Court Opinion

ID: 9670171
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:16:18.864027+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:42:20.637121
License: Public Domain

PEDERSON, Justice,
concurring specially-
The Legislature said that the purpose of the casualty insurance rate law is to promote public welfare by regulating insurance rates to the end that those rates not be excessive, inadequate or unfairly discriminatory. The Legislature further said that it was not intended (1) that reasonable competition should be prohibited or discouraged, or (2) that uniformity in insurance rates, rating systems, rating plans or practices should be unnecessarily prohibited or encouraged. Finally, the Legislature said that the law shall be liberally interpreted to carry out these purposes. See § 26-28-01, NDCC.
As far as I can determine after many months of evaluations, administrative hearings and judicial reviews, no one yet has said whether the Allstate rates are excessive, inadequate or unfairly discriminatory.
The author of the majority opinion, in 1970, wrote that “it is not the function of the judiciary to act as a super board of review,” and that it is not for the court to substitute its judgment for that of the lawfully designated authorities. See Appeal of Johnson, 173 N.W.2d 475 (N.D.1970). Although that was not a review pursuant to *393the Administrative Agencies Practice Act, the same principle applies. Ordinarily then, courts should not initially decide the adequacy of insurance rates. That does not mean that we engage in any cat-and-mouse game playing. Expertise of any specific administrator may be questioned politically but judicial restraint requires that we refrain from substituting our judgment for that of the administrator (or questioning his expertise) in every case where he has functioned under a statutory directive.
This all leaves me in a quandary. By affirming the judgment of the district court, which in effect authorized the increased rates for Allstate, it appears that we are fulfilling the function prescribed by the Legislature. Are we not, then, infringing upon the authority of the insurance commissioner and taking on the role of a “super board” or “super commissioner”? I understand the majority opinion to infer that because of the refusal of the commissioner to evaluate Allstate’s proposed rates as excessive, inadequate or unfairly discriminatory, the courts must, by necessity, allow them to become effective. This may be the only alternative available, but it impresses me that we are saying to the commissioner, “you didn’t do this right,” so we are going to penalize the public by making it pay insurance rates which might even be excessive.
The problem is eventually legislative. The all-or-nothing interpretation that both Allstate and the commissioner place upon Chapter 26-28, NDCC, violates my sense of reasonableness. The statute ought to be changed. During oral argument, counsel for the commissioner said that he was always willing to negotiate with applicants. I think that public interest requires that we leave room for those negotiations. My concurrence arises out of necessity — not necessarily conviction.