Southworth v. State, s. 58065
| Decision Date | 12 June 1979 |
| Docket Number | Nos. 58065,s. 58065 |
| Parties | , 392 N.E.2d 1254 John V. SOUTHWORTH, Individually and as Executor of Alice K. Southworth, Deceased, Appellant, v. STATE of New York, Respondent. John V. SOUTHWORTH, Appellant, v. STATE of New York, Respondent. (Claim& 58835.) |
| Court | New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
The orders of the Appellate Division should be affirmed, with costs.
For the reasons stated by Mr. Justice Michael F. Dillon in the majority opinion at the Appellate Division, we conclude that the State was not negligent in issuing the interim driver's license. We note in particular the fact, now conceded by the plaintiff, that the driver was not ineligible under the statutes in effect when the license was issued.
This determination, however, should not be read as suggesting that the State might have been liable if the Motor Vehicle Department had been negligent in issuing the license. Statutes and regulations adopted in the exercise of the police power are, of course, designed to protect the general public from certain known or anticipated harms. But it is settled that the State and its subdivisions acting "for the protection of the general public, cannot be cast in damages for a mere failure to furnish adequate protection to a particular individual to whom it assumed no special duty" (Evers v. Westerberg, 38 A.D.2d 751, 329 N.Y.S.2d 615, affd. 32 N.Y.2d 684, 343 N.Y.S.2d 361, 296 N.E.2d 257). It would seem that this principle should apply to the administration and enforcement of State licensing requirements. We also note that when State officials negligently issue a license or fail to revoke it, the State action is generally held not to be the proximate cause of the injury inflicted by the licensee (see State's Liability for Improperly Licensing Negligent Drivers, Ann., 79 A.L.R.3d, 955).
I would reverse and reinstate the determination of the Court of Claims on the issue of liability, as would Mr. Justice Stewart F. Hancock, Jr., at the Appellate Division, for the failure of the State to comply with the requirements imposed by the Legislature when it authorized the DWI Counterattack Program.
The experimental driver rehabilitation program in this case cannot be classified as an incidental component of the State's administration of the routine licensing of operators of motor vehicles. The Legislature in its wisdom (which I am not at liberty to question) has authorized "the establishment of experimental programs of rehabilitative instruction and direction for drivers with poor driving records" (Vehicle and Traffic Law, § 520; L.1968, ch. 464), in consequence...
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