Court Opinion

ID: 9571710
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:34:27.702439+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:30:50.128352
License: Public Domain

HENDERSON, Justice
(specially concurring in part; dissenting in part).
I.
I specially concur in approximately one-half of the majority opinion, i.e., declaring Cimarron’s household exclusion in the liability portion of the policy invalid as being violative of this state’s public policy.
II.
Joining our immediate past Chief Justice’s dissent in toto on the balance of the majority opinion, I likewise dissent to limiting the family exclusion clause “void” — up to $25,000.00. Where is the magic in the figure $25,000 when discussing public policy?
Freedom to contract. For whom? Certainly not, as an example, for the rights of a little child (defenseless to the commercial word, maimed for life) who has had his or her rights of financial protection contracted away. Our Financial Responsibility Act was fostered to assure monetary protection and compensation for South Dakotans who suffer injuries through negligent, careless and reckless use of public highways — not *889to take it away. Majority opinion would strip away and deny coverage to little children, spouses and family members of an insured. As the Supreme Court of Wisconsin observed: “The Safety Responsibility Law was designed to protect the third-party beneficiary, not the named insured.” Mueller v. American Indemnity Co., 19 Wis.2d 349, 120 N.W.2d 89, 90 (1963). In my opinion, the decision below capping coverage at $25,000, but void above that figure, is violative of public policy.
In balancing justice here, the public policy of providing monetary protection and comparison for all South Dakotans overrides any “freedom of contract” analysis. Therefore, I support the holdings in the minority jurisdictions, relying on the exact three cases cited by the majority opinion and Justice Wuest’s position. State Farm, Meyer, and Kish. Essentially, the majority opinion is splitting hairs to support wrong (i.e., $25,000.00 is void; an amount above that is not void). For posterity, it should be mentioned that Nonanna has alleged brain injury. Allen Paul Croyle, Jr.’s driving killed another person, Jeanette St. Peter. Cimarron Insurance Company brought this declaratory judgment lawsuit to save its pocketbook. Cimarron is an inanimate creation of the law and has no sense for right or wrong, i.e., justice in this case. Nor is its conscience piqued; inanimate objects do not have a conscience. Humans, endowed by their creator, with a brain and emotional psyche, have a conscience. Humans care. In one election from a Supreme Court District, and then in one state-wide retention election, the people bequeathed me with the title “Justice.” * I am supposed to concern myself with justice. As it stands, I see no ultimate justice in this case. I cannot join the writing of our present Chief Justice. In all due respect to our present Chief Justice, the majority opinion, in my opinion, creates injustice for the people of this state. This opinion has far-reaching consequences against the rights of my fellow South Dakotans and thus I dissent on our present Chief Justice’s position on the $25,000 “cap.”
Nonanna Croyle is an innocent victim. She is entitled to protection under SDCL 32-35-70 which requires that:
An owner’s policy of liability insurance ... shall insure the person named therein and any other person as insured, ... against loss from the liability imposed by law for damages arising out of the ownership, maintenance, or use of the vehicle .... (Emphasis added.)
In 1986, additionally, the South Dakota Legislature passed SDCL 32-35-113, which required that all owners and operators of motor vehicles must have liability insurance during the operation of a motor vehicle. This statute states in pertinent part:
Every driver or owner of a motor vehicle shall at all times maintain in force one of the forms of financial responsibility on the motor vehicle by one of the following methods:
(1) ... an owner’s policy of liability insurance as provided in § 32-35-70[.]
In Richard v. Fliflet, 370 N.W.2d 528, 534 (N.D.1985), the Supreme Court of North Dakota expressed:
The overriding purpose of our financial responsibility law is to protect innocent victims of motor vehicle accidents from financial disaster. (Emphasis added.)
In Rural Mutual Insurance Company v. Peterson, 134 Wis.2d 165, 395 N.W.2d 776, 778 (1986) it was expressed:
Parties are at liberty to enter insurance contracts which specify the coverage afforded by the contract as long as the contract terms do not contravene state law or public policy. (Emphasis added.)
Streich v. American Family Mutual Insurance Company, 358 N.W.2d 396 (Minn.1984), supports this same position. Con*890cerned I am that the majority of my Brothers on this Court, in my opinion, have forsaken both the state law and public policy arguments which address the vital interests of the people of South Dakota, compared to the contractual position of a Kansas insurance corporation.
In addressing all of these statutes, trying to harmonize them for the public good and safety, let us examine two further statutes. SDCL 32-35-72 requires that a motor vehicle liability policy:
[S]hall contain an agreement ... that insurance is provided ... in accordance with the coverage defined in this chapter as respects bodily injury ... and is subject to all the provisions of this chapter. SDCL 32-35-74(4) states that:
(4) The policy ... ■ and any rider or endorsement which does not conflict with the provisions of this chapter shall constitute the entire contract between the parties.
Here, the insurance contract issued by the Kansas insurance corporation, Cimar-ron, clearly omitted coverage required by the language and policy expressed in SDCL 32-35-113 and 32-35-70. In South Dakota, my position is that automobile liability insurance is mandated; it is not just required as proof of financial responsibility. Where there are exclusion clauses which conflict with statutory requirements, as can be noted heretofore, they are invalid. State Farm Mutual Auto. Insurance Co. v. Wagamon, 541 A.2d 557, 560-61 (Del.1988).
Insurance corporations should not abuse our state law nor should these insurance corporations dictate public policy. Nor should they be permitted to enslave the people of South Dakota with contracts of adhesion, contracts by which, of their inherent nature, are against public policy. Realistically, Croyle’s father had no “freedom of contract.” Either he accepted the policy or he did not have insurance. He was confronted with the same dilemma as all South Dakotans: “Take it or leave it.” And, under South Dakota law, he is mandated to have automobile liability insurance. If the insurance companies dictate the terms, it is adhesive.
We recognized contracts of adhesion in an insurance setting in Cheney v. Metropolitan Life Ins. Co., 370 N.W.2d 569 (S.D.1985) (Henderson, J., dissenting on other grounds). We are not plowing virgin ground now. I note that both parties briefed the issue as to the terms of the household exclusion. Cimarron cited to Rozeboom, addressing contracts that are unreasonable, harsh or oppressive; Cimar-ron sought to distinguish Rozeboom. Croyle also briefed contracts of adhesion. Thus, it is squarely before this Court. In keeping with my thesis heretofore articulated, the insurance policy before us is an adhesion contract. Cimarron's agent testified that Croyle’s father would not be able to obtain an insurance policy without a Family Exclusion Clause. Croyle’s father had no choice to include or exclude coverage for family members. “No choice” reflects no conscious bargaining between the parties. Read a good discussion of this point in Estep v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Co., 103 N.M. 105, 703 P.2d 882, 886-87 (1985). Wives and children are, essentially, ordinarily ignorant of the insurance provisions or incompetent to contract.
And so, Justice Wuest and myself are in the minority. So what? Thanks to the discoveries of Galileo, his successors found themselves in a New Earth surrounded by New Heavens. Walt Whitman sang the song of the “Open Road.” Many legal minds have different viewpoints on the very subject before us. I am no pioneer on the issue at hand. In Green v. Clinic Masters, Inc., 272 N.W.2d 813, 815-16 (S.D.1978), adhesion contracts were recognized by some of the former gentlemen who served on this Court and have now gone on to their heavenly reward. Back in 1971, this Court decided the Durham case, cited by Justice Wuest. Same story. Adhesion contracts recognized in. South Dakota. Thank God for creative men; men who dare to be different. As I wrote in Roze-boom, at 246:
We fully appreciate that our viewpoint is not the traditional viewpoint in this Nation. The righteousness of a cause is often solitary and perhaps time will bet*891ter serve our pronouncement. In a democratic society, we persevere under a system of laws where change is inevitable. Change can be simple, good, and effectual. Here, we associate with change in simple fairness and opposed to basic oppression.
Here, under the majority rule, a child under the age of emancipation cannot sue his parent for parental negligence. Maimed for life, he is leffe,defenseless to the commercial world. Simple fairness tells me that this should not be. This case accords us an opportunity to protect individuals within a family who reside with us. I would side with them, rather than the Kansas insurance corporation whose own agent, under oath, impales it upon a cross of adhesion. With our ex-Chief Justice, I would drive the nails.

 Prior to this, the people of the Seventh Judicial Circuit elected me to the position of Circuit Court Judge where I served for four years. In South Dakota, a circuit judge is a judge of general jurisdiction with a panoply of trial power, encompassing presiding over jury trials. Having been elected to the Circuit Court and then the Supreme Court (and retained in a statewide retention ballot), I am the last of this kind of Judicial Mohican on this Court. My identification is with the feelings, thoughts, and rights of the people.