Court Opinion

ID: 9681440
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 07:50:17.734682+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:33.973380
License: Public Domain

VANCE, Justice,
dissenting.
In my view the doctrine of sovereign immunity bars any recovery by the movant from the University of Kentucky Student Health Services Clinic.
It is not questioned that the University of Kentucky comes within the classification of a state governmental unit. Section 231 of our Constitution provides that the General Assembly may, by law, direct in what manner and in what courts suits may be brought against the Commonwealth.
As the majority opinion concedes, this section of the Constitution has uniformly been held to grant the Commonwealth immunity from liability unless the immunity is waived by the General Assembly. Immunity is waived when the General Assembly directs the manner and the forum in which suit may be brought. Kentucky Constitution, § 231.
There is absolutely no precedent for a limited waiver, a partial waiver, or a waiver of immunity by implication. The Board of Claims Act, cited by the majority as example of limited waiver, is not such because the act expressly directs the manner and the forum in which claims may be litigated against the Commonwealth.
The majority also cites Taylor v. Knox County Board of Education, 292 Ky. 767, 167 S.W.2d 700 (1942) as another example of limited waiver of immunity. In fact, however, Taylor expressly held that the act construed did not waive immunity at all, impliedly or otherwise. It specifically held that the Board of Education could not be held liable for damages. The decision in Taylor, supra, does offer movant some relief if his case can be fitted within the circumstances outlined therein. That relief is not because of any implied or limited waiver of immunity, however, but because, without any waiver of immunity, Taylor permitted suit against a school board as a nominal party only for the purpose of determining the extent of the liability, not of the school board, but of its insurance carrier, which of course had no immunity whatever.
The majority holds that an act of the General Assembly which does not direct the manner nor the forum in which actions against the Commonwealth may be brought may nevertheless be held to constitute an implied or limited waiver of governmental immunity. This undermines a doctrine of long standing and may eventually lead to abolition of the doctrine by judicial fiat. It is not within our province as a court to amend the Constitution. Frederick v. *224University of Kentucky Medical Center, Ky.App., 596 S.W.2d 30 (1979) holds that governmental immunity cannot be waived by implication. I would not overrule Frederick.
I would also hold that K.R.S. 164.939-944 violates § 59 and § 60 of our constitution.
The Constitutional Debates teach us that the delegates to the Constitutional Convention which adopted the present Kentucky Constitution, were greatly concerned with the propensity of the General Assembly to enact special and local laws. To prohibit this practice, the framers of our constitution, in § 59 and § 60, provided that the General Assembly shall not pass any local or special acts in any case where a general law may be made applicable and that the General Assembly shall not intentionally enact any local or special act by the repeal in part of a general act.
It has been recognized that peculiar circumstances relating to a particular class of persons may justify the enactment of laws applicable to members of that class only. In such.cases, however, the law must apply equally to all members of the class so designated, and the classification itself must be reasonably justified by the pattern of circumstances peculiar to the class. The classification may not be artificially drawn to include some person to whom the particular circumstances apply but exclude others to whom they likewise apply. When unique circumstances justify the creation of a special classification, the classification must be general in the sense that it includes all to whom the unique circumstances apply. Mannini v. McFarland, 294 Ky. 837, 172 S.W.2d 631 (1943); Board of Education of Jefferson County v. Board of Education, Ky., 472 S.W.2d 496 (1971).
In this state there are seven universities. All of them provide some medical services to students and maintain a staff for that purpose. I see no valid reason for a classification which permits the University of Kentucky to maintain a fund to protect itself and its agents from malpractice claims arising from negligence in administering health care while denying such protection to Murray State University, More-head State University, Western State University, Eastern State University, and Kentucky State University. On the other hand, I see no valid reason for a classification which would permit a student at the University of Kentucky to recover damages for an injury arising from medical malpractice at the university clinic, yet denying recovery to such a student at other universities who may be injured by similar malpractice. The majority opinion states only that the classification is justified upon the ground that the University of Kentucky and the University of Louisville have large scale hospital facilities. It is not clear from the record, however, that the movant was hospitalized or that his treatment was generally associated with hospital care in any way.
It seems to me that this is local or special legislation which addresses a situation at two Kentucky state universities but fails to address a similar situation at all of the other state universities.
STEPHENSON and WHITE, JJ., join in this dissent.