Editing Negligence per se (section)

==History==
A famous early case in negligence ''per se'' is ''[[Gorris v. Scott]]'' (1874), a [[Exchequer of Pleas|Court of Exchequer]] case that established that the harm in question must be of the kind that the statute was intended to prevent. ''Gorris'' involved a shipment of sheep that was washed overboard but would not have been washed overboard had the shipowner complied with the regulations established pursuant to the [[Contagious Diseases (Animals) Act 1869]], which required that livestock be transported in pens to segregate potentially-infected animal populations from uninfected ones. [[Chief Baron of the Exchequer|Chief Baron]] [[Fitzroy Kelly]] held that as the statute was intended to prevent the spread of disease, rather than the loss of livestock in transit, the plaintiff could not claim negligence ''per se''.

A subsequent [[New York Court of Appeals]] case, ''[[Martin v. Herzog]]'' (1920), penned by Judge [[Benjamin N. Cardozo]], first presented the notion that negligence ''per se'' could be absolute evidence of negligence in certain cases.