Robbins v. Town of Homer
| Decision Date | 16 June 1905 |
| Docket Number | 14,308 - (68) |
| Citation | 103 N.W. 1023,95 Minn. 201 |
| Parties | CHARLES P. ROBBINS v. TOWN OF HOMER |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
Appeal by plaintiff from a judgment of the district court for Winona county dismissing the action, entered pursuant to the order of Snow, J. Reversed and remanded for further proceedings.
Town Poor -- Medical Attendance.
Where the town supervisors are required to provide for the care and support of the poor therein, and have no regular physician to attend its paupers, and a pauper suffers from an accident which requires the immediate attention of a surgeon, who renders services to relieve the necessity, he may recover reasonable compensation from the town, although he had not been requested by the authorities to attend the patient.
William Burns, for appellant.
George T. Simpson and Earl Simpson, for respondent.
This is an action against a town having legal charge of a pauper to recover for his medical and surgical treatment furnished by a physician. There was a general demurrer to the complaint which was sustained, and judgment ordered dismissing the action. This appeal is from that judgment.
It is set forth that Richard Lessard was a resident of the town of Homer, and for a period of five years prior thereto had a legal settlement therein; that the plaintiff, a physician rendered surgical and medical treatment for Lessard, who had had no means of support for more than one year prior thereto, and was during such time a public charge upon the town; that under the laws of the state the supervisors of Homer, by virtue of their office, were superintendents of the poor; that the medical and surgical treatment rendered Lessard was under great emergency. It also appears from an account rendered, attached to an exhibit, that Lessard was suffering from a fracture of the right hip joint, and was taken (presumably from necessity) immediately to the Winona Hospital by the physician, and thereafter removed to the county poor farm by the town authorities. While the allegations of fact showing the emergency might have been more fully set forth, it still, upon a liberal construction of the challenged pleading, appears to have been a case where there was an urgent requirement for a physician's services, and the surgical treatment bestowed. Moreover, upon the views of the trial court in its memorandum, the liability of defendant was regarded as solely statutory, and that it was essential there should be a previous determination by the supervisors that the poor person was entitled to the physician's aid by the town, and to what extent such relief should have been granted. Upon this ground the court withheld the right of plaintiff to amend, since the alleged services were rendered without direction or authority of the supervisors.
The matter being thus presented we shall treat the exigency for the services performed as being urgent, imperative, and admitting of no delay. The able counsel for the defendant insists that a request by the supervisors of the plaintiff was necessary, even though the accident in which he was injured occurred at night, and distinctive action by the board would probably have required such delay as would have rendered any benefit to the patient very doubtful.
From the first organization of our state, the duty to take care of the needy and indigent has been recognized, and delegated to certain public officials in their representative capacity. From the start the political division charged with this obligation has been the county, and, to effectuate this, the commissioners of the several counties of the state were declared to be vested with the "exclusive superintendence of the poor in their respective counties." Section 1, c. 16, St. 1851. This language has been followed ever since, in the expressed imposition of the duty which the state assumed and has always recognized in accordance with the humane purposes of all civilized governments. In some instances the plan has been departed from, where the citizens of particular counties secured legislative changes for the supposed reason that the burdens on the towns were unjustly large, as compared with those of cities therein. Such was the case in Winona county, where, under chapter 479, p. 1082, Sp. Laws 1891, the supervisors of the several towns were made superintendents of the poor, instead of the county commissioners. This act further provides, in substance, that such supervisors, if they desire, may use the county poorhouse which had theretofore been provided for paupers, in any desirable case. But it seems in this particular instance that the poverty of the indigent person was not made the cause of removal to the county poorhouse until after his injury. No provision was made for the appointment of a physician for the defendant town, as we are authorized in assuming from the record and argument of counsel.
In chapter 172, p. 177, ...
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