Court Opinion

ID: 9719641
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:57:40.780724+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:08.606025
License: Public Domain

*215GATES, Judge,
concurring:
I concur in the result reached by the majority because an intermediate appellate court is compelled to follow the teaching of the ultimate appellate court in the judicial system. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court in Seymour v. Rossman, 449 Pa. 515, 521, 297 A.2d 804, 807 (1972), makes it unmistakably clear that:
“ . . . Where decedent is survived by two [2] classes of relatives, one which has suffered a pecuniary loss by reason of his death and the other of which has not, the class suffering the loss is entitled to the entire recovery to the exclusion of the class which has suffered no loss. Armstrong v. Berk, 96 F.Supp. 182 (E.D.Pa.1951).”
The statement in Seymour v. Rossman, supra, is, of course, dictum and not directly applicable, since the issue there involved the apportionment of the proceeds of a Wrongful Death Action between a widow who admittedly sustained a greater loss than a surviving dependent daughter.
Nonetheless, I believe that the earlier cases upon which the court relied were improperly decided. To me the legislative intent in directing the distribution of the funds recovered under the Wrongful Death Act is unmistakably clear. Distribution under the Wrongful Death Act “ . shall go to them in the proportion they would take his or her personal estate in case of intestacy . . . ”1
Under the Intestate Act2, Linda Civitella, the appellant, would be entitled to a share in her deceased father’s estate without regard to the fact that she is his daughter by a prior marriage and has lived apart from his household and received no support from him. Nonetheless, the decisional law in Pennsylvania has created two (2) classes of intestate heirs for the purpose of receiving benefits under the Wrongful Death Act despite its plain language. In doing so it seems clear to me that the courts have strayed far from the letter *216of the Wrongful Death Act and, under the guise of judicial interpretation, have rewritten the Act.
Undoubtedly, the Wrongful Death Act, as I would interpret it, is inequitable, at least insofar as the present action is concerned. But if we are to maintain that most desirable distinction between legislating and judicial interpreting we should beseech the General Assembly to address these changes by legislative amendment to the Wrongful Death Act. I am not alone in this view. See the concurring opinion by Montgomery, J. in Seymour v. Rossman, 220 Pa.Super. 92, 283 A.2d 495 (1971) and the concurring opinion by Mr. Justice Nix in Seymour v. Rossman, 449 Pa. 515, 297 A.2d 804 (1972).

. Act of April 26, 1855, P.L. 309, § 1, as amended (12 P.S. § 1602).

. Act of June 30, 1972, P.L. 508, No. 164, effective July 1, 1972 (20 Pa.C.S.A. §§ 2101, 2102 and 2103).