Court Opinion

ID: 9758737
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 23:42:58.221589+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:55.063084
License: Public Domain

BECK, Judge,
concurring:
I reluctantly agree that the result reached by the majority is compelled by the bare language of 47 P.S. § 4-497 and by Simon v. Shirley, 269 Pa.Super. 364, 409 A.2d 1365 (1979). I write separately to state unequivocally my belief that this result represents a social policy injurious to the commonweal.
The majority finds the recent holding of our supreme court in Congini v. Portersville Valve Co., 504 Pa. 157, 470 A.2d 515 (1983), inapposite because that case involved a social host not covered by section 4-497 of the Liquor Code. While I acknowledge that distinction, I believe the Congini decision is based on certain sound principles which should be made more broadly applicable.
A careful analysis of Congini reveals that the supreme court in that case imposed on social hosts the same standard of liability which appellants argue and I believe should be imposed on licensees. In Congini, the court held that a cause of action could be maintained against a social host who furnished liquor to a minor guest, causing that minor to become intoxicated. There was no evidence that the minor plaintiff was already intoxicated when he arrived at the office party and was served liquor by defendants. Accordingly, the court stated that “defendants were negligent per se in serving alcohol to the point of intoxication to a person less than twenty-one years of age, and defendants can be held liable for injuries proximately resulting *335from the minor’s intoxication.” 504 Pa. at 162-163, 470 A.2d at 518 (emphasis added). The clear implication of the supreme court’s carefully chosen language is that serving a minor enough alcohol that he will become intoxicated is sufficient to establish liability. It is not necessary to show that the host served additional liquor to a minor who was already intoxicated.
This court followed and applied Congini in Douglas v. Schwenk, 330 Pa.Super. 392, 479 A.2d 608 (1984). We held that “[a] complaint joining the additional defendants [who were social hosts] on the grounds that they ... ‘furnished’ [a minor] alcoholic beverages knowing she was underage, would be driving and would not be able to operate said motor vehicle in a safe manner was sufficient to state a cause of action for which relief could be granted,” 330 Pa.Super. at 397, 479 A.2d at 611.
In Congini, the supreme court explained the basis of its decision in terms of the special treatment of minors in our laws relating to the sale and consumption of liquor. The court noted that sections 6308 and 306 of the Crimes Code, 18 Pa.C.S. §§ 6308 and 306 respectively, make the consumption of alcoholic beverages by minors and the sale or provision of alcoholic beverages to minors criminal offenses. In the court’s view, these statutes reflect “a legislative judgment that persons under twenty-one years of age are incompetent to handle alcohol.” 504 Pa. at 161, 470 A.2d at 517. Applying section 286 of the Restatement, Second, of Torts,1 the court adopted the statutory standard of conduct *336set forth in 6308 of the Crimes Code as the standard of conduct of a reasonable person, concluding therefore that “an adult who serves alcoholic beverages to a minor, causing intoxication, is negligent per se and may be held liable for injuries proximately caused by the intoxication.” Note, Social Host Found Negligent per se for Serving Alcoholic Beverages to Intoxicated Minor, 57 Temp.L.Q. 453, 455-56 (1984), paraphrasing Congini, 504 Pa. at 162-163, 470 A.2d at 518. The student commentator’s apt restatement of the court’s language (quoted supra in this opinion at 991) indicates that Congini is clearly understood as basing liability on the serving of sufficient alcohol to a minor to cause the minor to become intoxicated, rather than on serving additional alcohol to an already visibly intoxicated person.
I see no reason from a public policy standpoint why this liability should be imposed on social hosts only and not on licensees. A licensee who serves liquor to a minor violates section 4-493(1) of the Liquor Code, 47 P.S. § 4-493(1), whether or not the minor is already visibly intoxicated. Under section 4-471 of the Liquor Code, 47 P.S. § 4-471, such violations can lead to the suspension or revocation of the liquor license. The combined import of the statutory provisions applicable to ordinary citizens and to licensees is that our legislature has decided that providing any person deemed by the law too young to handle alcohol with the means to become intoxicated is a wrongful act. It is not necessary to show that the host served additional liquor to a minor who was already intoxicated.
We note that the courts of our sister state of New Jersey, acting in the absence of a statute such as 47 P.S. § 4-497, have held that the serving of alcoholic beverages by a tavern-keeper to a minor, without more, can form the basis for imposing civil liability in negligence on the tavern-keeper for harm caused by the minor. See Rappaport v. Nichols, 31 N.J. 188, 156 A.2d 1 (1959). In Rappaport the New Jersey Supreme Court reasoned that
*337[w]here a tavern keeper sells alcoholic beverages to a person who is visibly intoxicated or to a person he knows or should know from the circumstances to be a minor, he ought to recognize and foresee the unreasonable risk of harm to others through action of the intoxicated person or the minor.
31 N.J. at 201, 156 A.2d at 8 (emphasis added). With particular reference to minors, the court further observed that “insofar as minors are concerned the sale of the first drink which does ‘its share of the work’ and which generally leads to the others is unequivocally forbidden.” Id., citation omitted.
Rappaport has been described as one of the first in a “new trend” of similar holdings. Felder v. Butler, 292 Md. 174, 176, 438 A.2d 494, 496 (1981) (collecting cases following Rappaport as well as cases in which liability was not imposed).
I endorse the reasoning of the New Jersey court in Rappaport and would adopt it as the law of Pennsylvania were we free to do so. Licensees who wrongfully serve alcoholic beverages to minors should be subject to at least the same liability as social hosts. Although the majority’s disposition of this appeal is technically correct, it is to be regretted that we find ourselves bound by statutes and judicial precedents which are out of step with current social policy priorities.

. Section 286 of the Restatement, Second, of Torts provides:
§ 286. When Standard of Conduct Defined by Legislation or Regulation Will Be Adopted The court may adopt as the standard of conduct of a reasonable man the requirements of a legislative enactment or an administrative regulation whose purpose is found to be exclusively or in part
(a) to protect a class of persons which includes the one whose interest is invaded, and
(b) to protect the particular interest which is invaded, and
(c) to protect that interest against the kind of harm which has resulted, and
(d) to protect that interest against the particular hazard from which the harm results.
*336This section has been adopted as the law of Pennsylvania. Majors v. Brodhead Hotel, 416 Pa. 265, 205 A.2d 873, 875 (1965).