrongful death resulting from unseaworthiness, recovery
was available for the death of a longshoreman due to unsea worthiness, but
not for the death of a Jones Act seaman.  See Moragne, supra, at 395-396.
This was because wrongful death actions under the Jones Act are limited to
negligence, and the Jones Act pre-empts state law remedies for the death or
injury of a seaman.  See Gillespie v. United States Steel Corp., 379 U. S.
148, 154-156 (1964).
    The United States, as amicus curiae, urged the Moragne Court to
eliminate these inconsistencies and render maritime wrongful death law
uniform by creating a general maritime wrongful death action applicable in
all waters.  The territorial limitations placed on wrongful death actions
by DOHSA did not bar such a solution.  DOHSA was itself a manifestation of
congressional intent "to achieve `uniformity in the exercise of admiralty
jurisdiction.' "  Moragne, supra, at 401, quoting Gillespie, supra, at 155.
Nothing in that Act or in the Jones Act could be read to preclude this
Court from exercising its admiralty power to remedy nonuniformities that
could not have been anticipated when those statutes were passed.  Moragne,
supra, at 399-400.  The Court therefore overruled The Harrisburg and
created a general maritime wrongful death cause of action.  This result was
not only consistent with the general policy of both 1920 Acts favoring
wrongful death recovery, but also effectuated "the constitutionally based
principle that federal admiralty law should be `a system of law coextensive
with, and operating uniformly in, the whole country.' "  Moragne, supra, at
402, quoting The Lottawanna, 21 Wall. 558, 575 (1875).

III
    We have described Moragne at length because it exemplifies the
fundamental principles that guide our decision in this case.  We no longer
live in an era when seamen and their loved ones must look primarily to the
courts as a source of substantive legal protection from injury and death;
Congress and the States have legislated extensively in these areas.  In
this era, an admiralty court should look primarily to these legislative
enactments for policy guidance.  We may supplement these statutory remedies
where doing so would achieve the uniform vindication of such policies
consistent with our constitutional mandate, but we must also keep strictly
within the limits imposed by Congress.  Congress retains superior authority
in these matters, and an admiralty court must be vigilant not to overstep
the well-considered boundaries imposed by federal legislation.  These
statutes both direct and delimit our actions.
    Apex contends that Moragne's holding, creating a general maritime
wrongful death action, does not apply in this case because Moragne was a
longshoreman, whereas Torregano was a true seaman.  Apex is correct that
Moragne does not apply on its facts, but we decline to limit Moragne to its
facts.
    Historically, a shipowner's duty of seaworthiness under general
maritime law ran to seamen in the ship's employ.  See Sieracki, 328 U. S.,
at 90.  In Sieracki, we extended that duty to stevedores working aboard
ship but employed by an independent contractor.  Id., at 95.  As this was
Moragne's situation, Moragne's widow was able to bring an action for
unseaworthiness under general maritime law.  In a narrow sense, Moragne
extends only to suits upon the death of longshoremen like Moragne,
so-called Sieracki seamen.  Torregano was a true seaman, employed aboard
the Archon.  Were we to limit Moragne to its facts, Miles would have no
general maritime wrongful death action.  Indeed, were we to limit Moragne
to its facts, that case would no longer have any applicability at all.  In
1972, Congress amended the Longshore and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act
(LHWCA), 86 Stat. 1251, as amended, 33 U. S. C. 15 901-950, to bar any
recovery from shipowners for the death or injury of a longshoreman or
harbor worker resulting from breach of the duty of seaworthiness.  See 33
U. S. C. MDRV 905(b); American Export Lines, Inc. v. Alvez, 446 U. S. 274,
282, n. 9 (1980).  If Moragne's widow brought her action today, it would be
foreclosed by statute.
    Apex asks us not to extend Moragne to suits for the death of true
seamen.  This limitation is warranted, they say, because true seamen,
unlike longshoremen, are covered under the Jones Act.  The Jones Act
provides a cause of action against the seaman's employer for wrongful death
resulting from negligence that Apex contends is preclusive of any recovery
for death from unseaworthiness.  See 46 U. S. C. App. MDRV 688.
    This Court first addressed the preclusive effect of the Jones Act
wrongful death provision in Lindgren v. United States, 281 U. S. 38 (1930).
Petitioner, who was not a wrongful death beneficiary under the Jones Act,
attempted to recover for the negligence of the shipowner under a state
wrongful death statute.  The Court held that the Jones Act pre-empted the
state statute: "[The Jones] Act is one of general application intended to
bring about the uniformity in the exercise of admiralty jurisdiction
required by the Constitution, and necessarily supersedes the application of
the death statutes of the several States."  Id., at 44.  The Court also
concluded that the Jones Act, limited as it is to recovery for negligence,
would preclude recovery for the wrongful death of a seaman resulting from
the unseaworthiness of the vessel.  Id., at 47-48.  In Gillespie v. United
States Steel Corp., 379 U. S. 148 (1964), the Court reaffirmed Lindgren,
and held that the Jones Act precludes recovery under a state statute for
the wrongful death of a seaman due to unseaworthiness.  Id., at 154-156.
    Neither Lindgren nor Gillespie considered the effect of the Jones Act
on a general maritime wrongful death action.  Indeed, no such action
existed at the time those cases were decided.  Moragne addressed the
question explicitly.  The Court explained there that the preclusive effect
of the Jones Act established in Lindgren and Gillespie extends only to
state remedies and not to a general maritime wrongful death action.  See
Moragne, 398 U. S., at 396, n. 12.
    The Jones Act provides an action in negligence for the death or injury
of a seaman.  It thereby overruled The Osceola, 189 U. S. 158 (1903), which
established that seamen could recover under general maritime law for
injuries resulting from unseaworthiness, but not negligence.  The Jones Act
evinces no general hostility to recovery under maritime law.  It does not
disturb seamen's general maritime claims for injuries resulting from
unseaworthiness, Pacific Steamship Co. v. Peterson, 278 U. S. 130, 139
(1928), and it does not preclude the recovery for wrongful death due to
unseaworthiness created by its companion statute DOHSA.  Kernan v. American
Dredging Co., 355 U. S. 426, 430, n. 4 (1958).  Rather, the Jones Act
establishes a uniform system of seamen's tort law parallel to that
available to employees of interstate railway carriers under FELA.  As the
Court concluded in Moragne, the extension of the DOHSA wrongful death
action to territorial waters furthers rather than hinders uniformity in the
exercise of admiralty jurisdiction.  Moragne, supra, at 396, n. 12.
    There is also little question that Moragne intended to create a general
maritime wrongful death action applicable beyond the situation of
longshoremen.  For one thing, Moragne explicitly overruled The Harrisburg.
Moragne, supra, at 409.  The Harrisburg involved a true seaman.  The
Harrisburg, 119 U. S., at 200.  In addition, all three of the "anomalies"
to which the Moragne cause of action was directed involved seamen.  The
"strangest" anomaly -- that recovery was available for the wrongful death
in territorial waters of a longshoreman, but not a true seaman -- could
only be remedied if the Moragne wrongful death action extended to seamen.
It would be strange indeed were we to read Moragne as not addressing a
problem that in large part motivated its result.  If there has been any
doubt about the matter, we today make explicit that there is a general
maritime cause of action for the wrongful death of a seaman, adopting the
reasoning of the unanimous and carefully crafted opinion in Moragne.

IV
    Moragne did not set forth the scope of the damages recoverable under
the maritime wrongful death action.  The Court first considered that
question in Sea-Land Services, Inc. v. Gaudet, 414 U. S. 573 (1974).
Respondent brought a general maritime action to recover for the wrongful
death of her husband, a longshoreman.  The Court held that a dependent
plaintiff in a maritime wrongful death action could recover for the
pecuniary losses of support, services, and funeral expenses, as well as for
the nonpecuniary loss of society suffered as the result of the death.  Id.,
at 591.  Gaudet involved the death of a longshoreman in territorial waters.
{1}  Consequently, the Court had no need to consider the preclusive effect
of DOHSA for deaths on the high seas, or the Jones Act for deaths of true
seamen.
    We considered DOHSA in Mobil Oil Corp. v. Higgin botham, 436 U. S. 618
(1978).  That case involved death on the high seas and, like Gaudet,
presented the question of loss of society damages in a maritime wrongful
death action.  The Court began by recognizing that Gaudet, although broadly
written, applied only in territorial waters and therefore did not decide
the precise question presented.  Id., at 622-623.  Congress made the
decision for us.  DOHSA, by its terms, limits recoverable damages in
wrongful death suits to "pecuniary loss sustained by the persons for whose
benefit the suit is brought."  46 U. S. C. App. MDRV 762 (emphasis added).
This explicit limitation forecloses recovery for nonpecuniary loss, such as
loss of society, in a general maritime action.
    Respondents argued that admiralty courts have traditionally undertaken
to supplement maritime statutes.  The Court's answer in Higginbotham is
fully consistent with those principles we have here derived from Moragne:
Congress has spoken directly to the question of recoverable damages on the
high seas, and "when it does speak directly to a question, the courts are
not free to `supplement' Congress' answer so thoroughly that the Act
becomes meaningless."  Higginbotham, supra, at 625.  Moragne involved
gap-filling in an area left open by statute; supplementation was entirely
appropriate.  But in an "area covered by the statute, it would be no more
appropriate to prescribe a different measure of damages than to prescribe a
different statute of limitations, or a different class of beneficiaries."
Higginbotham, supra, at 625.
    The logic of Higginbotham controls our decision here.  The holding of
Gaudet applies only in territorial waters, and it applies only to
longshoremen.  Gaudet did not consider the preclusive effect of the Jones
Act for deaths of true seamen.  We do so now.
    Unlike DOHSA, the Jones Act does not explicitly limit damages to any
particular form.  Enacted in 1920, the Jones Act makes applicable to seamen
the substantive recovery provisions of the older FELA.  See 46 U. S. C.
App. MDRV 688.  FELA recites only that employers shall be liable in
"damages" for the injury or death of one protected under the Act.  45 U. S.
C. MDRV 51.  In Michigan Central R. Co. v. Vreeland, 227 U. S. 59 (1913),
however, the Court explained that the language of the FELA wrongful death
provision is essentially identical to that of Lord Campbell's Act, 9 & 10
Vict. ch. 93 (1846), the first wrongful death statute.  Lord Campbell's Act
also did not limit explicitly the "damages" to be recovered, but that Act
and the many state statutes that followed it consistently had been
interpreted as providing recovery only for pecuniary loss.  Vreeland,
supra, at 69-71.  The Court so construed FELA.  Ibid.
    When Congress passed the Jones Act, the Vreeland gloss on FELA, and the
hoary tradition behind it, were well established.  Incorporating FELA
unaltered into the Jones Act, Congress must have intended to incorporate
the pecuniary limitation on damages as well.  We assume that Congress is
aware of existing law when it passes legislation.  See Cannon v. University
of Chicago, 441 U. S. 677, 696-697 (1979).  There is no recovery for loss
of society in a Jones Act wrongful death action.
    The Jones Act also precludes recovery for loss of society in this case.
The Jones Act applies when a seaman has been killed as a result of
negligence and it limits recovery to pecuniary loss.  The general maritime
claim here alleged that Torregano had been killed as a result of the
unseaworthiness of the vessel.  It would be inconsistent with our place in
the constitutional scheme were we to sanction more expansive remedies in a
judicially-created cause of action in which liability is without fault than
Congress has allowed in cases of death resulting from negligence.  We must
conclude that there is no recovery for loss of society in a general
maritime action for the wrongful death of a Jones Act seaman.
    Our decision also remedies an anomaly we created in Hig ginbotham.
Respondents in that case warned that the elimination of loss of society
damages for wrongful deaths on the high seas would create an unwarranted
inconsistency between deaths in territorial waters, where loss of society
was available under Gaudet, and deaths on the high seas.  We recognized the
value of uniformity, but concluded that a concern for consistency could not
override the statute.  Higgin botham, 436 U. S., at 624.  Today we restore
a uniform rule applicable to all actions for the wrongful death of a
seaman, whether under DOHSA, the Jones Act, or general maritime law.

V
    We next must decide whether, in a general maritime action surviving the
death of a seaman, the estate can recover decedent's lost future earnings.
Under traditional maritime law, as under common law, there is no right of
survival; a seaman's personal cause of action does not survive the seaman's
death.  Cortes v. Baltimore Insular Line, Inc., 287 U. S. 367, 371 (1932);
Romero v. International Terminal Operating Co., 358 U. S. 354, 373 (1959);
Gillespie, 379 U. S., at 157.
    Congress and the States have changed the rule in many instances.  The
Jones Act, through its incorporation of FELA, provides that a seaman's
right of action for injuries due to negligence survives to the seaman's
personal representative.  See 45 U. S. C. MDRV 59; Gillespie, supra, at
157.  Most States have survival statutes applicable to tort actions
generally, see 1 S. Speiser, Recovery for Wrongful Death 2d MDRV 3.2, (1975
and Supp. 1989), 2 id., 15 14.1, 14.3, App. A., and admiralty courts have
applied these state statutes in many instances to preserve suits for injury
at sea.  See, e. g., Just v. Chambers, 312 U. S. 383, 391 (1941).  See also
Kernan v. American Dredging Co., 355 U. S. 426, 430, n. 4 (1958); Kossick
v. United Fruit Co., 365 U. S. 731, 739 (1961); Gillespie, supra, at 157;
Comment, Application of State Survival Statutes in Maritime Causes, 60
Colum. L. Rev. 534, 535, n. 11 (1960); Nagy, The General Maritime Law
Survival Action: What are the Elements of Recoverable Damages?, 9 U. Haw.
L. Rev. 5, 27 (1987).  Where these state statutes do not apply, {2}
however, or where there is no state survival statute, there is no survival
of unseaworthiness claims absent a change in the traditional maritime
rule.
    Several Courts of Appeals have relied on Moragne to hold that there is
a general maritime right of survival.  See Spiller v. Thomas M. Lowe, Jr.,
& Assocs., Inc., 466 F. 2d 903, 909 (CA8 1972); Barbe v. Drummond, 507 F.
2d 794, 799-800 (CA1 1974); Law v. Sea Drilling Corp., 523 F. 2d 793, 795
(CA5 1975); Evich v. Connelly, 759 F. 2d 1432, 1434 (CA9 1985).  As we have
noted, Moragne found that congressional and state abrogation of the
maritime rule against wrongful death actions demonstrated a strong policy
judgment, to which the Court deferred.  Moragne, 398 U. S., at 388-393.
Following this reasoning, the lower courts have looked to the Jones Act and
the many state survival statutes and concluded that these enactments
dictate a change in the general maritime rule against survival.  See, e.
g., Spiller, supra, at 909; Barbe, supra, at 799-800, and n. 6.
    Miles argues that we should follow the Courts of Appeals and recognize
a general maritime survival right.  Apex urges us to reaffirm the
traditional maritime rule and overrule these decisions.  We decline to
address the issue, because its resolution is unnecessary to our decision on
the narrow question presented: whether the income decedent would have
earned but for his death is recoverable.  We hold that it is not.
    Recovery of lost future income in a survival suit will, in many
instances, be duplicative of recovery by dependents for loss of support in
a wrongful death action; the support dependents lose as a result of a
seaman's death would have come from the seaman's future earnings.  Perhaps
for this reason, there is little legislative support for such recovery in
survival.  In only a few States can an estate recover in a survival action
for income decedent would have received but for death. {3}  At the federal
level, DOHSA contains no survival provision.  The Jones Act incorporates
FELA's survival provision, but, as in most States, recovery is limited to
losses suffered during the decedent's lifetime.  See 45 U. S. C. MDRV 59;
Van Beeck v. Sabine Towing Co., 300 U. S. 342, 347 (1937); St. Louis, I. M.
& S. R. Co. v. Craft, 237 U. S. 648, 658 (1915).
    This state and federal legislation hardly constitutes the kind of
"wholesale" and "unanimous" policy judgment that prompted the Court to
create a new cause of action in Moragne.  See Moragne, supra, at 388, 389.
To the contrary, the considered judgment of a large majority of American
legislatures is that lost future income is not recoverable in a survival
action.  Were we to recognize a right to such recovery under maritime law,
we would be adopting a distinctly minority view.
    This fact alone would not necessarily deter us, if recovery of lost
future income were more consistent with the general principles of maritime
tort law.  There are indeed strong policy arguments for allowing such
recovery.  See, e. g., R. Posner, Economic Analysis of Law 176-181 (3d ed.
1986) (recovery of lost future income provides efficient incentives to take
care by insuring that the tortfeasor will have to bear the total cost of
the victim's injury or death).  Moreover, Miles reminds us that admiralty
courts have always shown a special solicitude for the welfare of seamen and
their families.  "[C]ertainly it better becomes the humane and liberal
character of proceedings in admiralty to give than to withhold the remedy."
Moragne, supra, at 387, quoting Chief Justice Chase in The Sea Gull, 21 F.
Cas. 909, 910 (No. 12,578) (CC Md. 1865).  See also Gaudet, 414 U. S., at
583.
    We are not unmindful of these principles, but they are insufficient in
this case.  We sail in occupied waters.  Maritime tort law is now dominated
by federal statute, and we are not free to expand remedies at will simply
because it might work to the benefit of seamen and those dependent upon
them.  Congress has placed limits on recovery in survival actions that we
cannot exceed.  Because this case involves the death of a seaman, we must
look to the Jones Act.
    The Jones Act/FELA survival provision limits recovery to losses
suffered during the decedent's lifetime.  See 45 U. S. C. MDRV 59.  This
was the established rule under FELA when Congress passed the Jones Act,
incorporating FELA, see St. Louis, I. M. & S. R. Co., supra, at 658, and it
is the rule under the Jones Act.  See Van Beeck, supra, at 347.  Congress
has limited the survival right for seamen's injuries resulting from
negligence.  As with loss of society in wrongful death actions, this
forecloses more expansive remedies in a general maritime action founded on
strict liability.  We will not create, under our admiralty powers, a remedy
disfavored by a clear majority of the States and that goes well beyond the
limits of Congress' ordered system of recovery for seamen's injury and
death.  Because Torregano's estate cannot recover for his lost future
income under the Jones Act, it cannot do so under general maritime law.

VI
    Cognizant of the constitutional relationship between the courts and
Congress, we today act in accordance with the uniform plan of maritime tort
law Congress created in DOHSA and the Jones Act.  We hold that there is a
general maritime cause of action for the wrongful death of a seaman, but
that damages recoverable in such an action do not include loss of society.
We also hold that a general maritime survival action cannot include
recovery for decedent's lost future earnings.  Accordingly, the judgment of
the Court of Appeals is

Affirmed.
    Justice Souter took no part in the consideration or decision of this
case.

 
 
 
 
 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1
    As with Moragne, the 1972 amendments to LHWCA have rendered Gaudet
inapplicable on its facts.  See supra, at ---; 33 U. S. C. MDRV 905(b).
Suit in Gaudet was filed before 1972.  Gaudet v. Sea-Land Services, Inc.,
463 F. 2d 1331, 1332 (CA5 1972).

2
    In Offshore Logistics, Inc. v. Tallentire, 477 U. S. 207, 215, n. 1
(1986), we declined to approve or disapprove the practice of some courts of
applying state survival statutes to cases involving death on the high
seas.

3
    See Mich. Comp. Laws 15 600.2921, 600.2922 (1986); Olivier v. Houghton
County St. R. Co., 134 Mich. 367, 368-370, 96 N. W. 434, 435 (1903); 42 Pa.
Cons. Stat. MDRV 8302 (1988); Incollingo v. Ewing, 444 Pa. 263, 307-308,
282 A. 2d 206, 229 (1971); Wash. Rev. Code MDRV 4.20.060 (1989); Balmer v.
Dilley, 81 Wash. 2d 367, 370, 502 P. 2d 456, 458 (1972).  See generally 2
S. Speiser, Recovery for Wrongful Death 2d MDRV 14.7, App. A (1975 and
Supp. 1989).  Speiser explains that many states do not allow any recovery
of lost earnings in survival, and that among those that do, recovery is
generally limited to earnings lost from the time of injury to the time of
death.  Ibid.
