Court Opinion

ID: 9532133
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:18:27.953729+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:28:40.977381
License: Public Domain

DE CONCINI, Justice
(dissenting).
This court has said on a number Of occasions that the Workmen’s Compensation Law was not designed to afford the protection of accident and death benefit insurance. The overruling of the Commission’s award in this instance appears to me to be a reversal of that policy.
The Town council of Holbrook met in regular session February 8, 1950, two days before the fatal accident in question. The council met again in a regular meeting March 8, 1950. In neither one of those meetings was there any authorization for, or ratification of, the deceased’s trip to Yuma. Then in a special meeting held March 22, 1950, a correcting entry in the minutes of February 8 was made authorizing the deceased to make the trip. Such a correcting entry is tantamount to an order nunc pro tunc. Such an order is void if no mention of it was made or action on it was taken at the February 8th meeting. Stephens v. White, 46 Ariz. 426, 51 P.2d 921.
Now as to the oral authorization of the mayor; he testified as follows: “A. Well, I wouldn’t say I gave him any definite instructions other than that he asked me if he might make the trip and that he would represent the Town of Holbrook in the event anything pertaining to towns in general came up at the Chamber of Commerce meeting.” (r.t. 7-13-50, p. 9.)
Counsel then adroitly led him into the following: “Q. In other words he was authorized to go and represent the Town of Holbrook? A. He was.”
From such contrary testimony the commission may have doubted whether any verbal authority was given.
However, the real question at stake here, is whether such verbal authorization is valid in law.
The Town of Holbrook is a municipal corporation existing by virtue of article 2, Chapter 16, A.C.A. 1939. Its powers are granted by law and it can exercise them only as provided by law. Woodward v. Fox West Coast Theaters, 36 Ariz. 251, 284 P. 350. The verbal authorization and subsequent ratification are not within its statutory powers.
*280In the next to the last paragraph of the majority opinion five cases are cited. Only one of them comes near the point and in that instance the court held that the sheriff had the authority to deputize the injured person, Sexton. See Sexton v. Waseca County, supra. None of the cases deal with a municipal corporation exceeding its statutory authority. The majority opinion also cites Bentley v. Industrial Commission. It is my opinion that the Bentley case holds exactly opposite to the majority opinion. The majority may cite it with the view that the deceased here was in the same position as Collins in the Bentley case. From my viewpoint they cannot be compared by any stretch of the imagination.
It is commendable that the city council of the Town of Holbrook would like to benefit the beneficiaries of the deceased, but they should do it with the money of the Town of Holbrook and not the Workmen’s Compensation Fund. The old maxim of “you must be just before you are generous” applies equally to the compensation fund as to other monies.
Justice Stone dissenting in the Sexton v. Waseca County case, supra [1 N.W.2d 395,] said: “Because ethically this 'decision seems right, it is not an agreeable task to dissent on the ground that it is legally wrong.”
I find myself in a similar position. Nevertheless, I dissent.