Reutzel v. State, Dept. of Highways
| Decision Date | 09 April 1971 |
| Docket Number | No. 42558,42558 |
| Citation | 186 N.W.2d 521,290 Minn. 88 |
| Parties | In re Petition of Claudia REUTZEL for Reinstatement of her Driver's License, Respondent, v. STATE of Minnesota, DEPARTMENT OF HIGHWAYS, Appellant. |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
Syllabus by the Court
The Safety Responsibility Act, Minn.St. c. 170, which by its terms authorizes the commissioner of public safety to suspend Warren Spannaus, Atty. Gen., Eric B. Schultz, Acting Deputy Atty. Gen., James M. Kelley, Asst. Atty. Gen., John R. Murphy, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., St. Paul, for appellant.
the license of an accident-involved, uninsured motorist who does not make a deposit of security in an amount necessary to satisfy any judgment that might thereafter be entered against the motorist--an administrative determination to be made upon reports to the commissioner without a presuspension hearing, but subject to postsuspension judicial review--is not unconstitutional as a denial of administrative due process. Although the statute does not require[290 MINN 89] that the administrative order be based upon an evidentiary showing sufficient to support a judgment, it does require an administrative record more substantial than that compiled in the instant case.
Weis & Frauenshuh and Dale E. Parker, Paynesville, for respondent.
Heard and considered en banc.
The issue for decision, important to the administration of the license suspension provisions of the Safety Responsibility Act, is whether as a matter of either constitutional imperative or statutory intent, the commissioner of public safety must afford an accident-involved, uninsured motorist a hearing, with notice, prior to the commissioner's determination of the amount of security necessary to satisfy any judgment that might thereafter be entered against the motorist.
The Safety Responsibility Act (L. 1945, c. 285, codified as Minn.St. c. 170), as disclosed in its title, was enacted 'for the promotion of safety of travel, minimizing of accidents on public highways and * * * the giving of proof of financial responsibility and security by owners and drivers of motor vehicles.' The statutory scheme may be briefly summarized. Within 90 days after receiving a report of a motor vehicle accident resulting in bodily injury or death, or property damage in excess of $100, 1 the commissioner must suspend the license of each driver and owner of each vehicle involved in such accident unless such driver or owner deposits security 'in a sum which shall be sufficient in the judgment of the commissioner to satisfy any judgment or judgments for damages resulting from such accident as may be recovered against such driver or owner; provided notice of such suspension shall be sent by the commissioner to such driver and owner not less than ten days prior to the effective date of such suspension 2 and shall state the amount required as security.' § 170.25, subd. 1. A security deposit is not required if, among other exceptions, the driver or owner was covered at the time of the accident by automobile liability insurance or bond in minimum amounts fixed by statute (§ 170.25, subds. 2 and 3; § 170.21, subd. 10); nor is a security deposit required if the accident caused no injury or damage or if 'it appears to the satisfaction of the commissioner that the driver or owner is not liable for any damages resulting from the accident.' § 170.26(1, 4). The security deposit ordered by the commissioner may not exceed the statutory amounts of required insurance and '(t)he commissioner may reduce or increase the amount of security ordered in any case if, in his judgment, the amount ordered is excessive or inadequate.' § 170.29. 3 The critical provisions governing the administrative determination and judicial review of that determination are contained in § 170.22:
'Subdivision 1. The commissioner shall have the powers and perform the duties imposed upon him by this chapter and may make rules and regulations necessary therefor and shall provide for hearings upon request of any person aggrieved by his final orders under this chapter.
The statutory and constitutional issues are put in sharp focus by this record. On June 17, 1969, petitioner, Claudia Reutzel, an uninsured motorist, drove her automobile into the rear end of an automobile owned and driven by one Bernard J. Harvanko, which was stopped at an arterial street in St. Cloud, Minnesota. Each driver shortly thereafter, in June, submitted a written report of the accident to the commissioner upon the prescribed departmental form. Reutzel, by check-marked answer to the form's questions as to 'apparent contributing factors,' asserted that Harvanko was improperly stopped but admitted that she had been too closely following his lead automobile. Harvanko did not answer these questions. 4
Information as to automobile damage and personal injury to either driver was called for by form questions in the accident report. Although this information was not supplied in the original report of either driver, it was submitted at later times. Sometime before August 19, 1969, it was apparently disclosed that Harvanko had incurred expense for the repair of his automobile in the amount of $125, and on that date the commissioner ordered petitioner to make a security deposit in that sum. She promptly complied within the time stated by the commissioner, and her driver's license was accordingly not suspended.
Thereafter, however, information was submitted to the commissioner that Harvanko had sustained personal injury for which he received medical treatment. On September 8 Harvanko and his physician completed a supplemental form supplied by the commissioner disclosing the physician's diagnosis of his injuries and declaring that his 'estimated medical expense' (for physician's fees and drugs) was $300. And, in a space for the physician's statement of 'other required expenses,' the physician noted lost earnings in the amount of $5,310 (because of physical inability to perform his occupation as a salesman). Although the form apparently was signed by Harvanko's attorney, rather than his physician, it appears that the medical information, as such, conformed to a written medical report of the physician to the attorney.
The commissioner thereupon notified petitioner that the required security deposit was increased to $5,725 and that she must make the deposit within 15 days thereafter to avoid suspension of her license. She was unable to make the additional deposit and accordingly surrendered her driver's license on September 27, 1969.
The issue concerning the propriety of the commissioner's order was raised for the first time after petitioner's license was surrendered. Initially, by a letter from her attorney to the commissioner on September 12, she protested the prospective suspension and asked as to the availability of a limited driver's license. Her attorney, in that letter, asserted that the accident resulted in no damage to the Reutzel automobile and inconsequential damage to the Harvanko automobile, and he asserted that Harvanko, at the time of the accident, had said he was not injured. The license suspension, as stated in the letter, resulted in hardship to petitioner in the pursuit of her employment. 5 The commissioner's response does not appear but his order was not modified. The issue was then raised for judicial determination by a petition for a writ of certiorari from the district court to review the final order of the commissioner pursuant to Minn.St. 170.22, subd. 2. 6 Petitioner did not request a stay of the proceedings as authorized by the statute.
The sole issue submitted to the district court was whether the statute, if it authorized suspension of Reutzel's driver's license by the commissioner without prior hearing and based only upon the written reports submitted to him, deprived her of procedural due process. The trial court, ruling that the suspension provisions of the Safety Responsibility Act were unconstitutional on that ground, ordered that petitioner's driver's license be returned to her forthwith. The state appeals from that order.
1. Our Safety Responsibility Act, as expanded in 1945, 7 is the Minnesota Legislature's response to what it deemed a compelling public necessity of promoting highway safety and, more directly, financial responsibility for injury, death, or property damage resulting from the use of motor vehicles. This necessity has been authoritatively acknowledged. 'The use of the public highways by motor vehicles, with its consequent dangers,' Mr. Justice Roberts wrote in Reitz v. Mealey, 314 U.S. 33, 36, 62 S.Ct. 24, 26, 86 L.Ed. 21, 24, 'renders the reasonableness and necessity of regulation apparent' and '(a)ny appropriate means adopted by the states to insure competence and care on the part of (licensed drivers) and to protect others using the highway is consonant with due process.' The police power exerted for such purpose, as Mr. Justice Frankfurter subsequently wrote in Kesler v. Dept. of Public Safety, 369 U.S. 153, 172, 82 S.Ct. 807, 819, 7 L.Ed.2d 641, 654, 'is as pervasive as any of the reserved powers of the States'; and, accordingly, as Mr. Chief Justice Warren added (369 U.S. 179, 82 S.Ct. 822, 7 L.Ed.2d 658), 'wide latitude should be allowed in the formulation of such laws.'
A state statute which supplemented its financial responsibility law with a requirement that all insurance companies make insurance available to driver licensees (with some exceptions) through a system of assigned risks was sustained against due-process challenge...
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