Stanley v. Mowery
| Decision Date | 19 April 1949 |
| Docket Number | Case Number: 32904 |
| Citation | 1949 OK 77,207 P.2d 277,201 Okla. 480 |
| Parties | STANLEY v. MOWERY |
| Court | Oklahoma Supreme Court |
¶0 1. AUTOMOBILES - Requirement by Corporation Commission that motor carrier file liability insurance policy or bond in sum fixed by proper order.
Under the law (47 O.S. § 169) the Corporation Commission must require that a motor carrier file a liability insurance policy or bond in such sum and amount as fixed by a proper order of the Commission.
2. SAME - Rules and regulations of Corporation Commission could not exclude motor carrier's employees from liability insurance coverage required by statute.
By virtue of 47 O.S. 1941 § 169 the liability insurance coverage, required to be filed by the motor carrier thereunder, must include compensation for death of the carrier's employees resulting from the operation of the carrier for which such carrier is legally liable and the Corporation Commission is without power to exclude the carrier's employees from such coverage by rules and regulations adopted by it under 47 O.S. 1941 § 162.
3. SAME - INSURANCE - Commission has provided liability on policy shall be not less than $5,000, with permission for larger coverage upon election of motor carrier and his insurer.
There is no showing that the Corporation Commission by any proper order has fixed the sum of $5,000 as the limit of liability on such a policy for injury to or death of one person. On the contrary, it appears the Commission has provided that such liability shall not be less than $5,000, with permission for larger coverage upon election of the motor carrier and his insurer.
4. SAME - Effect of endorsement on limit of liability - Lack of proper order of Corporation Commission fixing $5,000 as limit.
Where such a motor carrier and his insurer, acting pursuant to the statute, and appropriate order of the Corporation Commission, file an insurance policy providing in the body of the policy for liability up to $10,000 for injury to or death of one person, such liability of the insurer may extend up to said sum as so fixed by the insurer and the motor carrier, and that limit of liability is unaffected by an endorsement attached to said policy stating in effect that the limit of liability as to any one person is not more than $5,000 by reason of the fixing of such limit of liability by the Corporation Commission, when it does not appear that said Commission, by any proper order, has fixed said sum of $5,000 as the limit of liability on such a policy.
Appeal from District Court, Carter County; J.I. Goins, Judge.
Action by Eunice Cox Mowery, administratrix of the estate of William Leslie Lindesmith, deceased, against Kenneth Stanley, dba Kenneth Stanley Transport Company, et al. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendants appeal. Affirmed.
Duke Duvall and Dudley, Duvall & Dudley all of Oklahoma City, and Brown & Cund, of Duncan, for plaintiffs in error.
Ernest W. Tate and Williams & Williams, all of Ardmore, for defendants in error.
¶1 This was an action by the administratrix of a deceased employee of defendant Kenneth Stanley, d-b-a Kenneth Stanley Transport Company. William Leslie Lindesmith, plaintiff's intestate, was the operator of one of defendant's transport trucks and was killed in a collision between the truck driven by him and another truck of the defendant driven by another employee. Plaintiff's action is based upon the alleged negligence of defendant in furnishing to the deceased a transport truck which was improperly constructed and equipped and that defendant's negligence was the proximate cause of the death of decedent. Liability of the codefendant, National Auto Insurance Company of Los Angeles, Cal., is based upon its statutory liability as insurance carrier of defendant, Kenneth Stanley, under the provisions of 47 O.S. 1941 § 169.
¶2 On this appeal the first question presented to this court for determination is whether the interpretation by this court of said section 169 in the case of Casualty Reciprocal Exchange v. Sutfin, 196 Okla. 567, 166 P.2d 434, should be adhered to by this court or overruled as an erroneous interpretation of the language of said section 169. No claim is made here that the evidence of negligence was insufficient to justify the verdict and judgment.
¶3 The second paragraph of our syllabus here is adopted from the Sutfin case, supra.
¶4 The first contention of defendants is thus stated in their brief:
"The contentions of the defendants upon this appeal for reversal are that the trial court erred in refusing to eliminate the Company as a party defendant and instructing the jury of the existence of public liability and property damage insurance, because the statutory motor carrier insurance does not cover injuries to or death of employees occurring while engaged in the course of their employment; and that the case of Casualty Reciprocal Exchange v. Sutfin, 196 Okla. 567, 166 P.2d 434, holding to the contrary by a bare five to four majority, should be overruled."
¶5 It is clearly evident that the correctness of defendants' contention depends entirely upon whether or not the opinion in the Sutfin case erroneously determines that the language of 47 O. S. 1941 § 169 is inclusive enough to make the insurance coverage required by that section reach to and protect employees of the transport company.
¶6 Our opinion became final December 18, 1945. Evidently the interpretation therein given to section 169, Id., aroused considerable public interest throughout the motor trucking industry and the liability insurance business, because when the Legislature convened in January, 1947, one of the early bills introduced for passage at that session was House Bill No. 36. This bill had for its purpose, and the only objective sought to be attained by it, was to amend said section 169, Id., by inserting in the body thereof language which would make the section conform strictly to the contentions here made by the defendants. The title of that act reads:
"An Act amending Section 169, Title 47, O.S. 1941, relating to the Liability Insurance Policy required to be filed with the Corporation Commission by Motor Carriers, and declaring an emergency."
¶7 Section 169, Id., as proposed by that bill to be amended, if the same had been adopted by the Legislature, would have read as follows:
¶8 This bill never became a law and it is fairly inferable from the interpolated language intended as an amendment to the section, that the Sutfin case and the rule therein announced were known to and discussed in the Legislature during the pendency of the bill. It might be inferred from the failure of the bill to become a law that the Legislature at least did not desire to change the language of section 169 as construed by the decision in the Sutfin case. Defendants' contentions are reflected by the dissenting opinion filed in the Sutfin case, which was also before, and must have been considered by, the Legislature at the time it considered House Bill No. 36. The determination of public policy is primarily for the Legislature, and in formulating such policy, the Legislature is not bound by an administrative construction of a prior enactment, but may wholly disregard the same. The protection of industrial workers from the hazards of their employment is a proper subject for legislative action, and since the Legislature in the original enactment of the Workmen's Compensation Law omitted from the protection of that Act employees of motor carriers (M.V. Stillwell Trucking Contractor v. Patterson, 184 Okla. 642, 89 P.2d 766 and authorities therein cited), it was competent to thereafter provide for their protection by the enactment of section 169, Id., and to commit the details of that protection to the Corporation Commission which was given exclusive jurisdiction over motor carriers. If in the exercise of that administrative power the Corporation Commission erred in its interpretation of the legislative mandate, as held by this court in the Sutfin case, it may reasonably be assumed that when the Legislature failed to pass House Bill No. 36, it considered that the clarification of the language used by it in section 169 by this court reflected the original legislative intention.
¶9 Under all the circumstances, we decline to overrule the Sutfin case.
¶10 The plaintiff in error next contends in effect that the judgment against...
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Bennett v. The Preferred Acc. Ins. Co. of New York
... ... Continental Casualty Co. v. Shankel, 10 Cir., 88 F.2d 819; Casualty Reciprocal Exchange v. Sutfin, 196 Okl. 567, 166 P.2d 434; Stanley v. Mowery, 201 Okl. 480, 207 P.2d 277. These cases read the statute into the policies and held that public liability insurance issued to comply with ... ...
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Traill v. Felder
...policy actually certified to the Commission provided more liberal coverage it was held to be controlling. See also Stanley v. Mowery, 201 Okl. 480, 207 P.2d 277 (1949). Conversely, in Occidental Fire & Casualty Co. v. Keating, 276 F.Supp. 944 (W. D.Okl.1967) it was held that where a policy ......
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Occidental Fire & Casualty Co. v. Keating, Civ. 65-175.
...language of the Form E Endorsement, the claimant defendants Perrier and McCulloughs cite and rely on the case of Stanley v. Mowery, 201 Okl. 480, 207 P.2d 277 (1949). This case does not appear to be controlling but is distinguishable from the case at bar. In the opinion in Stanley v. Mowery......
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