Florida Forest and Park Service v. Strickland

• Decision Date: 19 May 1944
• Citation: 18 So.2d 251,154 Fla. 472
• Court: Florida Supreme Court
• Parties: FLORIDA FOREST AND PARK SERVICE et al. v. STRICKLAND.

18 So.2d 251

154 Fla. 472

FLORIDA FOREST AND PARK SERVICE et al. v. STRICKLAND.

Florida Supreme Court

May 19, 1944

Rehearing Denied June 20, 1944.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Taylor County; Hal W. Adams judge.

James Messer, Jr., of Tallahassee, for appellants.

L. W Blanton, of Perry, for appellee.

SEBRING, Justice.

Eston Strickland was employed by Florida Forest and Park Service as a firetower watchman. While on the job he became embroiled in an argument with one Slaughter, which culminated in a gun battle between the parties. In the exchange of shots which ensued, Slaughter was killed and Strickland was severely wounded. Strickland filed a claim for compensation under the Florida Workmen's Compensation Law, F.S.A. § 440.01 et seq., for the injuries sustained. The claim was controverted the employer and its insurance carrier denying liability on the ground that the injury was occasioned by the wilful intention of the employee to injure or kill another. See Sec 440.09, Florida Statutes 1941, F.S.A. A hearing on the controverted claim was held before a deputy commissioner of the Florida Industrial Commission. On the evidence adduced the deputy commissioner entered an order denying the claim on the ground of defense interposed by the employer and the insurance carrier. Strickland took an appeal to the Circuit Court of Taylor County from the order of the deputy commissioner. Thereafter, the circuit judge entered a judgment reversing the deputy commissioner's order. The employer and its insurance carrier have taken an appeal from that judgment.

The first question presented for consideration is whether the trial court had the power or authority to render the judgment appealed from. It is argued by the appellants that because of the recent holding of this court in Tigertail Quarries, Inc., v. Ward, Fla., 16 So.2d 812, 814--that an appeal from an order of a deputy commissioner will not lie directly to the circuit court--the judgment must be reversed and the case dismissed. It is true that in a reexamination of the statute law pertaining to the procedure provided for the review of compensation orders by the circuit court, this court, in the cited case, arrived at the decision that 'no right of appeal is given to the circuit court from the order or award of a deputy commissioner; only the right to appeal from an order or award of the Full Commission being provided by the statutes.' As pointed out in the opinion, 'it is * * * the order of the Full Commission on review--that is appealable to the circuit court, when appeal is taken by a party in interest within twenty days after the order on review is filed in the office of the Commission at Tallahassee.' The gist of the holding is that before a claimant can bring his case to the judicial department of the government as an original judicial controversy it is necessary that he first exhaust his remedies within the Florida Industrial Commission--a statutory administrative body established by the legislature for that purpose. The decision expressly overruled a previous decision of the court in the case of Johnson v. Midland Constructors, Inc., 150 Fla. 353, 7 So.2d 449, wherein we had given to the applicable statutes an entirely different construction. However, months before the overruling decision had been rendered the compensation claimant had appealed the adverse order of the deputy commissioner to the Circuit Court of Taylor County, under what was at the time the judicially declared, established and approved procedure for originating such proceedings in the circuit courts under the statutes. See Johnson v. Midland Constructors, Inc., supra.

The order of the deputy commissioner denying Strickland's claim for compensation was entered on April 6, 1943. The order was filed in the office of the Florida Industrial Commission on April 7, 1943. Notice of appeal was given by the claimant on April 30, 1943--a day within twenty days after the deputy commissioner's order had been on file in the office of the Florida Industrial Commission for a period of seven days. See Walker v. Telfair Stockton Co., Fla., 12 So.2d 177. Under the then existing holding of this court in Johnson v. Midland Constructors, Inc., the deputy commissioner's order was ripe for appeal as the order of the Full Commission. Apparently, the procedure adopted by the claimant was considered by the employer and its carrier to be proper, for the controversy was allowed to proceed in the circuit court without objection being interposed by motion or otherwise that the court did not have power or authority to entertain the matter. On December 14, 1943, the circuit court entered its judgment reversing the deputy commissioner. The judgment was recorded in the minutes of the court on January 11, 1944. On the same day the employer and its insurance carrier entered its appeal from the adverse judgment. The only ground of error assigned was that the circuit court erred in making and entering the judgment reversing the order and judgment of the Florida Industrial Commission.

Tigertail Quarries, Inc., v. Ward became the decision of this court on February 29, 1944--almost ten months after the order of the deputy Commissioner had been taken to the circuit court to be reviewed, and more than six weeks after the circuit court judgment had been appealed to this court. The opinion in the case did not become available to the bar and the public generally until it appeared in the advance sheets of 16 Southern Reporter, 2d Series, bearing date of March 30, 1944. As heretofore stated, the decision expressly overruled Johnson v. Midland Constructors, Inc., supra. Prior to the overruling decision it would have been considered by the Bench and Bar of Florida--and properly so--that the steps which had been taken by the compensation claimant to have the deputy commissioner's order reviewed by the circuit court accorded with statutory procedure judicially approved. Only by the overruling effect of the case of Tigertail Quarries, Inc., v. Ward, supra, did it become otherwise.

Ordinarily, a decision of a court of last resort overruling a former decision is retrospective as well as prospective in its operation, unless specifically declared by the opinion to have a prospective effect only. 14 Am.Jur. p. 345, Sec. 130; 21 C.J.S., Courts, p. 326, § 194. Generally speaking, therefore, a judicial construction of a statute will ordinarily be deemed to relate back to the enactment of the statute, much as though the overruling decision had been originally embodied therein. To this rule, however, there is a certain well-recognized exception that where a statute has received a given construction by a court of supreme jurisdiction and property or contract rights have been acquired under and in accordance with such construction, such rights should not be destroyed by giving to a subsequent overruling decision a retrospective operation. See 14 Am.Jur. p. 345, Sec. 130; 21 C.J.S., Courts, p. 329, § 194, subsec. b. Based upon a recognition of this commonsense exception to the rule, some of the courts have gone so far as to adopt the view that the rights, positions, and courses of action of parties who have acted in conformity with, and in reliance upon, the construction given by a court of final decision to a statute should not be impaired or abridged by reason of a change in judicial construction of the same statute made by a subsequent decision of the same court overruling its former decision. Accordingly, such courts have given to such overruling decisions a prospective operation only, in the same manner as though the new construction had been added to the statute by legislative amendment. See State ex rel. Midwest Pipe & Supply Co. v. Haid, 330 Mo. 1093, 52 S.W.2d 183; Gelpcke v. City of Dubuque, 1 Wall. 175, 17 L.Ed. 520; Douglass v. Pike County, 101 U.S. 677, 687, 25 L.Ed. 968; Mountain Grove Bank v. Douglas County, 146 Mo. 42, 47 S.W. 944. See also Culpepper v. Culpepper, 147 Fla. 632, 3 So.2d 330.

The compensation claimant in the present case proceeded in strict accordance with the then prevailing judicial interpretation of the statutes in force for the review of compensation orders. The employer and the compensation carrier followed him into circuit court without objection. It could not then have been known by him, or even surmised, that before his litigation would become terminated by final decision the statutory steps taken by him in good faith and in reliance upon a prevailing decision...