Court Opinion

ID: 9762329
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 02:20:09.204203+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:33.396218
License: Public Domain

CADENA, Justice
(concurring).
I would affirm the judgment below solely on the ground that the “duty” allegedly breached by defendant springs from the existence of the marital relationship between plaintiff and defendant. I am not willing to join in an opinion which is based on the notion that the vow to love, honor and cherish has the effect of creating in the avower a privilege to inflict upon the other party to, the marriage intentional or negligent injury which would create a cause of action if inflicted on a person to whom such solemn promises have not been made. There is no need, in this case, to voice unqualified approval of the unpersuasive reasoning found in Nickerson and Matson v. Nickerson, 65 Tex. 281 (1886), or to add to the number of cases which have mechanically followed the Nickerson holding.1
The courts must, of course, recognize that the parties to a marriage necessarily consent to a certain amount of even intentional contact which, if inflicted upon a third person, would be actionable. I have full faith in the ability of our judiciary to fashion what may be loosely described as a doctrine of “assumed risk” applicable to husband-wife relations. But the fact that the nature of the marital relationship requires some limitations on the right of one spouse to sue the other does not justify adherence to a rule which bestows upon a spouse a blanket license to inflict injury upon the other spouse.
I find nothing in the result reached in Gowin v. Gowin, 292 S.W. 211 (Tex. Comm’n App.1927), which is inconsistent with the views here expressed.

I. As pointed out in the majority opinion, the doctrine of interspousal immunity from liability for personal torts has been subjected to severe criticism, and recent decisions reflect a judicial willingness to reexamine the doctrine. See, generally, McCurdy, Torts between Persons in Domestic Relation, 43 Harvard L.Rev. 1030, 1041-56 (1930) ; Comment, 20 Baylor L. Rev. 27, 33-52 (1968). Cf., Felderhoff v. Felderhoff, Tex., 473 S.W.2d 928 (1971).