Court Opinion

ID: 9858229
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 16:18:51.406541+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:53:37.900700
License: Public Domain

*532LE BLANC, Justice
(dissenting).
I do not agree with the construction placed in the majority opinion on the collision provision of the insurance policy herein sued on, for the reason that I do not think that it ever was intended that the collision clause contemplated a case' of this kind.
In its ordinary and usual signification the word “collision” implies a violent contact or meeting of two bodies or objects and I cannot consent to the proposition that the surface of the road on which an automotive vehicle is traveling can be considéred as one of the objects with which the vehicle comes in contact in order tor a collision to result.
I fully agree with the proposition that a policy of insurance must be construed in the light most favorable to the insured but at the same time I cannot overlook the fact that in construing its provisions which contain words that have a very plain and ordinary meaning that such meaning should be stretched unreasonably in order to produce a favorable interpretation.
In consulting “Words and Phrases” for the definition- of the word “collision”, I found numerous citations in which that word was construed and find none to be as broad as the definition imputed to it in this case. One case in particular seems to be so strongly against such an interpretation that I am constrained, in support of this dissenting opinion, to refer especially to it. That is the case of New Jersey Ins. Co. v. Young, 290 F. 155 decided by the United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit. This Court attached great importance to it in deciding Brown v. Union Indemnity Co., 159 La. 641, 105 So. 918, 54 A.L.R. 1439, and quoted from it quite at length. I believe what was quoted will bear being requoted here [290 F. 156]:
“It is accepted that the noun ‘object,’ as used in the collision clause,. should be construed as including something of a different character from anything included in the specific words ‘automobile’ and ‘vehicle,’ and that the doctrine of ejusdem generis cannot properly be applied. But we are unable to construe the word ‘collision’ as including damage caused by the striking of the car upon the roadway after the defective axle broke and let the car down. The automobile was being driven upon the highway. It did not come in contact with any object upon the road or roadway until after the defective axle broke, when the car dropped and the end of the broken axle plowed into the roadway itself, and the car, pivoting on the broken axle, turned over and was damaged. In a usual sense, an accidental collision between an automobile and another object means striking against something on the road; for instance, hitting a pedestrian, or a horse, or a cow perchance straying in the road; or a rock or *534stump upon the roadway, or a guard rail, such as is often placed in the road at points where repairs are being made, or where the automobile hits or rubs the side of a tunnel or embankment or bridge alongside or defining the road. In other words, we think the language of the contract, when accorded the ordinary and usual meaning that should govern, does not extend to the incident under consideration, where the proximate cause was the breaking of the defective axle, and damage was not by ‘being in accidental collision’ with an object.”
Another case also referred to in the Brown decision is that of Great Eastern Casualty Co. v. Solinsky, 150 Tenn. 206, 263 S.W. 71, 35 A.L.R. 1007, and in its comment this Court stated that the court in that case especially approved the Young case among others, and stated [159 La. 641, 105 So. 921] :
“ ‘The thought expressed in the above cases is that the collision clause refers to some other object than the road upon which the automobile is being operated. Being already upon the road, and in contact with it, there can be no collision in the sense that the term contemplates two separated objects coming together.’ ”
Very logically, in my opinion, the author of the opinion in the Brown case made this further observation:
“Now it is a matter of common understanding that an automobile, to be of any practical value and utility, must travel on streets and roads. In order to do so, it is necessarily, at all times, in contact with the surface of the street or roadway. If the car upsets or tips over, the effect is merely to transfer the point of contact from its wheels to its side or to that portion of the machine that rests upon the roadway. We do not think that such circumstance can be said to be a collision in popular understanding of the word and within the meaning of the policy.”
I cannot understand how one object can collide with the same object with which it is and has been steadily in contact.
In the majority opinion the Brown case is discussed to some extent and apparently is sought to be distinguished. Considering the reasons upon which the decision was reached I cannot reconcile the holding in that case with the decision in the present case and can very well foresee the force of the impact which this decision will have on the Brown case.
For these reasons I respectfully dissent.