Court Opinion

ID: 9765755
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 04:18:19.469143+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:15.511589
License: Public Domain

GRIFFIN, Justice
(dissenting).
I am unable to distinguish the facts in this case from the facts of the Gallagher case (135 Tex. 41, 136 S.W.2d 590), except the facts in the Gallagher case are much more favorable to a recovery by the injured workman than they are here. In that case Gallagher testified:
“That he first talked to the officers or agents of the Drilling Company at Kermit, in Winkler County, Texas; that Kermit is about twelve miles from the New Mexico line; that at the time he first talked to the above-mentioned officers they were going to drill a well in Texas near Pecos; that he spoke to such officers about going over there on the Pecos job, and they said when they got ready to start that job they would send him (Gallagher) over there; that he did not go *157to work on the well near Pecos in Texas, and never did any work for the Drilling Company in Texas; that the well was started in New Mexico, and he was told by the officials of the Drilling Company to go over there, and when the Drilling Company got ready to rig up, he {Gallagher) would be transferred back to Texas; that the officers of the Drilling Company told him {Gallagher) that he would be sent to the deep test in Pecos County, Texas, which well was another job; that he (Gallagher) said he would rather work in Texas than in New Mexico for the reason he lived in Texas with his family; that the officers of the Drilling Company told him (Gallagher) to go over there (we presume meaning New Mexico), we carry Texas Compensation Insurance, and that he (Gallagher) then took the job and went to work on the well in New Mexico; that he (Gallagher) did not go to work in Texas; and that he was injured before the Texas job got started.”
In the case at bar, plaintiff Dossey testified on direct examination that he was hired on a Saturday and went to work on a Monday (eight days after the employment contract); at the time of his employment there was no discussion about where he was to work in what state or county; he was to work wherever the rig was, and that when he went to work the rig was close to Monument, New Mexico, lying on the ground; that the rig was erected on a location in the State of New Mexico and this is where he went to work.
Williams, the driller for Lowe Drilling Company who hired Dossey, testified that this was his first job for Lowe Drilling Company; that Mr. Massey, Lowe’s drilling superintendent, hired Mr. Williams to work on one of two rigs at the time stacked in New Mexico. Rig No. 1, on which Williams and Dossey worked, and Rig No. 5, on which neither worked so far as the record shows, were both located in New Mexico.
There is no testimony in the record that Dossey ever requested work in the State of Texas or that Williams ever promised him work in Texas; no testimony as to a request by Dossey or a promise by Williams that Dossey would ever be transferred to work in Texas.
The evidence does show that the three days’ work laying lines which Dossey did in Texas while his rig in New Mexico was being skidded to a new location in New Mexico was only temporary work given by Lowe “in order to enable the crew of Rig No. 1 to earn some wages while waiting. Dossey testified that when his first job on Rig No. 1 was finished, Williams asked his crew to remain available to go to work at the new location and that “Sonny” (Williams) promised that when the rig started up at its new location he still had a job working for Lowe, and that Williams told him the work in Texas was only temporary and the crew would go back to Rig No. 1 when it started up. There is no testimony that this rig or that the driller, Williams, ever thereafter worked on any rig in Texas for Lowe, but the evidence shows all their work was in New Mexico.
Try as hard as the majority does, it never does get away from the test laid down in Gallagher and Hale (150 Tex. 215, 239 S.W.2d 608) for determining whether or not an employee has acquired the status of a Texas employee so as to be covered by Texas Workmen’s Compensation. That test is simple and of easy application and is: “ * * * that one who has not in fact done any work in Texas for his employer before being hired to work in another state cannot be said to have acquired the status of a Texas employee and is not entitled to the benefits of the statute.” (Emphasis added.)
There is not a single case cited by the majority as authority for its holding in which a recovery has been allowed wherein the employee had not first been working for his employer in Texas prior to the time he was working for the same employer out*158side Texas. There is no such case in the books.
For this simple, understandable and easily applied test of when an employee has acquired the status of a Texas employee, the majority has substituted a confusing and many-pronged test, stated as follows: “He is a Texas resident; the contract of hire occurred in Texas; his employer is domiciled in Texas; he was employed to work in both Texas and New Mexico and he did, in fact, perform labor and services in both [states] before his injury in New Mexico.”
Patently the last test of performing labor in both Texas and New Mexico is directly contrary to the stipulation between the parties that “there was no breaking off of the contract to hire” and “no change of any contract to hire,” and “no change in his status” from the original conversation of hiring between Williams and Dossey about one week prior to the beginning of the work on Rig No. 1 in New Mexico. Such test is also directly contrary to Dossey’s testimony set out above that “Mr. Sonny Williams told me that the work I was doing in Texas was only temporary, and as soon as Rig No. 1 started back up (in New Mexico) I would go back there.” Clearly, under the ordinary meaning of the English language, the interim temporary Texas work could not serve to give Dossey the status of a Texas employee.
Which of the tests laid down by the majority is the controlling test? Must all tests be present? If not, which ones may be absent? Which combination of tests are necessary in order for an employee to have status as a Texas employee? The above questions illustrate the confusion that will result from the majority opinion.
If Gallagher is no longer the law, then that fact should be faced, and the bench and bar told not to rely further on Gallagher; Hale; Covington v. Associated Employers Lloyds, Tex.Civ.App., 195 S.W.2d 209, writ refused, and the many other cases now in the Texas Reports upholding the Gallagher rule.
In my opinion, it is much better for there to be certainty in the law than for it to be left In a state of confusion, so that the legal profession has no guideposts whereby it may steer a course of justice.
I would adhere to the Gallagher rule and reverse the judgments of the courts below and render judgment in favor of the petitioner herein.
HAMILTON, J., joins in this dissent.