Court Opinion

ID: 9580737
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:08:18.863652+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:36:29.205661
License: Public Domain

TANZER, J.,
specially concurring.
The pleading practice surrounding sovereign immunity is not entirely symmetrical, Wright v. Scappoose School Dist., 25 Or App 103, 548 P2d 535 (1976), but we need not unnecessarily complicate it. I take a simpler view of the pleading rules applicable to this case.
A demurrer lies to test the complaint against this truism: a complaint either states a cause of action by plaintiff against the defendant or it does not.1 This is so regardless of whether parts of the complaint may, upon motion, be stricken or made more definite and certain. Accordingly, here the motion is treated as a demurrer and the issue we are called upon to answer as a matter of law is: does the complaint state a cause of action for which defendant is liable to plaintiff?
The majority states that we cannot answer that question because we cannot tell from the complaint whether the city’s alleged acts are excepted from immunity under the Tort Claims Act, ORS 30.265(2)(d). The Supreme Court has held that the immunity issue is properly raised by demurrer, Smith v. Cooper, 256 Or 485, 475 P2d 78 (1970). Therefore, the majority to the contrary, if the complaint is capable of two interpretations, one establishing liability and one which fails to establish liability, then it *1146is elementary that the complaint is defective. That is because if the defendant admits every allegation, all that is established is that it might be liable. The mere possibility of liability, however, is not sufficient basis for a judgment. A demurrer tests for the allegation of a cause of action of plaintiff against defendant, not for the allegation of a possibility of a cause of action. ORS 16.260(6). Therefore, the conclusion of the majority that the demurrer should have been overruled because we cannot tell from the complaint whether or not it alleges a cause of action for which defendant is liable is fallacious.
The majority says that the discretionary/ministerial issue may be impossible to resolve until evidence has been heard. That may be true as a matter of proof, but not as a matter of pleading. Pleadings are sufficient or not on their faces. The fact that the evidence may ultimately fail to prove a cause of action does not relieve the pleader of the obligation of first alleging one.
The difficulty of pleading facts within the exceptions to sovereign immunity should properly be accommodated by the degree of specificity which the court requires of the pleading. It is no reason to validate a complaint which does not allege a cause of action.
Were I not alone and were I required to analyze the merits rather than merely demonstrate my disagreement with my colleagues, I would incline to the view that under the reasoning of Jones v. Chehalem Park & Rec. Dist., 28 Or App 711, 560 P2d 686 rev den (1977), the allegations are sufficient to describe ministerial acts for which the city would be liable. The ambiguity relied upon by the majority is not evident to me. That is not to say that a motion to make definite and certain would not have been warranted, but there was not one. Therefore, I would hold that the motion/demurrer should have been overruled because the complaint is sufficient. The majority, by sidestepping the issue of *1147sufficiency of the complaint, leaves the parties to proceed to trial in a state of uncertainty which I believe we should assist them to avoid.

ORS 16.260(6) provides:
"The defendant may demur to the complaint * * * when it appears upon the face thereof:
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"(6) That the complaint does not state facts sufficient to constitute a cause of action * *