Court Opinion

ID: 9553238
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 19:26:06.056515+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:30:26.646835
License: Public Domain

KENNARD, J.
I dissent.
The Legislature, by statute, has defined the conditions under which a court may grant a party’s motion to enforce an agreement to settle pending litigation. The Legislature has decided that a court should grant such a motion if, but only if, (a) the agreement is in writing and signed by the parties, or (b) the agreement has been recited “before the court.” (Code Civ. Proc., § 664.6 [hereafter section 664.6].) In this case, the majority has taken it upon itself to enlarge the statutory scheme to include, as a third situation in which a court may grant a motion to enforce a settlement agreement, recitation of the agreement before a person who, though not an active or even a temporary judge, has been granted adjudicatory powers in the pending action by stipulation of the parties. The majority concludes that this situation, though not literally within the terms of the statute, is, somehow, close enough. I disagree.
A basic rule of law, rooted in the doctrine of separation of powers, states that courts may not enlarge the terms of a statute. (Code Civ. Proc., § 1858 *924[“In the construction of a statute or instrument, the office of the Judge is simply to ascertain and declare what is in terms or in substance contained therein, not to insert what has been omitted, or to omit what has been inserted . . . Although the line between permitted construction and forbidden enlargement is not always easy to discern, courts must proceed with special caution when dealing with statutes that balance competing interests, because any deviation from the literal terms of the statute may disturb the balance that the Legislature has carefully struck. Section 664.6 is such a statute.
In deciding the conditions under which settlement agreements should be enforced, the Legislature undoubtedly sought to further the strong public policy in favor of settlement agreements. But this is not the only interest at stake. If it were, the Legislature would have enacted a much broader statute, permitting parties to enforce by motion virtually any settlement agreement that promised to terminate the litigation in whole or in significant part. That the Legislature did not enact such a statute shows its sensitivity to other values worthy of consideration.
Another interest at stake here is the parties’ interest in avoiding the loss of valuable rights through agreements they do not fully understand or have not carefully considered. Because litigation is enormously expensive, and court resources are strained to the limit, pressure to settle is intense. Under the weight of this pressure, a party may give an indication of assent to settlement terms without fully comprehending their meaning or appreciating their consequences. By providing that the agreement be reduced to writing and signed, or recited and assented to in the presence and under the supervision of a duly sworn judicial officer, the Legislature has sought to protect parties against hasty and improvident settlement agreements by impressing upon them the seriousness and finality of the decision to settle. (See City of Fresno v. Maroot (1987) 189 Cal.App.3d 755, 762 [234 Cal.Rptr. 353].)
There is also a substantial public interest in avoiding unnecessary litigation. Nothing is gained if the price of settling a lawsuit is a new round of litigation about the meaning or enforceability of the settlement agreement. To avoid this new round of litigation, the terms of the agreement and the parties’ assent thereto must be memorialized in a way that minimizes later factual disputes. By requiring either a writing signed by the parties or a recitation before a duly sworn judicial officer who can be counted upon to make the inquiries necessary to clear up any ambiguities, the Legislature has sought in section 664.6 to protect this interest.
Should the scope of section 664.6 be enlarged to include settlement agreements recited before an arbitrator who is not an active or temporary *925judge? This is a question for the Legislature, not this court. Enlarging the statute in this fashion allows enforcement of a few settlement agreements that could not be enforced under the literal terms of section 664.6, but in doing so it encroaches somewhat on the other interests at stake.
The interest of the parties in avoiding poorly understood and improvident agreements seems to be of little concern to the majority. The majority states that when parties have reached a settlement, any delay resulting from lack of immediate access to a courtroom would permit parties to renege and thereby impede use of alternative dispute resolution devices. (Maj. opn., ante, p. 910.) I submit that any agreement so fragile that it collapses on the way to the courthouse does not truly reflect mature and deliberate assent by the parties and for that very reason should not be enforced.
The interest of the judiciary in establishing a record that eliminates factual disputes likewise receives scant consideration by the majority. Here, the arbitrator did not participate in the settlement negotiations. When the agreement was recited before him, the arbitrator made no effort to clarify the agreement’s terms, and he accepted at face value, without further inquiry, the parties’ statements that they understood the agreement. Because the arbitrator reasonably believed that his role in the litigation was at an end, it is not surprising that he made no further effort to make a record that would minimize later factual disputes and provide' solid assurance that the parties’ assent to the agreement was knowing and voluntary.
The Court of Appeal correctly concluded that the statutory conditions under which a court is permitted to enforce a settlement agreement on motion by a party are not present here. Rather than rewrite the statute, I would affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeal.