Burke v. Hamilton Beach Division, Scovill Mfg. Co.

• Decision Date: 02 January 1981
• Citation: 424 A.2d 145
• Parties: Rosemary Lucore BURKE v. HAMILTON BEACH DIVISION, SCOVILL MANUFACTURING COMPANY and Day's, Inc.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

Page 145

424 A.2d 145

Rosemary Lucore BURKE v. HAMILTON BEACH DIVISION, SCOVILL MANUFACTURING COMPANY and Day's, Inc.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Argued Sept. 11, 1980.

Decided Jan. 2, 1981.

Jon Holder, (orally), Portland, for plaintiff.

Richardson, Tyler & Troubh, Robert J. Piampiano (orally), Portland, for Hamilton Beach Division.

Hunt, Thompson & Bowie, Glenn Robinson (orally), Roy E. Thompson, Jr., Portland, for Day's, Inc.

Before McKUSICK, C. J., GODFREY, NICHOLS and ROBERTS, JJ., and DUFRESNE, A. R. J.

McKUSICK, Chief Justice.

In this products liability case brought in the Superior Court (Cumberland County), plaintiff Rosemary Burke appeals from a judgment on the pleadings entered in favor of both defendants, Day's, Inc. and Hamilton Beach Division of Scovill Manufacturing Company. We affirm the judgment.

On November 25, 1958, plaintiff purchased at retail from defendant Day's an electric mixer manufactured by defendant Hamilton Beach. The mixer performed properly for nearly twenty years, until February 4, 1978, when an alleged malfunction in a safety mechanism caused the mixer to turn on while plaintiff was inserting the beater blades. Mrs. Burke's hand was badly injured.

In May, 1979, more than twenty years after she bought the mixer, Mrs. Burke filed a two-count complaint against the retailer and the manufacturer. Count I alleged that Hamilton Beach had negligently designed the mixer and had failed properly to instruct and to warn plaintiff regarding its use. Count II alleged that both defendants had committed breaches of express and implied warranties that the mixer was fit for its intended use.

In answering, both defendants raised the affirmative defense of the statute of limitations. On defendants' motion for judgment on the pleadings, the Superior Court held that all of plaintiff's causes of action accrued at the time she bought the allegedly defective mixer in 1958 and that, therefore, her claims were barred by our general six-year statute of limitations, 14 M.R.S.A. § 752 (1980). On appeal, we affirm the dismissal of the breach of warranty claim against the retailer Day's on the same statute of limitations ground relied upon by the Superior Court. As to the warranty and negligence claims against the manufacturer Hamilton Beach, however, our affirmance rests instead upon the controlling 1958 Maine law, which in general denied recognition to products liability claims against parties not in privity with the plaintiff.

I.

This case comes to us in an unusual factual and legal posture. In the twenty years that elapsed between plaintiff's purchase of the electric mixer in 1958 and her injury in 1978, Maine law governing products liability underwent vast change. In Maine in 1958, the requirement of privity, with limited exceptions, barred a negligence suit between a plaintiff and a defendant who had not contracted with one another. Flaherty v. Helfont, 123 Me. 134, 137, 122 A. 180, 181 (1923); see also McNally v. Nicholson Mfg. Co., Me., 313 A.2d 913, 925 (1973). In 1958, a plaintiff could not maintain a breach of warranty suit against a defendant with whom he had no privity. Pelletier v. Dupont, 124 Me. 269, 276, 128 A. 186, 189 (1925); see also Sams v. Ezy-Way Foodliner Co., 157 Me. 10, 17-18, 170 A.2d 160, 165 (1961). In 1958, Maine had not recognized, either judicially or by statute, strict liability as a source of products liability in tort. See McNally v. Nicholson Mfg. Co., supra at 925.

The 1960s and '70s, however, saw the Maine legislature bring our products liability law into the mainstream. In 1963, the legislature enacted the Uniform Commercial Code, P.L.1963, ch. 362, § 1, Article 2 of which governs the sale of goods. The original version of U.C.C. section 2-318 ¹ abrogated the "horizontal" privity requirement, thus permitting suit against sellers of goods by the family or household members or guests of a purchaser of defective goods. In 1969 U.C.C. section 2-318 was revised to abrogate "vertical" as well as "horizontal" privity requirements, permitting plaintiffs to reach remote sellers, suppliers, and manufacturers of defective goods. ² P.L.1969, ch. 327, § 1. At the same time, in 1969, the legislature enacted 14 M.R.S.A. § 161, which abrogated privity requirements in all negligence and breach of warranty suits. ³ Id., § 2. Finally, in 1973, the legislature recognized the doctrine of strict liability in tort by enacting 14 M.R.S.A. § 221. ⁴ P.L.1973, ch. 466, § 1.

II.

The dramatic changes in the law between plaintiff's purchase of the mixer in 1958 and her injury two decades later raise the serious question of which body of law this court must apply here the law prevailing at the time of purchase or that at the time of injury. In particular, that choice of law determines whether plaintiff's claims against defendant Hamilton Beach are barred by her lack of privity with that defendant. Although Hamilton Beach did not argue the privity issue before the Superior Court, it did put the legal sufficiency of plaintiff's complaint in issue by moving for a judgment on the pleadings under M.R.Civ.P. 12(c). 1 Field, McKusick & Wroth, Maine Civil Practice § 12.14 (2d ed. 1970) ("motion (for judgment on the pleadings) when made by the defendant is the equivalent of a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim"). The sufficiency of the entire complaint is thus drawn in question and may be determined on appeal as a pure question of law. ⁵

When deciding whether to give retrospective application to a statute, the courts must look to the intent of the legislature. It is a fundamental principle of Maine law that "all statutes will be considered to have a prospective operation only, unless the legislative intent to the contrary is clearly expressed or necessarily implied from the language used." Miller v. Fallon, 134 Me. 145, 148, 183 A. 416, 417 (1936); see also Langley v. Home Indemnity Co., Me., 272 A.2d 740, 746-47 (1971). If the legislature had remained silent regarding retrospective application of its products liability enactments, we might feel free, if we found compelling policy justifications, to give those statutes retrospective force. McNally v. Nicholson Mfg. Co., supra at 926. However, instead of evidencing or implying an intent to give retrospective application to those statutes, or even remaining neutral, the legislature has clearly and specifically directed the courts to give only prospective application to all three major statutory changes. For example, the 1969 statutes that, effective October 1, 1969, eliminated the requirement of privity in warranty and negligence actions (see nn. 2-3 above) at the same time provided specifically for nonretrospective effect, as follows:

This Act ... shall not be construed to affect any transaction occurring prior to the effective date of this Act.

P.L.1969, ch. 327, § 3. See McNally v. Nicholson Mfg. Co., supra at 926-27; see also Larue v. National Union Electric Corp., 571 F.2d 51, 55 (1st Cir. 1978) (applying Maine law). The 1963 and the 1973 enactments making other changes in Maine's products liability law had comparable provisions. ⁶ In light of this clear legislative mandate, we are compelled to hold that U.C.C. section 2-318 and sections 161 and 221 of title 14 do not apply to claims where any of the operative events, whether they are sales transactions or tort events, have occurred before the effective dates of the respective statutes.

Thus, the changes in Maine's law of products liability that have occurred since 1958 do not affect Mrs. Burke's suit. Her claims are governed by Maine law as it stood when she bought her mixer.

III.

Because the doctrine of privity had continued vitality in Maine law in 1958, we must deal with the two defendants separately. Plaintiff bought her mixer from Day's; having contracted with the retailer, she was in privity with that defendant. Plaintiff, however, never contracted with the mixer's manufacturer, Hamilton Beach; she thus lacked vertical privity with that defendant. See McNally v. Nicholson Mfg. Co., supra at 918; J. White and R. Summers, Uniform Commercial Code 399 (2d ed. 1980).

Plaintiff's Claim against Day's

Lack of privity presents no impediment to plaintiff's claim against Day's. Thus, as to that defendant the sole issue raised by the motion to dismiss is whether her suit for breach of warranty is barred by the statute of limitations.

The general statute of limitations, 14 M.R.S.A. § 752, which here governs, runs for six years from the time a "cause of action accrues." The time of accrual depends on the precise substantive elements of each cause of action. Williams v. Ford Motor Co., Me., 342 A.2d 712, 714 (1975). In contract actions a cause of action accrues at the time of breach. Manning v. Perkins, 86 Me. 419, 421, 29 A. 1114, 1115 (1894). A breach in the warranties of fitness and merchantability occurs at the time of sale or delivery of the defective goods, and the statute of limitations begins to run on warranty actions from that time. Kakargo v. Grange Silo Co., 11 App.Div.2d 796, 204 N.Y.S.2d 1010 (1960). See also Nelson v. Volkswagen of America, 315 F.Supp. 1120, 1121 (D.N.H.1970); J. White and R. Summers, supra at 418. See "Developments in the Law: Statutes of Limitations," 63 Harv.L.Rev. 1177, 1200-02 (1950). See also Annot., "Statute of Limitations: When Cause of Action Arises on Action Against Manufacturer or Seller of Product Causing Injury or Death," 4 A.L.R.3d 821, 829 (1965), and cases cited therein.

The implied warranties made by Day's to Mrs. Burke derived from the Uniform Sales Act, which was in force in 1958. R.S.1954, ch. 185, first enacted in P.L.1923, ch. 191. Section 15(II) declared an implied warranty of merchantability roughly equivalent to that later created by U.C.C. § 2-314. See Sams v. Ezy-Way Foodliner Co., supra at 12-14, 170 A.2d at 162-63. If, as plaintiff has alleged, the mixer was defective at the time she bought it, Day's...