Court Opinion

ID: 9760415
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 00:54:28.473568+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:12.007678
License: Public Domain

KARWACKI, Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent.
The majority concludes that 15 U.S.C. § 1667a (1988) requires that the lessee be furnished a copy of the lease containing the required disclosures and that the lessor’s *336failure to furnish the copy constitutes a violation of the disclosure requirement. In reaching that result, I suggest that the majority has ignored the plain meaning of the language employed by Congress and the history of the passage of this legislation.
15 U.S.C. § 1667a provides in pertinent part:
“Each lessor shall give a lessee prior to the consummation of the lease a dated written statement on which the lessor and lessee are identified setting out accurately and in a clear and conspicuous manner the following information with respect to that lease, as applicable: ...
(11) A statement of the conditions under which the lessee or lessor may terminate the lease prior to the end of the term and the amount or method of determining any penalty or other charge for delinquency, default, late payments, or early termination.
The disclosures required under this section may be made in the lease contract to be signed by the lessee.”
Thus, as the majority recognizes, alternative methods are provided for compliance with the disclosure requirements. The lessor may either set them forth in a written statement delivered to the lessee prior to consummation of the lease or they may be contained in the lease to be signed by the lessee.
There is no requirement in this legislation that a copy of the executed lease be furnished to the lessee. The decision to forego any such requirement was deliberate as is indicated from the history of the passage of the Consumer Leasing Act of 1976. Senate Report No. 590, 94th Cong.2d Session 1, reprinted in 1976 U.S.Code Cong. & Admin. News 431 explains:
“The Consumer Leasing Act had its origin in recommendations made by the Federal Reserve Board in its 1973 and 1974 Reports to Congress on Truth in Lending. Two bills were introduced in the Senate, S. 1900 by Senators Garn and Morgan, and S. 1961, by Senators Biden and Proxmire, and hearings were held on them on *337July 15, 17, and 24, 1975, by the Subcommittee on Consumer Affairs. The Subcommittee met on September 29 and recommended an amended composite of the two bills to the full Committee. On December 15, 1975, the full Committee approved the bill as recommended, with one additional amendment. In the meantime the House had passed a bill on the same subject, H.R. 8885, which had been sent to the Senate and referred to the Committee. The Committee therefore substituted the text of its bill for that of H.R. 8835, which without objection is herewith reported.”
The disagreements between the House of Representatives and the Senate were resolved by conference committee. The joint explanatory statement of that committee, reprinted in 1976 U.S.Code Cong. & Admin. News 442-43, expressly addressed the issue of whether the lessee need be furnished a copy of the lease containing the disclosures required by the legislation. That statement relates:
“The managers on the part of the House and the Senate at the conference on the disagreeing votes of the two Houses on the amendment of the Senate to the bill (H.R. 8835) to amend the Truth in Lending Act to protect consumers against inadequate and misleading leasing information, assure meaningful disclosure of lease terms, and limit ultimate liability in connection with leasing of personal property primarily for personal, family, or household purposes, and for other purposes, submit the following joint statement to the House and the Senate in explanation of the effect of the action agreed upon by the managers and recommended in the accompanying conference report:
The Senate amendment struck out all of the House bill after the enacting clause and inserted a substitute text.
The House recedes from its disagreement to the amendment of the Senate with an amendment which is a substitute for the House bill and the Senate amendment. The differences between the House bill, the Senate amendment, and the substitute agreed to in conference are *338noted below, except for clerical corrections, conforming changes made necessary by agreements reached by the conferees, and minor drafting and clarifying changes____
The House bill provided for the manner in which lessors were to make specified disclosures, including clearly and conspicuously, and that the disclosures were to be in the lease contract and a copy given to the lessee when executed. The Senate amendment was comparable, except that it additionally required that disclosures be accurate and could be either in the lease contract or in a written statement. There was no express requirement for a copy to be given to the lessee. The House receded to the Senate amendment.”
In Nat’l Un. of Hosp. v. Johns Hopkins, 293 Md. 343, 360, 444 A.2d 448, 456 (1982), we emphasized that:
“it is a cardinal rule that in construing a legislative enactment courts should confine themselves to a construction of a statute as written, and not attempt, under the guise of statutory construction, to supply omissions or remedy possible defects in the statute, or to insert exceptions not made by the legislature. Cases to this effect are legion. Employ. Sec. Adm. v. Browning-Ferris, 292 Md. 515, 438 A.2d 1356 (1982); Baltimore Gas & Elec. v. Department, 284 Md. 216, 231, 395 A.2d 1174 (1979) (construing a statute liberally and adding to it, by judicial fiat, a provision which the legislature did not see fit to include are not one and the same thing); Amalgamated Ins. v. Helms, 239 Md. 529, 535-36, 212 A.2d 311 (1965).”
In my view the majority has violated that cardinal rule in its construction of 15 U.S.C. § 1667a in this case.
Judges Smith and Orth have authorized me to state that they join in this opinion.