Court Opinion

ID: 9659550
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 21:49:13.390376+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:03:05.862521
License: Public Domain

HARRIS, Justice
(dissenting).
For reasons we now question, we once held there was no liability for a dram shop operator. In answer to that holding, the legislature enacted the dram shop law, carefully setting the limits of its coverage. Only licensees and permittees were made responsible. Our opinions, cited by the majority, spelled out that we recognized the limits fixed in the statute. Now the majority seizes on the fact that we no longer subscribe to the rationale for our former common law theory. On the basis of our change of heart, it pieces around the boundaries of legislation a right of recovery against those whom the legislature excluded.
The legislature did not anchor the dram shop law on our notion, since changed, about proximate cause. Rather, it addressed what it perceived to be an injustice. In setting the parameters of liability it preempted the dram shop field and delineated what claims are to be allowed against those involved in the commercial sale of alcoholic beverages. I think the majority is wrong in reentering the field, no matter how flawed we may now think our reasons were for denial of common-law dram shop liability.
I. The majority ignores what I consider to be a black-letter rule of statutory construction:
[Gjeneral and comprehensive legislation, prescribing minutely a course of conduct to be pursued and the parties and things affected, and specifically describing limitations and exceptions, is indicative of a legislative intent that the statute should totally supersede and replace the common law dealing with the subject matter.
2A Sands: Sutherland Statutory Construction § 50:05, at 281 (4th ed. 1973). We applied this rule of deference to legislative judgment in dram shop matters in Snyder v. Davenport, 323 N.W.2d 225, 227 (Iowa 1982):
[It is á] rule of construction that when a statute gives a right and creates a liability unknown at common law, and at the same time points to a specific method by which that liability can be ascertained and the right assessed, this method must be strictly pursued. [Authorities.]
See also 45 Am.Jur.2d Intoxicating Liquors § 561 (1969) (citing Robinson v. Bognanno, 213 N.W.2d 530 (Iowa 1973)).
*392Whatever turn the majority now chooses to take, there is no 'question that we squarely held:
“No common-law cause of action exists in Iowa against dram shop operators. Cowman v. Hansen, 250 Iowa 358, 92 N.W.2d 682. The legislature, consistent with its police power to regulate the sale and consumption of intoxicating liquors, has seen fit to provide exclusive right of action against vendors of liquor through the statutory scheme of the Dram Shop Acts, prescribing the remedies therein as well.”
Robinson, 213 N.W.2d at 531 (quoting Dairyland Insurance Co. v. Mumert, 212 N.W.2d 436, 441 (Iowa 1973)).
In Nelson v. Restaurants of Iowa, Inc., 338 N.W.2d 881 (Iowa 1983), we pointed out why the exclusiveness of the statutory remedy has special significance in Iowa. Our legislation has become progressively and expressly more restrictive. We traced recent legislative history of the dram shop act. Id. at 883-84. See also Snyder, 323 N.W.2d at 226-27 (Iowa 1982). That history shows a clear legislative purpose. The enactment of senate file 485, 1963 Iowa Acts chapter 115, section 8 (codified as Iowa Code section 123.95 (1966)), left Iowa with conflicting statutes because the old dram shop act, Iowa Code section 129.2 (1962), had not then been repealed. That section provided that “any person” could be held civilly liable for selling or giving intoxicants to a minor or intoxicated person.
As pointed out in Nelson, the conflict was resolved in 1971 when the legislature enacted the “Liquor and Beer Control” act, 1971 Iowa Acts chapter 131. Section 152 of the act expressly repealed old sections 123.95 and 129.2. Significantly, the legislature was faced with a choice of imposing dram shop liability either on “any person” or merely on licensees and permittees. It clearly chose the latter. The dram shop provision of the new act, 1971 Iowa Acts chapter 131, section 92 (codified as Iowa Code section 123.92), retained the language of section 123.95. The phrase “any person” was deliberately rejected. It still seems clear to me that the limitation of those to be held liable under the dram shop act “was not mere inadvertence.” Nelson, 338 N.W.2d at 884.
It should not be necessary to defend the reason the legislature chose to limit liability to licensees and permittees. No matter how patiently it is explained, I cannot subscribe to the majority’s willingness to read the “any person” term back into the statute. The legislature voted it out and I think we should yield to the amended statute.
II. For the same reason, we should also decline to extend common law liability to the agents of a licensee or permittee. Licensees and permittees could otherwise be held liable under common law theories of indemnity or respondeat superior through their agents. Such additional liability effectively would vitiate the legislative scheme underlying the dram shop act.
III. In Cochran v. Lovelace, 209 N.W.2d 130, 132 (Iowa 1973), we held that Iowa Code section 123.95 (1966) provided no relief against the surety of the licensee or permittee in a dram shop case. I agree with the majority’s holding that the claim against the surety was rightly dismissed. I would, however, base the holding on our majority opinion in Cochran.
In Nelson, 338 N.W.2d at 885, we held punitive damages are not recoverable under the dram shop act. The majority adheres to this holding but allows such a claim under its common law theory. Because I do not believe there should be a common law recovery, I think the trial court was right in dismissing the plaintiffs’ claims for punitive damages.
I would affirm.
McGIVERIN and CARTER, JJ., join this dispsent.