Court Opinion

ID: 9570722
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:25:36.49583+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:15:15.078378
License: Public Domain

*270HARRIS, Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent from division I of the majority opinion and the result. My disagreement is on the question of whether § 321.324, The Code, 1966, provides a specific exemption “with reference to authorized emergency vehicles” as contemplated in § 321.230. I think it does. Section 321.324 seems to me specific. I think it accords authorized emergency vehicles the right of way in preference to those vehicles required to yield.
The question of whether a statutory violation is negligence is unaffected by whether the mandate is to do an act for the benefit of another (such as in 321.324) or is a prohibition against the doing of an act. 73 Am.Jur.2d, Statutes, § 430, page 529. I do not believe § 321.324 is any less a specific exemption because it'is couched in terms of the obligation of others to yield rather than in terms of the right of emergency vehicles to benefit from such yielding.
Section 321.324 should be read in the light of § 321.1(48) which defines streets and highways as the “ * * * entire width between property lines of every way or place of whatever nature when any part thereof is open to the use of the public, as a matter of right, for the purposes of vehicular traffic.” The section should also be read in the light of § 321.1(66) which defines right of way as “ * * * the privilege of the immediate use of the highway.” Statutes relating to emergency vehicles in chapter 321 should be construed together.
“We have also consistently held that statutes relating to the same subject matter or to closely allied subjects must be construed, considered and examined in the light of their common purposes and intent. Such statutes are said to be ‘in pari materia’.” Northwestern Bell Tel. Co. v. Hawkeye State Tel. Co., 165 N.W.2d 771, 774 (Iowa 1969) and citations.
When emergency vehicles statutes are gathered together for such construction they should be studied for conflicts between general and specific statutes. If such conflict appears the specific statute controls. Shriver v. City of Jefferson, 190 N.W.2d 838, 840 (Iowa 1971). Section 321.297 is a general statute applicable to all motor vehicles. Section 321.324 treats the more specific subject of the movement of emergency vehicles. Accordingly it should control.
The obligation to yield imposed upon the traveling public by § 321.324 does not exist in a vacuum but raises corresponding rights to the emergency vehicles. That such rights were intended by the legislature is evidenced by the last sentence of the section. The sentence is a limitation on the specific exemption outlined by the section: “This section [321.324] shall not operate to relieve the driver of an authorized emergency vehicle from the duty to drive with due regard for the safety of all persons using the highway.”
I believe it was error to instruct the jury Sergeant Gillen was negligent as a matter of law. Whether it was negligent to operate his motorcycle left of the center of street under the circumstances was a question of fact for the jury to decide. I would reverse and remand for a new trial.
REYNOLDSON, and McCORMICK, JJ., join in this dissent.