look-out
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 62 U.S. 184 - William Cushing v. The Owners of the Ship John Fraser · 1858Most cited · 117 citing opinions
maritime
The law requires of a colliding vessel, that she shall prove not only that she had a competent look-out stationed at the proper place, but also that the look-out was vigilantly performing his duty.
How the Supreme Court has restated “look-out”
Each Supreme Court definition of “look-out,” sized by how often later courts cited it. “Change” is measured by wording overlap with earlier definitions — a rough signal, not a semantic judgment.
How often courts cite the cases defining “look-out”
Court decisions citing the 3 opinions that defined “look-out” — 284 in all, by decade. Counts are citations to the defining cases as a whole, not verified uses of the term. The dip in the most recent years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the latest years.
All 3 definitions, chronological · 1858–1870
To constitute a compliance with the requirements of law, they must be persons of suitable experience, properly stationed on the vessel, and actually and vigilantly employed in the performance of that duty; and for a failure in either of those particulars, the vessel and her owners are responsible.
admiralty requirement
The object of a look-out is to discover dangers that are unknown, the advance of an approaching vessel, the appearance of a light on the coast, the discovery of a dangerous object, and many other things, the existence and presence of which could not be so easily and quickly known to the pilot as to a person whose sole business it was to make and communicate such discoveries