Court Opinion

ID: 9865111
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-25 16:24:03.375683+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:37:23.301456
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Hays
dissenting.
The court by the majority opinion legalizes the payment of monthly benefits to a widow whose husband died prior to the date of the charter amendment here considered upon the ground that to do otherwise would be “arbitrary and brutally unfair.” With utmost respect to the author of the opinion and the concurring justices, I submit that it is not within our province to determine whether the people of the City and County of Denver in adopting the charter amendment acted arbitrarily or unfairly. That is their business and not ours. It is our duty, as I see it, to uphold what the people ■ did *274when the intent, as here, is plain, whether right or wrong, fair or unfair, reasonable or arbitrary. We are not justified in rewriting the amendment or any part thereof merely because we might think the people should have included this widow or should have used more fortunate language in expressing their intent.
The amendment provides generally for pensions for retired members of the police department and for monthly benefits to widows and children of deceased members thereof.
Following the retirement provision we find: “The pension herein provided for shall be paid to those who have been retired from service prior to the effective date of this amendment, as well as those who shall be so retired after the effective date of this amendment. * * *” No such provision follows the paragraph granting to widows of deceased members monthly benefits, but by judicial legislation there was added by this court, in effect, a new paragraph patterned after the one above, to wit: “The benefits herein provided for shall be paid to those who have become widowed prior to the effective date of, this amendment, as well as those who shall become widowed after the effective date of this amendment; * * *” It will be noted in connection with the above judicially added paragraph that we have used the exact language of the people as set forth in the paragraph following the retirement provision with appropriate minor changes to make it applicable to dependents.
I do not believe that we have the right upon the pretext of liberal construction or of the supposed intent of the charter framers to “change and broaden the basis of recovery” or to indulge in such legislative activity to the neglect of our own judicial functions. The people of Denver demonstrated in the clause following the retirement provision that they are fully competent to find words to make any provision of the amendment retroactive when súch is their intent. Not having done so *275with respect to the dependents provision, it seems conclusive that the people did not intend to make it retroactive in its operation. While I am in sympathy with the laudable object accomplished as a result of the majority opinion, I cannot join therein, because of a firm belief that the people of Denver, not this court, should, by proper legislative enactment, make such benefits available to the applicant.