Court Opinion

ID: 9686616
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 15:58:59.881371+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:44:30.200951
License: Public Domain

HARRIS, Justice.
This suit resulted from a car-pickup collision on a country gravel road. Plaintiff wife, Edna, was a passenger in her husband’s car and sued for personal injuries. Her husband, Robert, was driving at the time. Defendant owned and drove the pickup. The principal question on appeal involves the extent of defendant Junko’s right of contribution against Robert. The trial court reduced Edna’s award twenty-five percent on finding Robert was twenty-five percent negligent in the accident. We think it was inappropriate to reduce the judgment but that Junko is entitled to contribution from Robert proportional to Robert’s twenty-five percent negligence.
It is disappointing to note that four years passed between the filing of the suit and its trial. The accident happened January 27, 1979. Snow was piled high along each side of the road, narrowing the open way to a width of about thirteen to fifteen feet. Cars using the road had left one set of tracks which were about equidistant between the walls of piled snow. At a point where the road was thus narrowed it rose to a crest.
According to the evidence taken in the light most consistent with the trial court’s findings, Robert Franke’s car was traveling north along this road at about 25 miles per hour. Edna was in the passenger seat. As the car approached the crest it straddled the east rut of the tracks. At the crest Robert first saw Junko’s approaching truck driving towards him in the tracks cut by the previous cars. Robert drove as far to the right as he could but could not avoid the collision. There was sufficient space for the two vehicles to pass had Junko also pulled to his right. Junko’s pickup truck was traveling 45-60 miles per hour and never veered from its head-on collision course.
The Franke vehicle was totally destroyed. Edna received personal injuries, suffers neck and upper back pains. As a result she has reduced ability to carry out her nursing duties and to pursue a number of social activities. The trial court fixed her damage at $30,000.
I. In some respects it is disputed whether the trial court made necessary findings. Plainly proximate cause could and should have been more specifically addressed. Also the findings should have detailed more of the matters which inhere in the decision. There is another difficulty in that a literal reading of the findings would seem to impute the twenty-five percent negligence of Robert to- Edna, although there is no claim or showing that Edna was in any way responsible for Robert’s driving at the time or in any way negligent.
On the other hand it is apparent the trial court holding presupposed a finding that negligence of both drivers was a proximate cause to the collision. It is also apparent the trial court did not think Edna was personally negligent. We read the findings accordingly. Junko did not file a motion to enlarge under Iowa R.Civ.P. 179(b). In the absence of such a motion he cannot complain on appeal of the absence of specific findings. Fort Dodge Country Club v. Iowa-Illinois Gas & Electric Co., 231 N.W.2d 595, 597 (Iowa 1975); Grall v. Meyer, 173 N.W.2d 61, 65 (Iowa 1969).
Junko did file a motion for new trial in which he complained of the insufficiency of the findings. Normally a motion for new trial will not suffice as a rule 179(b) motion for preservation purposes. Only where the new trial motion is in actual “substance” a motion to enlarge, as in Estate of Dull, 303 N.W.2d 402, 404-05 (Iowa 1981), will a new trial motion serve in place of a rule 179(b) motion. We have no Dull situation here. Accordingly, we do not reverse on the basis of incomplete findings.
*539II. The trial court dismissed Junko’s cross-petition for a fifty percent contribution from Robert (though, as mentioned, it did reduce Edna’s recovery against Junko by twenty-five percent). Junko assigns the dismissal as error, relying on our' traditional rule for contribution:
How do we apportion contribution? Ordinarily the total amount of the judgment is divided equally among those liable to the injured person.
Schnebly v. Baker, 217 N.W.2d 708, 731 (Iowa 1974). The question here is whether this rule should persist following our adoption of comparative negligence in Goetzman v. Wichern, 327 N.W.2d 742 (Iowa 1982).
It is argued that we should consider no change in the equal contribution rule in view of a later statutory change. The legislature has since provided that, in cases filed after July 1, 1984, contributions shall be in proportion to attributable fault. 1984 Iowa Acts ch. 1293, §§ 5, 6.
This suit was filed long prior to the effective date of the legislation. We .of course give no retrospective application to the statute. We have often pointed out that it is the province of the legislature- to declare what the law shall be but it is exclusively the province of the court to declare what the law is. Richardson v. City of Jefferson, 257 Iowa 709, 717, 134 N.W.2d 528, 533 (1965).
We think, however, it is appropriate that we consider the effect of Goetzman on our common-law fifty percent contribution rule. There is a contention that our holding in Goetzman contained a pledge that we would consider no further modifications in tort law beyond its holding that pure comparative negligence would replace contributory negligence. That there was no such pledge is demonstrated by both the majority and dissenting opinions in Goetzman. In the majority holding it was stated:
Like most other courts that have adopted the comparative negligence doctrine, we do not decide in advance collateral issues which eventually may be raised. Those issues can best be addressed and resolved in the context of concrete cases.
327 N.W.2d at 754. The Goetzman majority clearly contemplated our consideration of other and collateral issues on a case by case basis.
The dissenting opinion also did. Indeed the main thrust of the Goetzman dissent was to point out a number of “unanswered questions” facing Iowa’s trial courts. It is inconsistent to suggest those unanswered questions were in fact answered by a holding that there would be no other changes in basic tort law.
Language in our later cases, particularly Glidden v. German, 360 N.W.2d 716, 721 (Iowa 1984) might seem to suggest a refusal on our part to make any changes before the effective date of the comparative fault act, Iowa Code section §§ 668.-1, .3 (1985). But that language should be read in context. It merely held that we should not give premature effect to the legislation. Our decisions in cases, such as this one, which arise before the act’s effective date should be wholly uninfluenced by it. The statute should not control; neither should a valid contention be rejected because the legislature adopts the same view for later application.
We proceed then to consider whether the fifty percent rule should persist under Goetzman. We think the better, and growing, common-law view is the one adopted by the legislature.
[Although the relative amount of comparable fault or causal negligence as between the tortfeasors does not affect their common liability to the injured person, it does affect their right to contribution, and ... such relative amount is to be considered in determining the proportionate share of the common liability which the respective tortfeasor shall bear.
18 Am.Jur.2d, Contribution, § 55 (1965); see also Annot. 53 A.L.R.3d 184, 204 (1973).
Such a view seems particularly appropriate upon the advent of comparative negligence in a jurisdiction previously commit*540ted to contributory negligence. Whatever equitable principles support the adoption of comparative negligence apply with at least equal vigor on the question of relative contribution. In a widely cited case the Supreme Court of Wisconsin reasoned:
If the doctrine [of contribution] is to do equity, there is no reason in logic or in natural justice why the shares of common liability of joint tortfeasors should not be translated into the percentage of the causal negligence which contributed to the injury. This is merely a refinement of the equitable principle.
Bielski v. Schulze, 16 Wis.2d 1, 9, 114 N.W.2d 105, 109 (1962).
On the basis of our holding in Goetzman, we abolish our prior rule of equal contribution among joint tortfeasors and adopt the rule that contribution shall be exacted on the basis of comparable causal negligence.
III. The trial court’s rejection of Junko’s petition for contribution is defended on a second ground. Edna points out that Junko has paid nothing on his obligation, a payment she urges was necessary in order for a right of contribution to accrue. Edna is on solid ground in arguing that ordinarily the right “does not accrue until one tortfeasor has discharged more than his proportionate share of the common obligation.” Dairyland Insurance Co. v. Mumert, 212 N.W.2d 436, 440 (Iowa 1973). See also Lovrien v. Fitzgerald, 245 Iowa 1325, 1330, 66 N.W.2d 458, 461 (1958). This is the general rule. 18 C.J.S. Contribution § 4 (1939); 18 Am.Jur.2d Contribution § 3 (1965).
The general rule, however, does not preclude a defendant from cross-petitioning for contribution in the original suit. This is a well recognized exception to the general rule which ordinarily makes payment a prerequisite before recovering contribution. 18 C.J.S. Contribution § 4 at p. 8. We note this is the rule adopted by the legislature for application in future cases. 1984 Iowa Acts ch. 1293, § 5. Under the rule Junko could not enforce any right of contribution against Robert until showing that he paid more than his own seventy-five percent of the obligation. But under the exception he can by cross-petition have his right to contribution determined in Edna’s original suit.
Of course a finding that a tort defendant is entitled to contribution does not apply to or bar a plaintiff’s right to a full recovery. Rozevink v. Faris, 342 N.W.2d 845, 850 (Iowa 1983). It was error for the trial court to dismiss Junko’s cross-petition for contribution and was error to reduce Edna’s recovery by twenty-five percent.
IV. Robert filed a cross-petition against Junko for damages to his car. The trial court, without explanation, dismissed the claim. Robert’s motion under rule 179(b) was denied. We find merit in Robert’s cross-appeal from the dismissal.
Under the trial court’s finding of seventy-five percent causal negligence on the part of Junko and twenty-five percent on the part of Robert the only remaining question is damages. The only evidence on damages to the car was in Robert’s testimony which set the value of the ear at $6,500 before the accident. It could not by repair be restored to its prior condition and was sold for $2,500. Robert also testified to the loss of use of the vehicle.
We explained the measure of damages for motor vehicles in Long v. McAllister, 319 N.W.2d 256, 261 (Iowa 1982). The measure here falls under the third category:
When the motor vehicle cannot by repair be placed in as good condition as it was in before the injury, then the measure of damages is the difference between its reasonable market value before and after the injury, plus the reasonable value of the use of the vehicle for the time reasonably required to repair or replace it.

Id.

Because we cannot discover from the trial court ruling the basis for rejecting Robert’s claim, the case must be remanded *541for further findings on damages. Any damages allowed will of course be reduced by twenty-five percent, the amount of Robert’s causal negligence.
V. We have considered other assignments and find them without merit. There was sufficient evidence to support the trial court’s damage award to Edna. There was ample evidence to support the trial court’s determination that Junko was seventy-five percent at fault and Robert was twenty-five percent at fault.
YI. Edna is entitled to a $30,000 judgment against Junko. Junko is entitled to a twenty-five percent contribution, or $7,500, against Robert. The trial court is directed to make specific findings on Robert’s damage claim against Junko. Costs on appeal are taxed ninety percent to Junko and ten percent to Robert.
AFFIRMED ON APPEAL; AFFIRMED IN PART AND REVERSED IN PART ON DEFENDANT’S CROSS-APPEAL; REVERSED ON PLAINTIFF’S CROSS-APPEAL; AND REMANDED.
All Justices concur except McGIVERIN, SCHULTZ, CARTER and WOLLE, JJ., who concur in part and dissent in part.