THE GOLFER’S SLICE.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVI, Issue 263, 5 October 1936, Page 12

THE GOLFER’S SLICE.

AVHAT IS ACTIONABLE NEGLIGENCE?

Poor golf does not constitute actionable negligence, and the decision of a Pennsylvania Judge to the contrary is a real cause for alarm, in the opinion of Mr Henry AV. Taft, eminent among American lawyers, if not, hitherto, among American golfers. This Judge recently held guilty of negligence, in Brosko v. Hetherington, a player who, without benefit of lessons from a professional, sliced a drive on tho first tee and hit a caddy in the eye. Startled by the thought of what might happen to the game of golf if a flood of litigation were let loose by reason of the Pennsylvania Judge’s decision, Mr Taft has written to the New York Law Journal a letter of protest. The Judge (he says) seems to have been without golfing background. Otherwise, why should he have said that tho ball was “irregularly driven by the defendant”? ... If an “improper posture and an incorrect swing,” referred to by the Judge, are to constitute actionable negligence, there would probably bo in a single day at a popular golf links a thousand or more such acts of negligence, and tho hazard of players and caddies would be so great that insurance companies would classify the pastime as “extra-hazardous.” Mr Taft asks, what is an improper posture ? -Some players (ho writes) spread their legs wide apart, some place them close together, some stand pigeon-toed, some slant their toes outward, and some stand straight, while others lean over. Ninety-five per cent of golf players have only moderate skill, ho continues, and everybody frequently lapses from perfect form. A professional’s dictum is no solution. He admits that lack of skill may amount to negligence, “but in a gamo where departures from perfect practice aro so common and result in so many risks, that can only occur in an ex tremo case.”