Court Opinion

ID: 9743893
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 21:48:23.732412+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:44.858870
License: Public Domain

Tauro, C.J.
(concurring). I concur in the result reached by the court, but I am constrained to disagree with much of the reasoning by which this result has been reached.
Considering the application of established principles of law to the limited record before us, the court has no alternative but to conclude that St. 1970, c. 670, and the amendatory provisions of St. 1970, c. 744, are constitutional.
All legislative enactments are presumed to be constitutionally valid. The Legislature, when it acts, “is presumed to be supported by facts known to the legislature unless facts judicially known or proved preclude that possibility.” South Carolina State Hy. Dept. v. Barnwell Bros. Inc. 303 U. S. 177, 191. “All rational presumptions are made in favor of the validity of every legislative enactment. Enforcement is to be refused only when it is in manifest excess of legislative power.” Commonwealth v. Finnigan, 326 Mass. 378, 379. See Howes Bros. Co. v. Unemployment Compensation Commn. 296 Mass. 275, 284; Slome v. Chief of Police of Fitchburg, 304 Mass. 187, 192; Druzik v. Board of Health of Haverhill, 324 Mass. 129, 138; Coffee-Rich, Inc. v. Commissioner of Pub. Health, 348 Mass. 414, 422. “Unless the act of the Legislature cannot be supported upon any rational basis of fact that reasonably can be conceived to sustain it, the court has no power to strike it down as violative of the Constitution.” Sperry & Hutchinson Co. v. Director of the Div. on the Necessaries of Life, 307 Mass. 408, 418. See also Merit Oil Co. v. Director of the Div. on the Necessaries of Life, 319 Mass. 301, 305; Commonwealth v. Chamberlain, 343 Mass. 49, 51-52; O’Gorman & Young, Inc. v. Hartford Fire Ins. Co. 282 U. S. 251, 257-258; Borden’s Farm Prod. Co. Inc. v. *33Baldwin, 293 U. S. 194, 209-210; Pacific States Box & Basket Co. v. White, 296 U. S. 176, 185. United States v. Carolene Prod. Co. 304 U. S. 144, 154. By employing this restrictive standard of judicial review, questions “fairly open to differences of opinion” are left to the judgment of the Legislature. Old Dearborn Distrib. Co. v. Seagram-Distillers Corp. 299 U. S. 183, 196. Simon v. Needham, 311 Mass. 560, 564. Foster v. Mayor of Beverly, 315 Mass. 567, 572. Caires v. Building Commr. of Hingham, 323 Mass. 589, 594-595. Druzik v. Board of Health of Haverhill, supra, at 138-139.
The court has properly concluded that the plaintiff has failed to sustain this burden of proof, a virtually insuperable task in the circumstances. To say, however, that it follows from this negative conclusion that the Legislature has acted wisely or even expediently in enacting the no-fault insurance law is a non sequitur. In my view the court is not presently in a position to form a proper judgment as to the wisdom or desirability of the no-fault statutes. Nor should we, in any event, attempt to do so. “It is not for us to inquire into the expediency or the wisdom of the legislative judgment.” Sperry & Hutchinson Co. v. Director of the Div. on the Necessaries of Life, supra, at 418. Slome v. Chief of Police of Fitchburg, supra, at 189. The court might well have rested its decision solely on the basis of the plaintiff’s failure to sustain his burden of proof. Nevertheless, despite the absence of any prior judicial fact-finding proceeding, the court gratuitously discusses at great length the reasonableness and merits of the legislation in question. In so doing, the court indulges in much speculation as to the Legislature’s intent and as to the existence of the “facts” purportedly underlying the Legislature’s action and, in the process, understates the departures from preexisting tort law. Moreover, the court, in view of the experimental nature of the no-fault law, is unduly generous in assessing its attributes and overly optimistic as to its ultimate success. Nor is there any saving grace in the statement by the court that no-fault may not be the sole solution. Implicit in this statement is the premise that no-fault is a *34solution. This is a conclusion that cannot be reached presently on any sound basis of fact or experience.
Given the context and posture in which these important issues have been presented to us, I believe that a more appropriate approach could have been followed and a more useful purpose served had the court opinion subjected the legal principles underlying the no-fault insurance law to more severe and objective critical analysis and avoided endorsement of the social policy in dispute. This is especially true in a case such as this with its vast implications and where additional constitutional challenges undoubtedly will be made concerning other aspects of the statute.
A novel statute, denying a long-standing common law right to a substantial number — if not a majority — of persons injured by another’s negligence indeed presents a “solemn occasion.” Any law so drastically altering legal rights and liabilities deserves minute scrutiny and analysis. Although a potential personal injury claim may not rise to the level of a vested property right, as maintained by the defendant, the courts, nonetheless, must scrupulously insure that no person is deprived of any right by arbitrary legislative action.
The reduction of automobile insurance premiums and the removal from the courts of frivolous and even fictitious claims for pain and suffering allegedly associated with injuries received in automobile accidents is undeniably a most desirable objective.
I agree that the volume of such claims and the manner of their disposal undermined the former compulsory insurance law, causing its failure. The elimination of these claims is of paramount importance to the success of any alternative plan of insurance. No plan, however, should resort to “burning down the barn to get rid of the mice.” See fri. 1.
Our Commonwealth’s Constitution does recognize that principles of the common law in use at the time of its adoption are subject to legislative modification. Massachusetts Constitution, Part II, c. 6, art. 6. The Legislature may alter common law rights, liabilities and remedies at least *35where a suitable and effective alternative is provided and no fundamental rights are affected. Opinion of the Justices, 309 Mass. 571, 599.
The issue, however, is not nearly so clear-cut as the court suggests. The parties have stipulated that the plaintiff, prior to the no-fault law would have been entitled to $1,565 in damages. It would require much more than ordinary powers of persuasion to convince the plaintiff in the instant case that, in comparison to the exchange of rights and defences under the workmen’s compensation law, he is just as well off (as the defendant maintains) to receive a fraction of the $1,565.
The court relies heavily on Silver v. Silver, 280 U. S. 117, and Hanfgarn v. Mark, 274 N. Y. 22, app. dism. 302 U. S. 641. The Silver case, however, was decided on narrow equal protection grounds. 280 U. S. at 122. The Hanfgam case and other decisions upholding the legislative power to enact “Heart Balm” statutes generally rest on the State’s plenary power over the institution of marriage. See Langdon v. Sayre, 74 Cal. App. 2d 41; Fearon v. Treanor, 272 N. Y. 268; Clark, Law of Domestic Relations 15-22. Compare Daily v. Parker, 61 F. Supp. 701 (N.D. Ill.); Zaremba v. Skurdialis, 395 Ill. 437, and Heck v. Schupp, 394 Ill. 296, in which the Illinois “Heart Balm” statute was declared unconstitutional. The constitutionality of our “Heart Balm” statute, G. L. c. 207, § 47A, was not decided in Thibault v. Lalumiere, 318 Mass. 72, simply because the issue was not raised. Furthermore, the broad holding of Thibault v. Lalumiere was subsequently limited by this court on nonconstitutional grounds in De Cicco v. Barker, 339 Mass. 457.
The analogy of no-fault insurance to workmen’s compensation is also overly simplified. Without dwelling on the history of workmen’s compensation legislation and litigation in Massachusetts, it should be noted that “[t]he workmen’s compensation act (except in Part II) is not an amendment to the common law, but the establishment of heretofore unknown obligations, compensations and methods *36of procedure .... As stated in the Report of the Massachusetts Commission on Compensation for Industrial Accidents submitted in 1912, which framed the act adopted by the Legislature ... at page 46: 'The Massachusetts law may be briefly characterized as an elective compensation insurance law giving compensation for all injuries arising out of employment irrespective of negligence .... The basic principle of the act is that the cost of injuries incidental to modern industry should be treated as a part of the cost of production. The act was framed with that end in view.’” Duart v. Simmons, 231 Mass. 313, 318-319. The court’s reliance upon New York Cent. R.R. v. White, 243 U. S. 188, a case arising under the laws and Constitution of New York, without alluding to the constitutional history surrounding the enactment of the New York workmen’s compensation law, is misplaced. Ives v. South Buffalo Ry. 201 N. Y. 271. Strikingly, in this respect, discussion of the Massachusetts cases upholding the constitutionality of our Workmen’s Compensation Act is omitted. See general discussions in Opinion of the Justices, 309 Mass. 562, and Opinion of the Justices, 309 Mass. 571.
Parenthetically, our workmen’s compensation law, which was drafted for the benefit of the employee, and not to reduce insurance rates, still permits an employee to retain his common law rights as an alternative to coverage by workmen’s compensation. More significant is that workmen’s compensation creates no classifications for employees and treats equally all persons coming within its coverage.
When the Legislature clearly oversteps the limits of its police power and enacts a statute, recognizable on its face as violative of fundamental precepts of constitutional law, the courts may adequately review such actions purely on the basis of legal arguments. In matters not so patently offensive — or permissible, for that matter — the courts’ ability to scrutinize legislative acts is severely limited and circumscribed. In addition to legal arguments, the courts may take judicial notice of indisputable and either generally known or easily ascertainable facts. See the "plethora” of *37cases compiled in Leach and Liacos, Handbook of Massachusetts Evidence, at 34-39. “Where the existence of a rational basis for legislation whose constitutionality is attacked depends upon facts beyond the sphere of judicial notice, such facts may properly be made the subject of judicial inquiry.” United States v. Carotene Prod. Co. 304 U. S. 144, 153. See Commonwealth v. Leis, 355 Mass. 189; Chastleton Corp. v. Sinclair, 264 U. S. 543, 547-549; Borden’s Farm Prod. Co. Inc. v. Baldwin, 293 U. S. 194; South Carolina State Hy. Dept. v. Barnwell Bros. Inc. 303 U. S. 177; Karst, Legislative Facts in Constitutional Litigation, 1960 Sup. Ct. Rev. 75; Alfange, The Relevance of Legislative Facts in Constitutional Law, 114 U. of Pa. L. Rev. 637; Note, The Presentation of Facts Underlying the Constitutionality of Statutes, 49 Harv. L. Rev. 631. Particularly where the issue is novel and complex, it may be proper to permit judicial inquiry into relevant facts underlying the enactment of the statute in question. The scope of the hearing should be sufficiently broad in the circumstances to allow a judicial determination regarding the asserted arbitrariness, irrationality or discriminatory effects of the statute under attack. Commonwealth v. Leis, supra.
No such judicial inquiry was made in this case and, thus, the court’s opinion must be interpreted accordingly. I do not speculate whether the holding of such an evidentiary proceeding would have led to a different result, but it might have eliminated any conjecture as to what facts the Legislature may reasonably have conceived to exist and considered.
I do not intend that the courts should set themselves up as “super-Legislatures.” However, by careful use of evidentiary inquiries in appropriate circumstances, the courts might avoid becoming virtual rubber stamps in upholding the constitutionality of challenged legislation on the basis of abstract and perhaps necessarily superficial review of an inadequate record. I personally experience a deep sense of frustration in being compelled to sit in review of so important a case as this without the benefit of controlling *38factual determinations which might have resulted from a prior judicial inquiry.
One of the most important and difficult issues raised by this case, for example, is the classification system adopted whereby claimants are denied their former common law right to seek damages in a jury trial for pain and suffering associated with injuries received in a motor vehicle accident unless they incur reasonable medical expenses exceeding $500 or suffer death, any form of fracture regardless of its degree of severity, loss of sight or hearing, partial or total loss of a bodily member, or serious and permanent disfigurement. It is argued that one of the intended purposes of this legislative classification is the elimination from the courts of minor and, supposedly by definition “nuisance,” claims for pain and suffering. Yet, this case has not been presented in a manner that would make us aware of any facts coriceivably considered or ignored by the Legislature in appraising any possible relationship between the extent of reasonable medical expenses and the legitimacy of claims for pain and suffering. In fact, specific questions were put by me to counsel on both sides during oral argument but no information was available to us as to the approximate percentage of automobile tort cases in which the reasonable medical expenses do not excede $500.1 In supporting this new and experimental no-fault insurance law (in addition to ruling on its constitutionality), the court, in my view, has ventured needlessly into the realm of speculation and conjecture.
I entertain still further doubts as to the reasonableness of other aspects of the statutory classification system of the no-fault insurance law both on due process and equal protection grounds. For example, a slight linear fracture of a single bone in the little finger, regardless of the amount of resulting medical expenses, would permit a suit for pain and *39suffering under the no-fault plan with the concomitant right to a jury trial. On the contrary, absent reasonable medical expenses in excess of $500 or one of the other criteria specifically enumerated in the statute, a person suffering serious disability from torn muscles, tendons or ligaments or from sprained or dislocated joints, may not seek damages in court for the pain and suffering associated with such an injury. Under similar circumstances the right to seek recovery is also denied in cases of a speech defect or diminution or loss of the sense of taste caused by injury to the tongue, diminution or loss of the sense of touch from an injury to a nerve, an injury to the nose causing a diminution or loss of the sense of smell, a rupture of a cervical disc, contusions or lacerations of the brain which occur even without a fracture of the skull or other serious injuries to vital internal organs. Furthermore, at least to the extent of the $2,000 exclusionary provision of the no-fault law, such persons would be subject to a different measure of damages than the victims of other torts as regards economic losses resulting from their inability to work. It is no response to surmise that most persons in such circumstances would incur reasonable medical expenses exceeding $500. The court has no basis for such a conclusion.
Calling attention to his prior service as Chief Justice of the Superior Court, the author of the court’s opinion suggests that the eradication of the “cancer” of automobile tort litigation and its “devastating effect upon the administration of justice” supports the enactment of the no-fault insurance law.
While recognizing the impact of the motor vehicle upon our judicial system, I believe that the impression conveyed by the court in this regard ought to be clarified. Admittedly, a high percentage of the civil entries in the Superior Court involve motor vehicle torts. Yet, the court nowhere indicates what percentage of such cases are transferred to the District Courts and the Municipal Court of the City of Boston for disposition. In fact, the no-fault law should have little, if any, effect upon the judicial workload of the *40Superior Court since most motor vehicle cases now subject to the limitations of the no-fault law remain, in general, subject also to the provisions of the transfer statute. G. L. c. 281, § 102C. Rule 33A of the Superior Court (1954).
No mention is made by the court of the small percentage of motor vehicle tort cases entered that are ever tried in the Superior Court. A careful survey conducted by the clerk’s office in Suffolk County in 1967 indicated that only thirteen per cent of Superior Court judges’ time is spent in the trial of motor vehicle tort cases. Surveys conducted in other jurisdictions tend to verify this finding. See The Law’s Explosion, 44 J. of Am. Ins. 18 (Nov.-Dee. 1968).2 Of the remaining eighty-seven per cent of the Superior Court judges’ time, the greatest portion is spent on the trial and disposition of criminal cases. The rest, far exceeding the time spent on motor vehicle tort cases, is devoted to a broad range of judicial matters including land damage, medical malpractice, products liability, general liability, contract, contested election, unfair labor practices and equity cases, petitions seeking the issuance of extraordinary writs, commitments of narcotics addicts and sexually dangerous persons and judicial review of the decisions of State and municipal regulatory and administrative agencies. There is no denying that motor vehicle litigation has some impact on the courts, especially at the administrative level of the clerks’ offices. I respectfully suggest, however, that to single out the “cancer” of motor vehicle torts as the cause of congestion and delay in the Superior Court is to ignore the facts.
The volume of these cases and of all other forms of civil and criminal litigation do indeed strain our inadequate judicial resources, but, based upon my experience, other *41factors also combine significantly to bring about this aggravated situation — inadequate facilities, a shortage of judges and supporting personnel, an insufficient number of properly trained trial advocates, archaic rules of practice and procedure and outmoded administrative techniques.3
The court, I believe, has gone too far in lauding this experimental no-fault insurance plan. It is for this that I have offered my comments and observations in this concurring opinion. Had an evidentiary hearing been held in this case prior to its submission to us, it might have facilitated a more satisfactory resolution of the issues presented.
In the circumstances of this case, it is enough to say that the presumption of constitutional validity must prevail in the absence of some factual foundation specifically brought to our attention that would preclude it. Commonwealth v. Chamberlain, 343 Mass. 49, 51-52. Pacific States Box & Basket Co. v. White, 296 U. S. 176, 185. I do not, however, consider the court’s decision necessarily dispositive of issues *42possibly arising by virtue of the application of the no-fault law to different facts.
As an alternative I would remand this case to the Superior Court for the purpose of conducting an appropriate judicial inquiry into those controverted facts, beyond the sphere of judicial notice, upon which the existence of a rational basis for the no-fault insurance plan and the classification system contained within it might depend. See Borden’s Farm Prod. Co. Inc. v. Ten Eyck, 297 U. S. 251.

 Unfortunately, in the absence of verified statistics, there can be no determination of the actual effect of this particular standard on tort claims resulting from automobile accidents. However, even conservative estimates from official sources indicate that medical expenses may not exceed $500 in as many as eighty to ninety per cent of all automobile tort claims.

 Automobile Accident Litigation, A Report of the Federal Judicial Center to the Department of Transportation, April 1970, estimates, at page 7, that motor vehicle accident litigation in the court system occupies seventeen per cent of the system’s available resources.
The report also concludes that the impact of motor vehicle tort litigation on the courts relates “to the differences in mean delay of case terminations, i.e., the fewer resources allocated to motor vehicle accident litigation, the greater the corresponding delay.” Id. at 7-8.

 It is generally recognized that there is an urgent need for enlarging the base and improving the competency of the trial bar. There are those who conceive a trial lawyer’s practice as being one devoted almost exclusively to the handling of motor vehicle tort cases, and the trial calendar of our Superior Court as being similarly dominated by such cases. This is a gross misconception which does injustice to lawyers who have dedicated their careers to the art of advocacy. It demonstrates also a startling lack of awareness as to the breadth and scope of the business conducted in our “great trial court.” The unfortunate effect is that those who foster such misconceptions, whether through ignorance or indifference, have served to discourage young lawyers from a career in trial advocacy — to the detriment of both the judicial process and the public alike. This misconception fails to distinguish between lawyers who may have a large negligence practice and yet rarely, if ever, try then cases when settlement is refused and those lawyers who are truly trial advocates — triers of varying types of contested causes, negligence among them. The talents of these advocates are often engaged by other lawyers, much as British solicitors engage barristers. It is this latter group which deserves recognition as being a vital component of our judicial process and whose membership must be expanded if litigants, large and small, are to be represented properly in our courts. After all, our courts do not exist merely for the trial of cases involving great sums of money, or disputes involving corporate giants or substantial property rights. Courts exist also to provide a forum for the redress of grievances for the person whose $500 claim, whether it sounds in contract or in tort, may be just as important to him as a $50,000 claim is to a person of affluence. We must have a sufficiency of dedicated and competent trial lawyers, civil and criminal, and the availability of accessible forums in order to provide equal protection of the laws and “a certain remedy ... for all injuries or wrongs . . . completely, and without any denial; promptly, and without any delay; conformably to the laws.” Massachusetts Constitution, Declaration of Rights, art. 11.