Wing Memorial Hospital Ass'n v. Town of Randolph
| Decision Date | 03 September 1957 |
| Docket Number | No. 840,840 |
| Citation | 120 Vt. 277,141 A.2d 645 |
| Court | Vermont Supreme Court |
| Parties | WING MEMORIAL HOSPITAL ASSOCIATION v. TOWN OF RANDOLPH. |
Black, Plante & Ellison, White River Jct., for plaintiff.
Stanley L. Chamberlin, Randolph, Wilson & Keyser, Chelsea, for defendant.
Before CLEARY, ADAMS, HULBURD, and HOLDEN, JJ., and SYLVESTER, superior judge.
The plaintiff, a Massachusetts hospital corporation, seeks recovery by this action in contract, for hospital services furnished to Mrs. Annie Rice in Palmer, Massachusetts, on the strength of an undertaking by the defendant's town manager and overseer, Robert A. Hancock. On the findings of fact made, judgment was entered for the defendant by the Orange County Court. The plaintiff appeals and assigns error to certain findings and to the judgment.
The findings state that on October 3, 1951, Mrs. Annie Rice, aged 83, 'who was then residing with her son, Walter Stocks, at 91 Springfield Street, Three Rivers, Massachusetts' accidentally sustained a fractured hip and was removed to the plaintiff's hospital for care and treatment. On the day of her admission, the plaintiff directed a printed and typed communication to the town of Randolph. The typed portion is filled in blank spaces provided, indicated by underlining.
'Date 10-3-51
To the Board of Public Welfare of Randolph, Vermont
Parents
Wife
Husband
Son} of the Patient Walter Stocks, Three Rivers, Mass.
Name of Patient Mrs. Annie Rice
and Address 91 Springfield St., Three Rivers, Mass.
and 13 Railroad St., Randolph, Vermont
was admitted to this hospital on Oct. 3, 1951 as a responsibility of your Board, sent in by Doctor Dr. R. Hunt with an admitting diagnosis of Fractured Rt. Hip
'Wing Memorial Hospital
By T. Johnson'
To this communication was attached a form for a reply that was printed with blank spaces to complete. The blank spaces were filled by writing in longhand and was signed by the defendant's overseer. The printed and written reply contained these words with the written words underlined:
'To Wing Memorial Hospital
Palmer, Massachusetts
'Date Oct. 8, 1951
'You are authorized to send bills in the case of Mrs. Annie Rice admitted to your hospital on Oct. 3, 1951 to this Board.
'Board of Public Welfare
Overseer of the Poor' The reply, Plaintiff's Exhibit 3, was detached from the original communication of the plaintiff, Plaintiff's Exhibit 2, and was returned to the Wing Hospital which received it October 11, 1951. Both exhibits were handed to the Court during oral argument.
After receipt of the reply from the defendant's overseer, the plaintiff continued to furnish hospital care to Mr. Rice until the date of her discharge, February 29, 1952. Upon her release from the hospital Mrs. Rice returned to the home of her son in Three Rivers.
On March 20, 1952, Hancock advised the plaintiff by written communication that in his opinion the 'Town of Randolph or its Overseer Dept. are in no way legally responsible for your recent expense in connection with Mrs. Rice.'
Statements of the hospital care furnished Mrs. Rice have been provided the defendant as well as the patient. The defendant has not paid the plaintiff the amount due for the hospital service rendered Mrs. Rice. The plaintiff seeks recovery for this care during the period of October 9, 1951, to February 29, 1952, in the amount of $1,596.13.
The plaintiff excepted to the statement of the descriptive clause in Finding 3, which makes reference to Mrs. Rice, at the time of her accident, in the words, 'who was then residing with her son, Walter Stocks, 91 Springfield Street, Three Rivers, Mass., * * *'. During oral argument of this appeal, counsel for the defendant town stated in substance that the town made no claim that this part of the Court's findings attempted to fix the legal residence of Mrs. Rice in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The record fully justifies this concession. Clearly, from the evidence, Mrs. Rice's presence in Massachusetts at the time of her hospitalization was not such as to establish her residence there. To constitute a residence under our pauper law the fact that the poor person actually lived in the town in question and his intent to make the town his home must concur. V.S. 47, § 7097; Town of Georgia v. Town of Waterville, 107 Vt. 347, 350, 178 A. 893, 99 A.L.R. 453. The record is silent on the issue of Mrs. Rice's domiciliary intent except for the single instance of her declaration to one of the plaintiff's officers that she was 'visiting' her son at the time of her admission to the hospital. Presence as a visitor, in the usual sense, is inconsistent with location for the purpose of establishing a home. A visitor is a person away from home; not one who has come to reside. Wilbur v. Town of Calais, 90 Vt. 335, 337, 98 A. 913.
There is no justification by the evidence for an affirmative determination that Mrs. Rice's residence was in Three Rivers, Massachusetts, within the meaning of Chapter 303 relating to relief of the poor
With the inference of the patient's residence in Massachusetts removed from the findings, it is for us to determine whether sufficient facts remain in the findings to sustain the judgment for the defendant.
The plaintiff's exception to the judgment directs this appeal to consideration of whether the facts reported establish a contract, and if so, whether the overseer was possessed of the authority to enter such an agreement.
At the outset, the defendant has challenged the validity of the undertaking of the overseer on the basis that the town is not liable for hospital care administered outside Vermont. This contention might have merit if the plaintiff relied entirely on the statutory remedy of V.S. 47 § 7112, and affirmative action by the overseer had not been engaged. That section permits recovery by a hospital for relief furnished a town charge where no contract obtains and in the absence of agreement or approval by the overseer. When this section is read with the definition of the word 'town' contained in V.S. 47, § 7097, recovery thereunder is limited to relief furnished within the state.
The plaintiff here, however, has not resorted to the statutory remedy of section 7112. The hospital places determinant reliance on the action taken by the overseer by his reply of October 8, 1951. It claims his course of conduct implies a contract which binds the town.
The distinction between actions under our pauper law, purely statutory, and those founded in contract is noted and explained in Wolcott v. Town of Wolcott, 19 Vt. 37 at page 39.
V.S. 47, § 7111 controls the liability of towns for hospital care funished on agreement or approval by the overseer. This statutory provision imposes no restriction that the care be funished within the State. The oversser may provide relief at such places as his judgment deems expedient. Town of Randolph v. Ketchum, 117 Vt. 468, 475, 94 A.2d 410.
Reduced to its plain, reasonable meaning, the original communication from the plaintiff hospital to the Board of Public Welfare of Randolph was in substance an application to the defendant for public assistance in behalf of its patient, Mrs. Rice. To effect such an application, no particular formality of form or expression is required. An application is accomplished if what is said and done is intended as a request for public aid, and thus understood by the overseer to whom it is directed. Peabody v, Town of Holland, 107 Vt. 237, 242, 178 A. 888, 98 A.L.R. 866.
It was fitting that the hospital bring the circumstances of its patient to the attention of the overseer in quest of an agreement. See Town of Hardwick v. Town of Barnard, 102 Vt. 330, 334, 148 A. 408.
The receipt of the request invoked the duty of the overseer to act. His duty arises and becomes ineludible whenever he receives information, however conveyed, that relief is needed. V.S. 47, § 7108; Town of Waitsfield v. Town of Craftsbury, 87 Vt. 406, 408, 89 A. 466; Town of Hardwick v. Town of Barnard, supra, 102 Vt. 334, 148 A. 410.
The law relating to the relief of poor persons conferred upon him the authority to determine whether he will furnish relief, and whether the facts make the case proper for him to do so. Nadeau v. Marchessault, 112 Vt. 309, 311, 24 A.2d 352; Holloway v. Town of Barton, 53 Vt. 300, 301-302.
Section 7108, Vermont Statutes, Revision of 1947, makes it mandatory for the overseer of a town to give relief to a poor person residing therein when application for such relief is made, or when he receives information that relief is required. The function of his office required him to make inquiry of the fact of Mrs. Rice's residence and of her status as a poor person in need of relief. Only by deciding these basic facts could he properly determine whether the request for the relief of Mrs. Rice should be granted. This was the very duty the law imposed upon Hancock as the defendant's overseer.
The function of his office permitted Hancock the liberty to deny the residence of Mrs. Rice and thereby reject the application for her relief. He could have withheld action on the request to permit further investigation. The defendant's overseer failed to resort to either of these courses of action. By his reply on the form submitted by the plaintiff he acknowledged the town's responsibility for the care of the patient. He 'authorized' the hospital to look to the defendant for payment of her expense.
Considering the nature of the subject matter, the clear import of the interchange of communications between the plaintiff and the defendant's overseer is that the plaintiff requested relief in behalf of Mrs Rice, and the overseer acknowledged the request and granted the relief. These writings, under the circumstances, could not be expected to give rise to any different understanding on the part of the hospital and the overseer. See Pocket v. Almon, 90...
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