Court Opinion

ID: 9865350
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-25 16:32:38.96191+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:38:31.437444
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Butler
concurring specially.
I concur in the affirmance of the judgment. In the concluding words, the opinion goes beyond the necessities of the occasion, and discusses a matter not before us. The plaintiff, in his replication, does not shift “from one kind of legal action to another.” He does not shift at all. The negligence of the defendant is alleged in the replication, not as a cause of action or a basis of recovery, but merely to defeat the defendant’s affirmative plea that the injury was caused by the act of God, which, of course, implies the absence of human agency. If the defendant was negligent, and if such negligence so contributed to the injury, or so co-operated with the storm in causing the injury, that without such negligence the injury would not have occurred, the proximate cause of the injury would not be the act of God; and in such case the affirmative defense would fail. In pleading such negligence in his replication, the plaintiff did precisely what this court and the defendant’s counsel, when the case was here before, said that he should do. Ryan Gulch Reservoir Co. v. Swartz, 77 Colo. 60, 68, 234 Pac. 1059. It may be that such allegation was a mere argumentative denial; if so, the defendant cannot now complain on that ground, as it did not make such objection below. In any event, the trial court’s refusal to strike the allegation from the replication did not prejudice the substantial rights of the defendant.
Mr. Chiee Justice Denison concurs herein.