Utah Fuel Co. v. Industrial Commission

• Decision Date: 04 December 1920
• Docket Number: 3534
• Citation: 194 P. 122,57 Utah 246
• Court: Utah Supreme Court
• Parties: UTAH FUEL CO. v. INDUSTRIAL COMMISSION

194 P. 122

57 Utah 246

UTAH FUEL CO. v. INDUSTRIAL COMMISSION

No. 3534

Supreme Court of Utah

December 4, 1920

Proceeding before the Industrial Commission by Clyde L Knighton, employee, opposed by the Utah Fuel Company employer, and its own insurer. An award was made, and the employer brought this original proceeding against the Industrial Commission to review the award.

AWARD SUSTAINED.

Ferdinand Ericksen, H. J. Binch, and Ray & Rawlins, all of Salt Lake City, for plaintiff.

Dan B Shields, Atty. Gen., and Morgan & Huffaker, of Salt Lake City, for defendant.

CORFMAN, C. J. FRICK, WEBER, GIDEON, and THURMAN, JJ., concur.

OPINION

CORFMAN, C. J.

This is an original proceeding brought by the plaintiff, Utah Fuel Company, to review an award made by the Industrial Commission of Utah under the provisions of title 49, Comp. Laws, Utah 1917, as amended by chapter 63, Laws Utah 1919.

On the 14th day of January, 1920, one Clyde L. Knighton, hereinafter referred to as the applicant, filed a claim for compensation with the Industrial Commission wherein he alleged, among other things, that during the latter part of the month of January, 1919, he sustained an injury occasioned by an accident arising out of and in the course of his employment with the plaintiff.

The plaintiff, after notice pursuant to statute, appeared and answered the petition, denying that the applicant had been injured in an accident arising out of and in the course of his employment with the plaintiff, and to the contrary, alleging in substance that applicant was suffering with some injury received or illness had or condition existing long prior to his employment with the plaintiff.

A hearing was had before the Industrial Commission during the month of February, 1920, at which it was stipulated and agreed between the applicant and the plaintiff that the plaintiff was an employer and its own insurance carrier, "subject to the provisions of chapter 100, Laws Utah 1917" (the Industrial Commission Act).

The average weekly wage of the applicant was also stipulated and agreed to between the contending parties. At the said hearing the applicant testified in substance that during the latter part of January, 1919, while engaged in the regular course of his employment with the plaintiff, in driving a horse used to move mine cars in plaintiff's coal mine at Sunnyside, Utah the horse became excited and suddenly turned in such a manner as to cause the applicant to be tripped and to fall, whereby the ligaments and nerves of his left leg became slightly injured, and from which he afterward suffered as a result thereof a permanent partial paralysis of his said leg.

Opposing evidence on the part of the plaintiff was to the effect that the applicant's present condition was due to a hysterical nervous or psychic condition. The respective theories of the parties were supported by medical experts who widely differed as to the applicant's physical condition and present disability. The commission found for the applicant and awarded him compensation for disability and also for medical services rendered unto him.

After a rehearing had been applied for and denied, the plaintiff brought the matter to this court for review in the manner provided by statute.

The plaintiff assigns, as its reasons why the award should be vacated and set aside, the following, to wit:

"First. The grounds enumerated in section 3148, Compilied Laws of Utah 1917, as amended, i. e., (a) that the Industrial Commission acted without or in excess of its powers, and (b) that there was no evidence sustaining or tending to sustain the conclusion and decision of said commission that the paralyzed condition of applicant was proximately caused by an accident arising out of and in the course of his employment by defendant during the latter part of January, 1919, but on the contrary the evidence did establish that Knighton's diseased condition existed at the time he was employed by defendant fuel company, that the award of compensation based on its said decision was entirely without or in excess of the power of the Industrial Commission, and therefore null and void.

"Second. The defendant fuel company contends that the Industrial Commission of Utah is an administrative body, authorized and empowered to exercise such functions as may be specifically delegated to it by law, and no other functions. The defendant further contends that the so-called Compensation Act, to wit, title 49, Compiled Laws of Utah 1917, as amended by chapter 63, Laws of Utah 1919, does not specifically, nor by implication, delegate nor attempt to delegate to said Commission the power to hear, consider and determine controversies between litigants as to ultimate liability, or their property rights, and that the Industrial Commission, in assuming the power to so hear, consider, and determine the ultimate liability between the applicant and defendant, unlawfully usurped judicial power, and that such usurpation of judicial power by said commission violates those sections of the Constitution of the State of Utah specifically delegating such power to regularly constituted courts, to wit, article 5, § 1, article 8, §§ 1, 5, and 7.

"Third. That even though it is held that title 49, Compiled Laws of Utah 1917, as amended by chapter 63, laws of Utah 1919, actually does attempt, specifically or by implication, to vest said Industrial Commission with power to hear, consider, and adjudge with whom is the right of the cause, such attempted delegation of power would be to constitute said commission in legal effect a court; and, further, that the statutes creating and defining the powers of the Industrial Commission do not protect the right of employer or employee to have questions of fact involved in a controversy between an employer and employee passed upon by any court as provided by article 1, §§ 7 and 11, article 5, § 1, article 8, §§ 1, 5, and 7, Constitution of the State of Utah and is therefore null and void."

It will be seen that the first contention made by plaintiff is that the commission acted in excess of its powers in granting to the applicant compensation, for the reason "that there was no evidence sustaining or tending to sustain the conclusion and decision of the commission" that the paralyzed condition of the applicant was due to "an accident arising out of and in the course of his employment" with the plaintiff.

The province of the Supreme Court in matters in review of the awards of the Industrial Commission has so frequently been discussed and passed upon in the former opinions of this court that it would seem wholly unnecessary and needless repetition to again set forth the...