Court Opinion

ID: 9736934
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 19:10:21.793194+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:23:55.223149
License: Public Domain

HARRIS, Justice
(dissenting in part).
A judicial opinion draws its importance, not from what it says, but from what it holds. Although the majority opinion reflects exhaustive research and careful scholarship it nevertheless strikes me as flawed because of its practical effect. I dissent from division II C because I believe the holding is out of plumb with the comparative fault act and with our own holdings.
The facts are important because they are extreme and emphasize the incongruity of the majority position. Mary E. Abell’s consortium claim stems from an automobile collision. Mary’s husband, William Abell, was driving a car which collided with one driven by Schwennen. Mary’s loss of consortium claim was brought against her husband, the other driver and, because of its duty to maintain the intersection where the accident occurred, Floyd County. A jury fixed Mary’s damages at $85,000 and assessed fault 63% to William Abell, 27% to the Schwennens, and 10% to Floyd County.
My difference with the majority is on the question of whether Mary’s consortium judgment against the other defendants should be reduced by the percentage of fault assigned to her husband. The majority thinks it should not; I think it should.
In McIntosh v. Barr, 397 N.W.2d 516, 517 (Iowa 1986), we held that a husband is not liable to his wife for loss of consortium when his injuries result in part from his own negligence. If, as I believe, this is sound law, it makes no practical sense to allow recovery against others for the husband’s same fault. Either a husband should be made to pay for consortium loss derived from his own fault, or others should not be made to pay for it. Because I think our holding in McIntosh was right I think the majority holding in this case is wrong.
The majority holding in effect allows for joint and several liability in contravention of Iowa Code section 668.4.1 This is what really happens when other defendants can be made to answer for William Abell’s 63% of the fault.
The majority says, because there is no viable claim against William Abell, he should not be considered a party for purposes of allocating fault. This general rule is indeed supported by the authorities cited, but it should not apply here. None of the cited cases involved a loss of consortium claim. See Peterson v. Pittman, 391 N.W. 2d 235, 238 (Iowa 1986); Reese v. Werts Corp., 379 N.W.2d 1, 4 (Iowa 1985).
The rule may seem reasonable enough for general application but it becomes patently unreasonable when it is injected into a loss of consortium claim. Consortium claims are unique. They involve close family relationships and compensate for voluntary services which, we have said, cannot be legally exacted. McIntosh, 397 N.W.2d at 518.
Although the same legal ratiocinations now employed by the majority would have suggested no liability, we held in McIntosh that a wife cannot recover from her husband when his negligence causes her a loss of consortium. Id. But what the right hand took away in McIntosh, the left hand now restores under the majority holding. Others are made to answer for the husband’s fault, even in a consortium claim.
In the end I am unwilling to extend liability for William’s fault to other defendants because I am persuaded it would be illogi*106cal and wrong. Having refused Mary a consortium recovery against her negligent husband I would not transfer his liability to other defendants who were less at fault than he was.
The trial court’s entry of judgment in favor of Mary and against William must, I agree, be reversed. But consortium awards against those whose negligence contributed to an injury should be reduced by the fault assigned to the injured spouse.
McGIVERIN, C.J., and SNELL, J., join this dissent.

. Section 668.4 states:
In actions brought under this chapter [comparative fault], the rule of joint and several liability shall not apply to defendants who are found to bear less than fifty percent of the total fault assigned to all parties.