Court Opinion

ID: 9657545
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 20:30:07.727417+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:05:46.836844
License: Public Domain

Black, J.
(concurring). Like Division 1 (3 Mich App 183), Justice Kelly has applied correctly our case law to plaintiffs’ theory of recovery and has found that theory wanting. I accordingly vote with Justice Kelly to affirm.
There is more to be said though, the precedential future considered in conjunction with a conceded fact. That fact is that defendant had immediate notice of plaintiff Catherine Serinto’s fall and of the condition which caused it, hence full opportunity of timely investigation and submission of proof stemming from'that investigation. The following portion of the pretrial summary will suffice to point up my allusion:
“Defendant’s version:
“On or about March 27, 1959, defendant operated a grocery store at 3647 Dix in the city of Lincoln Park. Defendant was informed by plaintiff about an accident or fall at about 11:15 a.m., on March 27, 1959. Defendant’s manager inspected the area where the plaintiff, Catherine Serinto, claimed she had fallen and noted a broken jar of mayonnaise or salad dressing on the floor in an aisleway of defendant’s store. The mayonnaise or salad dressing-appeared fresh and smooth and was located in an area where the product itself was not shelved.
*645“Defendant claims that it had no notice or knowledge of the presence of the broken jar of mayonnaise or salad dressing on the floor prior to the plaintiff’s alleged accident, that the jar had apparently been dropped by a customer shortly before plaintiff’s alleged fall as the debris was located in an area where the product was not shelved and the product appeared fresh and smooth, that defendant exercised reasonable care in the maintenance of its premises and was, therefore, not negligent, and that the plaintiff, Catherine Serinto, was negligent. Defendant claims that plaintiff was negligent in her failure to see the presence of the broken jar of mayonnaise or salad dressing, in her failure to make proper observations of the floor or area as she proceeded through the aisleway, and in carelessly and negligently stepping into the broken jar of mayonnaise or salad dressing in an area which was lighted and protected for customers.”
The application of our case law to common-law causes as at bar, involving as such causes do the rights of invitees commercial invitors have attracted for purchase and sale, has become most unfair when the scene of injury is the slickly smooth surface of a modern supermarket distinguished from the unevenly boarded floors of old-fashioned grocery stores and butcher shops. I think the burden-bearing feature of such case law should be revised, prospectively as Justice Cardozo suggested in 1931 shortly before he was nominated and confirmed to the Supreme Court (address of January 22, 1932; Vol. 55, report of New York State Bar Association, 262, 295-297):*
*646“For such cases and others where a retroactive declaration is for any reason inexpedient, I find myself driven more and more to the belief that courts should be competent to follow the practice proposed by Mr. Wigmore in his suggestive little book ‘The Problems of Law’ and since espoused by others; they should apply the outworn rule to the case that is then at hand, and couple their judgment with the declaration that they will feel free to apply' another rule to transactions consummated in the future.”
The lead I would pursue (as to causes arising hereafter) was taken openly, last year, by the supreme court of New Jersey, Wollerman v. Grand Union Stores, Inc. (1966), 47 NJ 426, 429 (221 A2d 513, 514, 515):
“Here the hazard could have been caused by (1) carelessness in the manner in which the beans were piled and displayed; or (2) carelessness of an employee in handling the beans thereafter; or (3) carelessness of a patron. As to (1) and (2), defendant is chargeable whether .or not it was aware of its employee’s neglect. Defendant’s knowledge is relevant only, as to (3), but even there, since the patron’s carelessness is to be anticipated in this self-service operation, defendant is liable, even without notice of the bean’s presence on the floor, if (4) defendant failed' to use reasonable measures commensurate with the risk involved to discover the debris a customer might leave and to remove it before it injures another patron.
“The customer is hardly in a position to know precisely which was the neglect. Overall the fair probability is that defendant did less than its duty demanded, in one respect or another. At least the probability is sufficient to permit such an inference in the absence of evidence that defendant did all that a reasonably prudent man would do in the light of the risk of injury his operation entailed. It is just, therefore, tó place ‘the onus of producing evidence upon the party who is possessed of superior know!*647edge or opportunity for explanation of the causative circumstances.’ Kahalili v. Rosecliff Realty, Inc., 26 NJ 595, 606 (141 A2d 301, 307); Bornstein v. Metropolitan Bottling Co., (1958) 26 NJ 263, 269 (139 A2d 404, 408).”
My vote to affirm is evidenced by endorsement of Justice Kelly’s opinion.

 This passage was copied by the writer into our record of Williams v. City of Detroit (1961), 364 Mich 231, 282, 283. Sooner or later both eventful realism and stark necessity will force application of the doctrine generally upon stare decisis, much as has appeared recently in criminal jurisprudence. See LinMetter v. Wallcer (1964), 381 US 618 (85 S Ct 1731, 14 L Ed 2d 601) ; Tehan v. United States, ex rel. Shott (1966), 382 US 406 (86 S Ct 478, 15 L Ed 2d 436), and Johnson v. New Jersey (1966), 384 US 719 (86 S Ct 1772, 16 p Ed 24 882).