Court Opinion

ID: 9713382
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 05:14:33.992135+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:18.435924
License: Public Domain

Black, J.
(concurring in result). For at least a quarter century prior to advent of Schillinger v. Wyman, 331 Mich 160, the presumption of due care was applied, denied, or submitted in our trial courts according to the useful and intelligent rules that were analyzed so exhaustively in Gillett v. Michigan United Traction Company, 205 Mich 410. Schillinger has temporarily sidetracked Gillett. The question is — for how long?
Gillett is firmly grounded on Cooley doctrine (Teipel v. Hilsendegen, 44 Mich 461) and it classifies cases to which the presumption should or should not apply as follows :*
(a) The case where direct, positive, uncontradicted and unimpeached testimony of an eyewitness or eyewitnesses discloses negligent acts or omissions of the decedent. The presumption as to this class is, of course, eliminated by such testimony as a matter of law.
(b) The case where direct or circumstantial evidence is presented which has but a slight or inconclusive tendency to overcome the presumption. As to this class, the presumption and the testimony *463make, according to Gillett, a jury question to be submitted under rules stated on page 416 of tbe report.
(c) The case where direct testimony of an eyewitness or eyewitnesses, as to negligent- acts or omissions of the decedent, is contradicted, impeached, or rendered improbable by . other circumstances shown in evidence. This class of case should, according to Gillett, be governed by the same rules that appear on page 416 of the report.
(d) The case where circumstantial evidence of contributory negligence, usually consisting of or supported by physical facts, is so clear as to lead to inevitable conclusion by all reasonable minds that the decedent was contributorily negligent. As to this class the presumption, as in (a) above, is eliminated from the case.
The Court, having reviewed its earlier cases as indicated, proceeded (p 421 of report) to summarize its classification and analysis as follows:
“While the above may serve as a rough classification of the decisions relative to the presumption of due care, it will be seen that the real test in each case is whether or not the evidence tending to show contributory negligence, be it direct or circumstantial, is so conclusive that reasonable and unprejudiced minds could not fail to be convinced that decedent was careless. If there is room for reasonable doubt, the question must be submitted to the jury. And while the jury, in weighing the evidence, may not consider the presumption, yet if, uninfluenced by the presumption, they reach the conclusion that the evidence tending to show decedent’s negligence is not entitled to credit and should be disregarded, the presumption may then be considered as remaining in force so far as may be necessary to establish the fact that the deceased exercised proper care in all respects not expressly established by the evidence. It was not entirely displaced, but remained in abey*464anee pending the jury’s reaching this' preliminary decision as to the credence to he given the evidence on the particular point in which negligence was claimed.” '
I turn next to another reasoned decision of the so-called Fellows Court. Petersen v. Lundin, 236 Mich 590, presents a set of facts substantially duplicating what we have here in this Hett Case, save only as noted at conclusion of the present opinion. The Court said:
“In behalf of .defendant it is said that the presumption of care allowed by law in cases where there are no eyewitnesses cannot be indulged because defendant was an eyewitness and his testimony established want of care on the part of Mr. Petersen. Defendant’s testimony was limited to a view of decedent at the very moment he was in front of the automobile and just as he was struck. Defendant did not see decedent before he was in front of the automobile^ ■ and the case is barren of witness evidence of. what care decedent exercised before he got in the path of the automobile. The fact decedent was in a place of danger did not require a finding of want of care, for this would make the happening of the accident evidence of contributory negligence on his part, and this can no more be done with reference to contributory negligence than it can upon the question of defendant’s negligence. The care required of Mr. Petersen was exercised or not as he approached the path of the automobile and at such point defendant did not see him. In the absence of testimony showing the actions of Mr. Petersen as he approached the path of the oncoming automobile, the law permitted the presumption of due care on his part to carry the issue to the jury. This being true, the court was not in error in instructing the jury that they should assume Mr. Petersen saw the automobile. Such instruction was no more than the application of the presumption that Mr. Petersen was exercising due care.
*465“The ruling asked in behalf of defendant would, in effect, make a pedestrian guilty of -negligence as a matter of law if he so conducted himself as to get into the path of an automobile. On a dark, misty' night the distance automobile lights are away is somewhat deceptive, and also the speed of an automobile. Persons do get in the path of automobiles even while exercising due care. There is no rule of law requiring a pedestrian to rivet his eyes on an approaching automobile. He should look but if, having looked, it appears safe to cross, he may proceed, and his care is not to be determined solely by the fact he was struck and was not at that second looking at the automobile.”
In light of the foregoing I am unable to sign the opinion proposed in this case by Mr. Justice Boyles. He brands defendant Edward A. Duffy, and the witness Tuskey, as “eyewitnesses to the accident.” He does so as a matter of law, necessarily on favorable-to-defendant view of the testimony. The jury below was amply justified in finding, from defendant Edward A. Duffy’s admissions and contradictory statements, that he did not see the decedent at all prior to impact and, as to the witness Tuskey, was similarly justified in finding that he saw nothing tending to indicate presence or absence of contributory negligence.
Mr. Justice Boyles relates that Tuskey saw the decedent “through his windshield just before he was' hit.” The fact is that whatever Tuskey saw of the decedent prior to impact was through his own windshield plus the rear window of defendants’ car and the windshield or right-front window of the latter. Even if we were to consider Tuskey’s testimony in light favorable to the defendants — and I suggest it should be the other way around — all he saw through the windshield and through the defendants’ car with *466respect to what the decedent did or did not do prior to impact was a fleeting view of the decedent’s head and shoulders in the split instant prior to impact. I do not look upon the testimony either of Tuskey or of the defendant driver as “eyewitness” testimony and, even if it be so viewed, it should come within the scope of division (b) above.
This Court in recent years has gone a long way toward final destruction of the presumption of due care. In 8chillinger we went so far as to manufacture sua sponte an “eyewitness” out of pure rumor made into hearsay. Upon that tragic novelty, Schillinger until it is retired has eliminated the presumption of due care from all pedestrian death cases where the Court chooses to presume, or infer from hearsay, that the surviving driver “saw decedent at all before the accident.” The driver may have seen nothing of evidentiary value tending to prove or disprove contributory negligence of him whose mouth is closed in death. The Court knows naught of that without the testimony of such driver. It simply presumes that the driver may have seen something and, on that homemade ipse dixit, the time-tried presumption of due care is ousted from the case as a matter of law. A new presumption has thus crept without honors into Michigan pedestrian law — a presumption of existence of credible eyewitness testimony to negligent acts or omissions of the decedent — a presumption that annihilates another presumption, that of due care, as a matter of law. Uncommon law like this will be found only in Michigan and I note that it did not spawn in our State until after the Court of Cooley through Fellows passed into praiseful history. We can well imagine, having again scanned the worthy opinions of their day, what these great scholars would say, were they yet here, of an attempt to make an “eyewitness” of one who has never taken the oath of a witness, and it may be said with *467conviction that the error of picking np a misunderstood remark (as in Collar v. Maycroft, 274 Mich 376) would never have grown in their presence into Schillinger’s monstrous form. -
Here, in the Schillinger Case, is the sole proof of the fact-premise on which past decisions of this Court were arrayed and divided according to favor or disfavor (p 161):
“Shortly after the accident defendant told an officer that she had not seen decedent until she was practically upon him. A witness for plaintiff testified that from what he learned he knew that defendant saw the accident. There were no other eyewitnesses.”
(It is fair to inquire, the hearsay statement not being offered or rendered admissible as an admission, how with evidentiary value a witness may testify that another “saw” an event. It would seem that such other would be the only living mortal who could testify to the fact of his own sight and what if anything it revealed.)
I turn now to the target paragraph of Mr. Justice Boyles’ opinion — the 9th. It is said there, in one sweeping sentence, that the presumption of due care is out of the case “under all the circumstances.” Nineteen cases, including Cary v. Thomas, 345 Mich 616,* are cited in support without proffered analysis or representation as to collectively applicable rule thereof.
The practice of writing an expansive conclusion of law, followed by indiscriminate strewing over the *468page of numerous references only, is known to most trial counsel as “shotgun citation.” It pursues the-whimsey that potent impression will be made if a multitude of citations is crowded into the muzzle of the brief with or without special attention to fit and weight thereof. Of course, and when detonation is over, the dissenting ballistician will, if wise, check each of the pellets to determine penetrable worth and effect thereof.
The first of the 19 (Elrich v. Schwaderer, 251 Mich 33) is that of a motorist whose violation during nighttime of the “assured clear distance” rule cost, him his life. He was unable to clear a huge concrete mixer from the path of his car and his personal representative was properly ruled out of court on cited strength of Gillett’s rule (d) above. The last {Cary) is not even a highway or traffic death case. It involved a question of proper jury instruction on the issue of contributory negligence of one who died of lethal gas in a private home, and the case admittedly presented an issue of fact on that score.
As to the remaining 17 cases I will simply say, after deduction of already considered Schillinger and its brood (Marchlewicz v. Morrisette, 332 Mich 271, and Hoag v. Hyzy, 339 Mich 163), that each has been carefully examined and that no one with possible exception of Buchel v. Williams, 273 Mich 132, and Swartz v. Dahlquist, 320 Mich 135* presents even remote counterpart of the situation we have here, that is to say, the situation where in the absence of genuine eyewitnesses the representatives of a deceased pedestrian actually do call the defendant motorist to the witness stand and do succeed in establishing, by the certain or uncertain testimony of the-*469latter, either that he did not see the decedent at all prior to impact or, if he did see him, that his view was limited to the same extent as was dealt with in Petersen v. Lundin, 236 Mich 590. On this contrasted record the testimony of Duffy and Tuskey “was limited to a view of decedent at the very moment he was in front of the automobile and just as he was struck” (quotation from Petersen, p 592).
Until we modify Schillinger to Gillett and Petersen the representatives of deceased pedestrians in cases where there are no real eyewitnesses to the decedent’s conduct will he denied right to jury verdict if they do not call the surviving driver to the stand and correspondingly will he denied that right if they do call him. The driver thus and regardless of his impeachment or the inconclusive nature of his testimony will continue to enjoy shameful advantage over the dependents of his victim — an advantage of even greater magnitude than he obtained over that victim when the unequal battle of steel against flesh was resolved against the latter. No wonder we are presently in the quaint position of compelled admission “that not all presumptions have the same effect.” (Cebulak v. Lewis, 320 Mich 710.)
I will conclude by picking up one of the aforesaid 19 cases (Molitor v. Burns, 318 Mich 261) for presentment as follows:
In the Molitor Case decedent was standing on and near edge of the highway pavement within the angle made by the opened left door of a State police car. He as a motorist had been stopped by the police for a traffic violation. His car was stopped immediately ahead of the police car. The latter was parked on the shoulder of the highway adjacent to right edge of pavement. Its left wheels were between 12 and 22 inches from the edge of the pavement. Defendant’s truck approached from the rear of the police car and struck decedent while he was standing in such posi*470tion, facing the officers who were in the car. The officers testified to hearing defendant’s track approaching (the court presumed decedent did also) and to the fact that decedent did not pay any attention to it but continued looking and talking in. their direction (into their car) until hit by the truck. The Court held that decedent’s alleged contributory negligence was a question for the jury and proceeded to say this (p 265):
“Under the circumstances presented in this case the presumption of freedom from contributory negligence does not exist. Fairchild v. Railway Co., 250 Mich 252, 260.”
Here, in Molitor, unimpeaehed eyewitnesses testified to everything the decedent did or did not do' prior to impact. Naturally and under Gillett the' presumption of due care had no place in the case.
Since Molitor is one of the aforesaid 19 cases, and since it cites and relies on Fairchild, we should of right examine the latter. Here is what we fjnd on page 260 of the report:
“There are many cases holding that the presumption of exercising due care does not apply where there are eyewitnesses to the accident. But, if we are to preserve and apply the reason underlying this presumption, we must hold that the language used in such opinions cannot be too literally construed, and that ‘eyewitnesses’ to the accident must be held to mean those who have knowledge of some fact or circumstance which throws light upon the question as to whether or not the deceased did those things which under the circumstances constituted the exercise of due care.”
This last quotation is my final commentary on the opinion of Mr. Justice Boyles. I would return to the rule of Gillett and Petersen and, on strength thereof, respectfully dissent from the reasoning set forth in Mr. Justice Boyles’ opinion. Both were written and *471unanimously adopted by respected members of this Bench whose lucid opinions were and still are pridefully pointed to by older members of the bar, and no good reason for disregard thereof has as yet been written into our reports.
■ The presumption of due care having been considered on both sides of the conference table, I turn to record facts on which it must be said, as a matter of law, that plaintiff failed to sustain the burden of disproof of contributory negligence. It is alleged in the declaration, admitted by answer, and plainly echoed in unmodified pretrial statement that the decedent, then engaged in crossing Southfield from east to west, did not see the defendants’ car at any time after it progressed through the intersection of Joy road. Joy road is at least 400 feet from the point of impact. The pedestrian engaged in crossing a busy divided-lane highway whose failure of lookout continues to such extent is obviously and as a matter of law guilty of causally-connected negligence.
The pleadings and pretrial statement establish the fact and conclusion of law respecting decedent’s contributory negligence exactly as if an unimpeaehed and disinterested eyewitness had testified to decedent’s continued passage across the separate southbound traffic lane without turning of head or other evidence of observation in the only direction from which traffic danger was expectable. The case thus fits Gillett’s division (a) above.
On ground that the decedent’s contributory negligence is established by the aforesaid pleadings and pretrial statement, I concur in the result reached by Mr. Justice Boyles.
Addenda (Added August 24, 1956): The foregoing dissent was submitted for consideration of other members of the Court on May 29th. Since then Justices Smith and Dethmers have written in the *472case and Justice Boyles has deleted from his opinion the above-mentioned “target paragraph” with its 19 cited cases and included treatment of testimony given by witnesses Tuskey and Duffy. This supplement, then, will explain reference to and treatment in foregoing dissent of that which no longer appears in the opinion reported over Mr. Justice Boyles’ signature.
I reiterate, for reasons given above, concurrence in reversal without new trial.

 Another class, that of eases disclosing no evidence, direct or circumstantial, tending to establish contributory negligence of the decedent, was not considered in Gillett probably because the facts gave no reason for discussion thereof.

 The majority opinion in tliis ink-fresh Cary Case adopts a quotation from Heckler v. Laing, 300 Mich 139 (cited above with the 19), and I note with deferential humor that the quotation includes the approving and possibly unnoticed citation of Gillett. It is clear that Gillett, like a persistent stray cat of annoyance to my present Brothers, will not go away and that they sooner or later must either recognize or dispose of it. Its above classified 4-footed rule is enduring because it is right, and it may well prove to have more lives than those of its enemies.

 In Súchel the question of decedent’s contributory negligence was held for the jury and in Smarts an unimpeached and disinterested eyewitness testified to decedent’s continued acts of negligence-right up to impact.