Beltinck v. Mt. Pleasant State Home and Training School
| Decision Date | 04 September 1956 |
| Docket Number | No. 67,67 |
| Citation | 78 N.W.2d 302,346 Mich. 494 |
| Parties | Ona BELTINCK, Plaintiff and Appellee, v. MT. PLEASANT STATE HOME AND TRAINING SCHOOL and State Accident Fund, Defendants and Appellants. |
| Court | Michigan Supreme Court |
James R. McNamara, Mt. Pleasant, for plaintiff and appellee.
Harry F. Briggs, Lansing, for defendants and appellants, Stanley Dodge, Lansing, of counsel.
Before the Entire Bench.
Defendants and appellants present but one question in this appeal from a workmen's compensation award, namely: Was the injury sustained by plaintiff an accidental injury compensable under part 2 of the Workmen's Compensation Act?
Plaintiff, a man 68 years of age, was employed by defendant Mt. Pleasant State Home and Training School for over 20 years in a supervisory capacity. The first 18 years of said employment he was farm superintendent and the last 2 years he was an assistant to the farm superintendent.
The injury complained of occurred on December 31, 1953, when a log approximately 12 feet long and 10 inches in diameter, weighing approximately 200 pounds, rolled off of a burning fire, and plaintiff, who was present at the time, endeavored, with his superior, the farm superintendent, to throw the log back on an adjoining fire a few feet away.
The farm superintendent, who was with plaintiff at the time of the injury, testified that the log rolled 3 or 4 feet, and when asked: 'You picked it up and laid it on the fire?' he answered, 'Well, no, we didn't lay it on the fire because it was a hot fire--we threw it on the fire.'
Plaintiff immediately complained to his superior of a sharp pain in his back. He was hospitalized for 15 days and was released with his back in a plaster cast. The testimony discloses that plaintiff will have to continue wearing a steel back support; that he must avoid bending over to pick up anything, and that he can do no physical labor.
The facts of the case justify the following finding of the workmen's compensation appeal board:
Shortly after the Workmen's Compensation Act was enacted (1912) this Court decided the case of Adams v. Acme White Lead & Color Works, 1914, 182 Mich. 157, 148 N.W. 485, 486, L.R.A.1916A, 283. In this case our Court for the first time defined the word 'accident' and, also, for the first time used the word 'fortuitous,' a word which is not found in the legislative enactment, but has been repeatedly, since the Adams case, used by this Court. In defining 'accident' the Court quoted from Black's Law Dictionary as follows:
;
and, also, quoted from Hensey v. White (1900), 1 QB 481, "I think the idea of something fortuitous and unexpected is involved in both words 'peril' or 'accident."' The Court also used a quotation from Fenton v. Thorley & Co., 72 LJKB 790, as follows: "The expression 'accident' is used in the popular and ordinary sense of the word as denoting an unlooked for mishap or an untoward event which is not expected or designed."
To determine the popular and ordinary sense of the expression 'accident' we turn to Webster's New International Dictionary (Second Edition, Unabridged) where we find 'accident' defined as: And where we also find the word 'fortuitous' defined as, 'Happening by chance or accident; occurring unexpectedly, or without known cause; chance.'
In Twork v. Munising Paper Co., 275 Mich. 174, 266 N.W. 311, 312, this Court commented upon the Corpus Juris definition of the word 'accident' as follows:
"In its most commonly accepted meaning, the word denotes an event that takes place without one's foresight or expectation; an event which proceeds from an unknown cause, or is an unusual effect of a known cause, and therefore not expected; chance, casualty, contingency, an event happening without any human agency, or, if happening through human agency, an event which under the circumstances, is unusual and unexpected by the person to whom it happens; something unexpectedly taking place, not according to the usual course of things; an unusual or unexpected result attending the operation or performance of a usual or necessary act or event; something happening by chance; a mishap."'
The Court then stated:
In Rainko v. Webster-Eisenlohr, Inc., 306 Mich. 328, 10 N.W.2d 903, 904, this Court said:
In Nichols v. Central Crate & Box Co., 340 Mich. 232, 65 N.W.2d 706, this Court stated that the test of the existence of an accident or fortuitous event was whether an unusual or excessive strain was imposed on plaintiff's physique or that he exerted himself in a manner unusual to or greater than is ordinarily the case in the general field of labor which plaintiff was employed to perform.
The record in this case proves that an event took place without plaintiff's foresight or expectation and, further, that the rolling of the large log off the fire and the strenuous effort made by plaintiff to help his superior throw the log back on the fire constituted an undesigned, sudden and unexpected event. The severe injury he suffered cannot be connected up with a mere change in the human system incident to the general processes of nature, or existing disease, or weakened physical condition: The event took place without plaintiff's foresight or expectation and the close relationship of the log suddenly rolling off the fire and the offort to throw it back onto the fire created an event which unexpectedly took place, and certainly was not according to the usual course of events for plaintiff, whose activities for 20 years had been confined to and directed toward supervisory duties.
Our Court has said that the definition of 'accident' could not be accepted by it as 'a narrow definition of the word as applied to the Workmen's Compensation Act', and has further stated that where something unusual occurs in the course of employment causing an injury that could even be said to be brought about through a "'miscalculation of the effects of voluntary action"', that such injury is compensable under the Workmen's Compensation Act.
The record sustains the finding of the appeal board that
Affirmed. Costs to plaintiff.
EDWARDS, J., took no part in this decision.
I agree in part and disagree in part with the opinion Mr. Justice Kelly has prepared in this case of Beltinck. Reasons for such partial disagreement appear over my signature in Brazauskis v. Muskegon County Board of Road Commissioners, 345 Mich. 480, 76 N.W.2d 851. They trace back to and may be found in Mr. Justice Smith's dissent in Wieda v. American Box Board Co., 343 Mich. 182, 72 N.W.2d 13.
Plaintiff herein was employed by the defendant Mt. Pleasant State Home and Training School for a number of years prior to December 31, 1953. On said date he was engaged, with another employee, in burning brush, such work being undertaken as a part of his duties. While so engaged he injured his back, as a result of which he sustained a disability. His application for compensation under the Workmen's Compensation Law 1 was duly heard before a deputy of the workmen's compensation commission and an award was made in his favor. The workmen's compensation appeal board 2, under date of September 16, 1955, affirmed the award, and on leave granted defendants have appealed.
Under the provisions of the statute here involved plaintiff was not entitled to an award, which was based on part 2 of the act, unless his injury was received as the result of an accidental occurrence. The appeal board determined this issue in favor of the plaintiff and the sole question presented in the case is whether there was testimony taken on the hearing before the deputy commissioner supporting the findings. Plaintiff's...
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