Court Opinion

ID: 9629957
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 09:54:38.145111+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:07:28.094939
License: Public Domain

ERWIN, Justice
(dissenting).
I dissent from that portion of the majority opinion which holds that this case must be reversed for an error in instructions. I believe that any such error was waived through appellant’s failure to properly present his objections to the trial court as required by Civil Rule 51(a).
In this case the borrowed servant doctrine was raised in appellee’s answer and was his primary defense at trial. The pretrial order of May 19, 1969, ordered that all requested instructions be presented at the beginning of the trial, yet appellant presented no suggested instructions or legal memoranda on the definition of a borrowed servant. He presented only a single requested instruction which did not even mention the doctrine of borrowed servant.1
*1206Appellant did object to the borrowed servant instruction given below on the general ground that it was not a proper statement of the law. However, such a general objection is particularly noninformative to the trial judge who is called upon to instruct on the law. It simply does not meet the requirements of Civil Rule 51(a) which provides in part:
No party may assign as error the giving or the failure to give an instruction unless he objects thereto before the jury retires to consider its verdict, stating distinctly the matter to which he objects and the grounds of his objection, (emphasis added)
We have construed this section to require specific objection in criminal cases before claimed error in the instructions will be considered on appeal.2 There is no compelling reason to relax this requirement in civil litigation where there are even greater opportunities to refine the issues before trial.
For the Rule 51(a) procedure to function properly, a substantial burden must be imposed on counsel to present specific objections. Otherwise, the trial judge will be unable to adequately review the objection and consider the argument made in formulating jury instructions.
Under the provisions of the Second Restatement of Agency,3 the instruction given was not such plain error as should lead to this court’s intervention in the absence of a proper objection at trial. I would, therefore, affirm the judgment below.

. The requested instruction reads as follows :
The defendant Ghemm Construction Company has been sued on the theory that it was the employer of Dan Walsh on July 7, 1967, and that Dan Walsh was acting as agent (or employee) of Ghemm Construction Company within the scope of his employment at the time the accident occurred.
If you find that Dan Walsh was not negligent, or if he was negligent but that his negligence was not a proximate cause of any injury to plaintiff (or if you should find in favor of the defense of contributory negligence), then of course it would not be necessary to consider the question of agency because in that event the defendant could not lawfully be held liable even if agency existed.
*1206But if you should find that Dan Walsh was negligent, and that his negligence was a proximate cause of injury to plaintiff (and that the evidence does not support the defense of contributory negligence) then you must decide whether at the time of the accident Dan Walsh was acting within the scope of his employment.
If you find either that Dan Walsh was not then the agent (or employee) of the defendant, or, if the agent (or employee), that he was not acting within the scope of his employment, then your verdict must be in favor of the defendant; but if you find that Dan Walsh was acting as agent (or employee) of the defendant and within the scope of his employment and if you will have found in plaintiff’s favor on the other issues mentioned in this instruction then you [sic] verdict must be for the plaintiff.

. Pope v. State, 478 P.2d 801, 805-806 (Alaska 1970), reh. denied 480 P.2d 697 (Alaska 1971). See also, Bakken v. State, Op. No. 728, 489 P.2d 120, at 125 (Alaska, 1971) (Erwin, J., dissenting).

. Restatement (Second) of Agency § 227 (1958).