Long v. Northeast Soil Conservation Dist. of La.

• Decision Date: 13 December 1954
• Docket Number: No. 41915,41915
• Citation: 226 La. 824,77 So.2d 408
• Parties: Wealthia Miller LONG et al. v. NORTHEAST SOIL CONSERVATION DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA et al. In re NORTHEAST SOIL CONSERVATION DISTRICT OF the State of LOUISIANA Applying for Certiorari, or Writ of Review.
• Court: Louisiana Supreme Court

Page 408

77 So.2d 408

226 La. 824

Wealthia Miller LONG et al. v. NORTHEAST SOIL CONSERVATION DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA et al. In re NORTHEAST SOIL CONSERVATION DISTRICT OF the State of LOUISIANA Applying for Certiorari, or Writ of Review.

No. 41915.

Supreme Court of Louisiana.

Dec. 13, 1954.

Rehearing Denied Jan. 10, 1955.

Fred S. LeBlanc, Atty. Gen., Joel B. Dickinson, Asst. Atty. Gen., Smith & Taliaferro, Harrisonburg, for Northeast Soil Conservation Dist. of Louisiana, defendant and appellee.

DeBlieux & McKinnis, Baton Rouge, Milton L. LeBlanc, Jr., New Orleans, for Wealthia Miller Long et al., plaintiffs-appellants.

HAWTHORNE, Justice.

Plaintiff Wealthia Miller Long, widow of Tom Long, Sr., instituted this suit individually and as natural tutrix of her seven minor children to recover from the Northeast Soil Conservation District of Louisiana and one of its employees, O. H. Gulledge, damages for the death of her husband caused by the alleged negligence of the defendants.

The case was tried before a jury which returned a verdict for Mrs. Long and her children in the sum of $12,000-$5,000 for the widow and $1,000 for the benefit of each of her seven minor children. After this verdict was returned by the jury but before the judgment was signed, the defendant Northeast Soil Conservation District of Louisiana filed an exception of no cause or right of action on the ground that it was an agency or subdivision of the State, created by authority of Act 370 of 1938, R.S. 3:1201 et seq., and that the Legislature had never authorized the action instituted by plaintiff in this suit. The district judge sustained this exception. Plaintiff appealed to the Court of Appeal, Second Circuit, and that court reversed the judgment of the district court which had maintained the exception of no cause or right of action, and awarded judgment against both defendants in solido in favor of plaintiff individually and as natural tutrix of her seven minor children in the sum of $12,000. See 72 So.2d 543.

Upon application of the defendant Northeast Soil Conservation District, this court granted a writ to review the judgment of the Court of Appeal holding that this governmental subdivision or agency of the State could be sued ex delicto, or in tort, in the state courts without a special act of the Legislature specifically authorizing the suit instituted by plaintiff.

According to the pleadings, Tom Long, Sr., husband of the plaintiff Mrs. Long and father of the minor children, was killed on September 3, 1948. This suit was instituted in the district court on September 2, 1949. The judgment of the Court of Appeal was rendered on April 22, 1954, and application for a rehearing was denied by that court on May 26. The defendant's application for a writ was filed in this court on June 22, 1954, and the case was submitted for our decision on November 8.

After the granting of the writ of certiorari by this court but before the submission of the case, the Legislature, which convened in May for its regular session of 1954, adopted Acts 243 and 244. The title of Act 243 reads as follows:

'An Act To authorize Wealthia Miller Long, individually, and as natural tutrix of the minors, Marguerite Long, Earl Long, Vivian Long, Tom Long, Jr., Herbert Gary Long, Laura Gene Long and Mary Delores Long, to file suit on her own behalf and on behalf of her said minor children, against the State of Louisiana, through the Northeast Louisiana Soil Conservation District, upon the claims of each on account of the death of Tom Long, Sr. on or about September 3, 1948, which occurred as the result of the alleged negligence of employees or agents of the Northeast Louisiana Soil Conservation District; to provide a method for citing the state; to designate the Court or Courts in which the suits may be instituted; to provide a method for procedure and the effect of the judgment which may be rendered in such suits; and to provide for waiver of prescription.'

This act, after authorizing the suit and prescribing the manner of citation, the method of procedure etc., provides in Section 5 that '* * * any suit brought under the authority herein shall be filed not later than January 1, 1954'. Section 6 provides that 'The authorization to sue, herein granted, shall be retroactive to the date of the alleged death, September 3, 1948'. In Section 7 it is provided: 'That, except as otherwise expressly provided herein, the effect of this authorization shall be nothing more than a waiver of the State's immunity from suit insofar as the suit authorized herein is concerned.'

Act 244 of 1954 recites that the plaintiff herein has obtained a judgment individually and as natural tutrix of her minor children in the Court of Appeal, Second Circuit, against the State of Louisiana through the Northeast Louisiana Soil Conservation District in the amount of $12,000 with legal interest from judicial demand until paid, and that in that court a rehearing has been denied. The act then appropriates to the plaintiff and her children the amount of the judgment, and recites that the purpose of the act is to pay the judgment rendered in the case as finally approved by the proper courts of this state.

As we have stated above, this court granted a...