Court Opinion

ID: 9641324
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 17:28:44.769307+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:10:36.632741
License: Public Domain

SANBORN, Circuit Judge
(concurring).
I concur, but my opinion as to the burden of proof is, I think, not exactly that expressed by Judge GARDNER. I agree that it is not necessary, in deciding this case, to attempt to establish a rule as to the burden of proof applicable to all cases arising under the Declaratory Judgment Act. I agree, also, that the court below was justified in requiring the plaintiff to proceed with its evidence at least up to the time that it became apparent that an actual controversy between the parties existed and that the defendants were claiming the right to recover under the policies in suit. The plaintiff in its complaint asserted the existence of a justiciable controversy between the parties. This the answer denied. If such a controversy did not exist, the case was for dismissal for want of jurisdiction. If such a controversy did exist, it was the subject matter of the suit and was properly before the court for adjudication. As soon as the existence and the nature of the controversy were established, it was then apparent that the right of the defendants to recover under the policies depended upon their establishing, by a fair preponderance of the evidence, that the insured came to his death as the result of. an accident. From that time forward, the burden of proving that the insured’s death was accidental was as much upon the defendants as it would have been had they initiated the suit themselves. See and compare Travelers Insurance Co. v. Green-ough, 88 N.H. 391, 190 A. 129, 109 A.L.R. 1096. See, also, 16 Am.Jur. page 337, § 69.
My opinion is that the burden of proving the existence of the controversy was on the plaintiff, but that the burden of proving the fact upon which the defendants relied for the establishment of their *241right of recovery was upon them. I think it would be safe to say that when an actual controversy is presented to a court for adjudication through the medium of a suit for a declaratory judgment, the burden of proving, by a fair preponderance of the evidence, the existence of the fact or facts upon which the riglits and liabilities of the parties depend is upon him who has the affirmative of the issue which forms the basis of the controversy, without regard to whether he is plaintiff or defendant in the suit. In this case, the question of the burden of proof is perhaps not controlling, hut it may be vital in some similar case, and it is of consequence, I think, that the party who actually has .the burden should be accorded the advantages upon the trial which usually go to one in his situation.
It is apparent that we are all agreed that the acttial controversy presented by a declaratory judgment suit is to be determined upon its merits according to the evidence and the applicable rides of law, and that no rights are to be declared which have not the necessary factual basis to support them. It seems to me that when the nature of a controversy which forms the subject matter of such a suit and the relations of the parties to that controversy are fully disclosed, the trial court will ordinarily have little difficulty in determining upon which of the parties the burden of proof rests.