Court Opinion

ID: 9548274
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:00:55.944756+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:18:44.801580
License: Public Domain

JOHNSON, Justice,
dissenting.
“Oh, it’s a long, long time from May to December.” So goes a refrain from a song that was popular a few decades ago. It’s not much longer from May to January. Today, this Court announces the demise of a rule of law that was reaffirmed by a majority of this Court as recently as May of last year. This decision causes me to wonder how much confidence the bench and bar of this state will continue to have in the legal principles recently announced or reaffirmed by this Court.
In Bates v. Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center, 114 Idaho 252, 254, 755 P.2d 1290, 1292 (1988), issued on May 31, 1988, we concluded “that a majority of this Court continues to adhere to the orthodox view ... that ‘[t]he duty to keep the premises safe for an invitee only requires the exercise of ordinary care, and does not extend to dangerous conditions which are known to the invitee, or which are or by the exercise of ordinary care should have been observed by the invitee.’ ” There, we also specifically rejected the rule that is adopted today.
While no rule of the common law remains inviolable forever, eight months seems a little too soon to upset settled precedent.
SHEPARD, C.J., concurs.