Court Opinion

ID: 9667827
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 01:55:57.187757+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:41.123000
License: Public Domain

Fitzgerald, J.
(dissenting). I dissent for the reason that the constitution1 and the statute2 are controlling. There is evidence on this record which supports the finding of the referee and the WCAB majority that plaintiff sustained a compensable injury on September 30, 1963, but that he did not thereafter sustain "a new injury within the meaning of the act * * * ”. That evidentiary support is the testimony of plaintiff himself that his lower back problems began with his 1963 injury:
”Q. Now, since your injury of September 30, 1963, I believe you said that you went back to the same job, is that correct?
"A. Yes, sir.
*698”Q. And that you continued doing the same work that you had done before?
"A. That’s right.
”Q. But your back hurt you so much that every once in a while you had to take time off, is that correct?
"A. That’s right.
"Q. And has it been the same way, hurting—
'A. It’s been hurting constantly ever since I’ve been out of there.
”Q. I see. And did it hurt you constantly since your accident of September, 1963?
'A. It hurts me constantly because I would go to the first-aid and get treatments.
”Q. Then has it always bothered you since September, 1963, to lift these shot bags?
’A. Well, it bothered me, it kept bothering me all the time, for the whole while since I got hurt. I never had no complaint till I got hurt.
"Q. So all of your complaints have come on since you got hurt in September, 1963?
’A. That’s right.
”Q. And you continued to work until you decided to take an early retirement because you felt you couldn’t go on doing that work anymore?
’A. That’s right.”
The question of whether disability is "attributable to a single event”3 is a question of fact.
In Carter v Kelsey-Hayes Co, 386 Mich 610, 615; 194 NW2d 326 (1972), this Court restated the limitations to its jurisdiction in cases such as these:
"We now reiterate the characterizations of our appellate function in such cases, as set forth in Thornton v Luria-Dumes Co-Venture, 347 Mich 160, 162 [79 NW2d 457] (1956), initially quoting from Meyers v Michigan Central R Co, 199 Mich 134, 137, 138 [165 NW 703] (1917):
*699" ' "[T]his Court does not review the findings of fact of the board, except to determine whether there is any evidence to support the award. The evidence may not he direct; it may be circumstantial. The board not only passes on the credibility of witnesses, but draws its inferences from the circumstances and the facts which it finds established. We may reverse awards for a failure of evidence to support them, but we are not the triers of the facts. With this view in mind, we approach the consideration of this case.”
" 'Our jurisdiction, invoked upon issuance and return of certiorari to the workmen’s compensation department, is markedly limited. The writ brings us questions of law only. It does not permit scale-weight of evidence and inference here, as on appeals from circuit court judgments, to determine whether administrative findings of fact offend rules governing clear weight and preponderance. Our obligation is to accept, without question, findings that are certified here if there be any evidence whatever to sustain those findings, regardless of thought or suggestion addressed to improbability thereof.’ ”
I would affirm.
Coleman, J., concurred with Fitzgerald, J.

 Const 1963, art 6, § 28.

 MCLA 418.861; MSA 17.237(861).

 MCLA 412.1; MSA 17.151. Now MCLA 418.301; MSA 17.237(301).