Court Opinion

ID: 9562032
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 18:20:38.793461+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:17:11.104000
License: Public Domain

Evans, Judge,
dissenting. I cannot agree to the majority view holding that the trial court did not err in granting defendants’ motions for summary judgments. The majority take the position that the old decisions holding that the death statute, being in derogation of the common law,' must be strictly construed, *645and, under the circumstances, a child by virtual adoption cannot she under this statute, even though the adoption' laws in this State have since been amended to set forth that an adopted child shall hereafter be considered in all respects as if it were a child of natural bodily issue. See Code Ann. § 74-414 (Ga. L. 1941, pp. 300, 305; 1949, p. 1157'; 1957, pp. 339, 340; 1961, p. 219, 1962, pp. 524, 525; 1966, pp. 212, 213; 1969, p. 927). The majority seek to avoid .a confrontation with this law by holding that a virtual adoption by a court of equity is different from that of a legal or statutory adoption. The legislature of this State declares the public policy, and having done so by amending the adoption statute to allow adopted children to be considered in all respects as if they were children of natural bodily issue, this, of course, results in an amendment, by implication, to the death statute, as well as to the statutory adoption law. A court of equity has declared the party here suing to be an adopted child. The equitable principle of considering done what ought to have been done with regard to an unperformed contract by and between the parties results in this child being entitled to all rights given him under the law. It is my firm opinion that under the law as now written the status of an adopted child is such that he is thereafter entitled to “enjoy every right and privilege of a natural child after the adoption.” As stated in 1 Encyclopedia of Georgia Law 486, Adoption of Persons, § 30: “There have been no adjudications interpreting the 1949 amendment to Georgia Code Annotated, section 74-414 which broadens the rights of an adopted child. But the phrase 'said adopted child . . . shall enjoy every right and privilege of a natural child of petitioner or petitioners’ seemingly is clear enough to escape the necessity of judicial rewriting. There should be no question that the adopted child can sue for the wrongful death of either of the adoptive parents.”
When the General Assembly in 1949 (Ga. L. 1949, p. 1157) amended Code Ann. § 74-414, and provided that thereafter adopted children should enjoy every right and privilege of a natural child after the adoption, it was not necessary that each and every statute on the statute books with reference to rights of action, etc., be amended, because the Act of 1949, in Section 3 *646thereof, provided: “All laws and parts of laws in conflict with this Act are hereby repealed,” which Act was approved on February 25, 1949. This being the latest expression of the General Assembly on this question (admitting this Act has been several times since- amended but in no material respect as to rights and privileges), then all laws in conflict with it, including the right to sue for wrongful death, were impliedly amended thereby.
I therefore dissent from the judgment of affirmance and the opinion on which it is based. I am authorized to state that Presiding Judge Jordan and Judges Deen and Quillian concur in this dissent.