Court Opinion

ID: 9633232
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 11:39:05.84677+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:11:26.771299
License: Public Domain

DOOLIN, Justice
(specially concurring).
If I correctly interpret the majority opinion, it has limited Plaintiff’s recovery in these' cases as in the companion case, Cherokee Laboratories, Inc. v. Rogers, 398 P.2d 520 (1965), to the Missouri limitation for wrongful death in effect at the time of the accident ($25,000.00), applying the rule in conflict of law termed “lex loci delicti.” My colleagues further point out and I concur in their holding that the Plaintiff’s additional evidence was rightfully held by the trial court to create a “mere condition”, and not the “proximate cause” of the accident.
Although the rationale of the majority opinion is not stated as such, I believe it to be the time-honored doctrine of “Stare De-cisis.” I am further convinced that to allow a different standard of recovery in these cases or the possibility of an unlimited recovery under Oklahoma’s wrongful death statute would be unjust if not invidiously discriminatory in view of the facts and circumstances of these and the companion cases.
It is my opinion that the doctrine of “lex loci delicti” in interstate tort cases is outmoded and has served its day. The Appellant has pointed out in his brief that since our decision in Rogers, supra, a number of states1 have abandoned the purely mechanical or wooden application of “lex loci de-*1380licti”. We quote from the Appellant’s brief:
"What was a trickle in January, 1967, when Rogers was decided is today an avalanche of repudiation of lex loci delicti. Why have state supreme courts and commentators come down so heavily against the rule? There are many reasons; one of the chief reasons was cited in Griffith v. United Airlines, Inc., [416 Pa. 1] 203 A.2d 796 (Pa.1964):
‘The basic theme running through the attacks on the place of the injury rulé is that wooden application of a few overly simple rules, based on the outmoded “vested rights theory”, cannot solve the complex problems which arise in modern litigation and may often yield harsh, unnecessary, and unjust results.’
In Wilcox v. Wilcox, [26 Wis.2d 517] 133 N.W.2d 408 (Wis.1965), the Wisconsin Court pointed out the injustice of applying the rule to a case such as this:
‘All of the commentators in all of the cases that end up in disagreement with the unbending application of lex loci delicti, have a common thread that runs through the skein of rationale, and that thread is that the place of the occurrence of an unintentional tort is fortuitous, and it is by mere happenstance that the lex loci state is concerned at all.’
* * * * But in recent years, courts and legal commentators who have made it their business to look afresh at lex loci delicti agree that the doctrine of lex loci delicti is not merely a neutral point of reference, but is positively harmful, unjust, and ought to be expunged from the law.”
I would therefore lay to rest the doctrine of “lex loci delicti” in interstate torts actions for Oklahoma and would hold, prospectively, that Oklahoma decisions in the field of interstate tort will be governed by the principle set forth in the Restatement (Second) Conflicts of Law as amended in 1968, to-wit:
“Section 379 The General Principle.
(1) The local law of the state which has the most significant relationship with the occurrence and with the parties determines their rights and liabilities in tort.
(2) Important Contacts that the forum will consider in determining the state of most significant relationship include:
(a) The place where the injury occurred,
(b) The place where the conduct occurred,
(c) The domicile, nationality, place of incorporation and place of business of the parties, and
(d) The place where the relationship, if any, between the parties is centered.
(3) In determining the relative importance of the contacts, the forum will consider the issues, the character of the tort, and the relevant purposes of the tort rules of the interested states.”
That the method of prospective overruling suggested in this opinion may be novel or new in Oklahoma is not denied, but the authority for such a manner and method of prospective overruling is supported by no less authority than Great Northern Ry. Co. v. Sunburst Refining Co.,2 287 U.S. 358, 53 S.Ct. 145, 77 L.Ed. 360, where Mr. Justice Cardozo says:
“This is not a case where a court in overruling an earlier decision has given to the new ruling a retroactive bearing, and thereby has made invalid what was valid in the doing. Even that may often be done, though litigants not infrequently have argued to the contrary. This is a case where a court has refused to make its ruling retroactive, and the novel stand is taken that the constitution of the United States is infringed by the refusal.
We think the federal constitution has no voice upon the subject. A state in defin*1381ing the limits of adheience to precedent may make a choice for itself between the principle of forward operation and that of relation backward. It may say that decisions of its highest court, though later overruled, are law none the less for intermediate transactions. Indeed there are cases intimating, too broadly . that it must give them that effect; but never has doubt been expressed that it may so treat them if it pleased, whenever injustice or hardship will thereby be averted.”
We have searched the Oklahoma Constitution and have found no provision therein which would prohibit the prospective manner of overruling that we choose to follow.3 I therefore would affirm the trial court in the instant case, but would overrule prospectively the application of “lex loci delicti” in all interstate tort cases in Oklahoma.
I am authorized to state that Justices HODGES, LAVENDER and SIMMS concur in the views herein expressed.

. Alaska: Armstrong v. Armstrong, 441 P.2d 699 (Alaska 1968) ; Arizona: Schwartz v. Schwartz, 103 Ariz. 562, 447 P.2d 254 (1968) ; California: Reich v. Purcell, 67 Cal.2d 551, 63 Cal.Rptr. 31, 432 P.2d 727 (1967) ; District of Columbia : Myers v. Gaither, 232 A.2d 577 (D.C.App.1967) ; Idaho: Rungee v. Allied Van Lines, Inc., 92 Idaho 718, 449 P.2d 378 (1968) ; Illinois: Ingersoll v. Klein, 106 Ill.App.2d 330, 245 N.E.2d 288 (1969) ; Wartell v. Formusa, 34 Ill.2d 57, 213 N.E.2d 544 (1966) ; Indiana: Witherspoon v. Salm, 142 Ind.App. 655, 237 N.E.2d 116 (1968) ; Watts v. Pioneer Corn Company, 342 F.2d 617, (7th Cir. 1965) ; Iowa: Fabricus v. Horgen, 257 Iowa 268, 132 N.W.2d 410 (1965) ; Kentucky: Wessling v. Paris, 417 S.W.2d 259 (Ky.1967) ; Maine: Beaulieu v. Beaulieu, 265 A.2d 610 (Maine 1970) ; Minnesota: Balts v. Balts, 273 Minn. 419, 142 N.W.2d 66 (1966) ; Mississippi: Mitchell v. Craft, 211 So.2d 509 (Miss.1968) ; Missouri: Kennedy v. Dixon, 439 S.W.2d 173 (Mo.1969) ; New Hampshire: Clark v. Clark, 107 N.H. 351, 222 A.2d 205 (1966) ; New Jersey: Mellk v. Sarahson, 49 N.J. 226, 229 A.2d 625 (1967) ; Oregon: Casey v. Manson Construction and Engineering Company, 247 Or. 274, 428 P.2d 898 (1967) ; Rhode Island: Woodward v. Stewart, 104 R.I. 290, 243 A.2d 917 (1968) ; Wisconsin: Wilcox v. Wilcox, 26 Wis.2d 617, 133 N.W.2d 408 (1965).

. Sunburst Refining Co. v. Great Northern Ry. Co., 91 Mont. 216, 7 P.2d 927 (1932).

. See: Schaefer, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Illinois, “The Control of ‘Sunburst’s’ Techniques of Prospective Overruling”, 42 NYU L.Rev. 631; Keeton, Professor of Law Harvard School, “Creative Continuity in the Law of Torts”, 75 Harvard L.Rev. 490; Schaefer, “Chief Justice Traynor and the Judi-dal Process”, 53 Calif.L.Rev. 17; Schaefer, “Precedent and Policy”, 34 Chicago L.Rev. 17; Levy, Lecturer in Law, Columbia University, “Realist Jurisprudence and Prospective Overruling,” 109 U. of Pa.L.Rev. 56; Cardozo, The Nature of the Judicial Process.