Opinion ID: 1758792
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Extending Common Law to Permit Parent's Consortium Claim for Child's Death

Text: Five years after Whittlesey, we were asked to decide whether Texas should revise its position on the traditional common-law principle limiting a surviving parent's damages for a child's death to the pecuniary value of the child's services and financial contributions, minus the cost of his care, support and education. Sanchez, 651 S.W.2d at 251. Describing the pecuniary-loss rule as antiquated and inequitable, we rejected the common-law concept which viewed the child as an economic asset. Id. We reasoned that [t]he real loss sustained by a parent is not the loss of any financial benefit to be gained from the child, but is the loss of love, advice, comfort, companionship and society. We, therefore, reject the pecuniary loss limitation and allow a plaintiff to recover damages for loss of companionship and society and damages for mental anguish for the death of his or her child. Id. Relying primarily on Whittlesey, we concluded that injuries to the familial relationship are significant injuries and are worthy of compensation and that [such injuries] were real, direct, and personal losses ... not too intangible or conjectural to be measured in pecuniary terms. Id. at 252 (citing Whittlesey, 572 S.W.2d at 667, 668). Further, in abrogating the common-law pecuniary-loss rule, we found persuasive the argument that a parent's claim for damages for the loss of companionship of a child was closely analogous to a spouse's loss of consortium cause of action. Id.; see also Reagan, 804 S.W.2d at 468 (opinion on reh'g) (The purpose of [recognizing a parental-consortium claim] is to allow children the same protection allowed spouses when a third party causes serious, permanent, and disabling injuries to their parent.).