Court Opinion

ID: 9699281
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 20:18:03.588142+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:48.492586
License: Public Domain

McEWEN, Judge,
concurring.
The ruling of the majority is not, of course, subject to question, and so I rush to agreement with the eminent author of the majority Opinion and his perceptive expression of the presently prevailing law of this Commonwealth upon the claim of a child for loss of parental consortium. I proceed, however, to this concurring effort because I am so firmly convinced that tortious behavior so impacts upon the entire family of the injured party that each member of the family is a victim.
If one were to select a particular component of the vast change to which this latter half of the 20th Century has been witness, surely the ascendancy of the individual would find prominent mention. That ascendancy, though forced upon government and the other institutions of our society, is demonstrated by an enormously enhanced awareness of the worth and stature and dignity of the individual. We reap such a harvest in the present half century due, of course, to the toil and effort, sacrifice and struggle 1 of those who, during the first half of this century, wrested from government and the *194affluent and the corporations, if not a respect for the dignity of each individual, a begrudging acceptance of the equality of each individual.
Intrinsic to the notion of the dignity of the individual is the right of the individual to be free from unwanted interference, intrusion — and harm. It is wrongful to harm, criminally so when intentional, and tortiously so when unintentional. And, of course, sanction must follow the infliction of harm — the imposition of penalty for criminal harm pursuant to the mandate of the natural law, and, as well, the imposition of damages for unintentional harm pursuant to the command of our Constitution that:
... every man for an injury done him in his lands, goods, person or reputation shall have remedy by due course of law____
Article I, Section 11, Constitution of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
This Court, as the majority states, in Steiner by Steiner v. Bell Telephone Co. of Pennsylvania, 358 Pa.Super. 505, 517 A.2d 1348 (1986) aff'd, 518 Pa. 57, 540 A.2d 266 (1988), declined the opportunity to recognize a cause of action by a child for loss of parental consortium. Our venerable colleague Judge John G. Brosky found himself unable to join the rationale of the majority in that case and reflected the view that children should not be denied a cause of action for loss of parental consortium when he entreated:
The compensation of those who have wrongfully suffered losses is the very heart of our system of civil justice. Absent an affirmative reason why a person should not be so compensated, a cause of action should be allowed to proceed.
Steiner by Steiner v. Bell Telephone Co. of Pennsylvania, supra, 358 Pa.Super. at 522, 517 A.2d at 1358. As evidenced by this concurring expression, I echo that plea.
A major measure of the vast social change earlier mentioned has been accomplished by jurisprudential initiative, and, it might even be suggested, the Pennsylvania Supreme *195Court has set the pace. It is undisputed that one accused of a crime in Pennsylvania enjoys broader rights of personal liberty than have been mandated by the United States Constitution. As for the civil courtroom, that court has made the individual the sure and certain beneficiary of jurisprudential enlightenment and has delivered due heed to the foregoing constitutional declaration as revealed, inter alia, by these decisions:
Sinkler v. Kneale, 401 Pa. 267, 164 A.2d 93 (1960). The Court established the right of an infant to pursue a cause of action for damages for prenatal injuries.
Flagiello v. Pennsylvania Hospital, 417 Pa. 486, 208 A.2d 193 (1965). The Court abolished the doctrine of charitable immunity.
Webb v. Zern, 422 Pa. 424, 220 A.2d 853 (1966). The Court adopted the principle of strict liability in tort of a manufacturer or seller of a defective product.
Beckham v. Travelers Ins. Co., 424 Pa. 107, 225 A.2d 532 (1967). The Court abandoned the artificial distinction between accidental means and accidental results in the determination of liability under policies of insurance.
Reitmeyer v. Sprecher, 431 Pa. 284, 243 A.2d 395 (1968). The Court held that failure of a landlord to carry out a promise to repair defective premises (made at the time of negotiation of the lease) imposed upon the landlord a liability in tort for damages or injuries suffered by the tenant as a result of the defect.
Kassab v. Central Soya, 432 Pa. 217, 246 A.2d 848 (1968). The Court held that a purchaser was no longer required to show privity in an assumpsit suit against remote manufacturers for breach of implied warranty.
Niederman v. Brodsky, 436 Pa. 401, 261 A.2d 84 (1970). The Court decided that an injured individual may recover from a negligent party even though the injuries arose in the absence of actual impact.
*196Papieves v. Lawrence, 437 Pa. 373, 263 A.2d 118 (1970). The Court established a right of recovery for emotional distress caused by intentional and wanton acts.
Smalich v. Westfall, 440 Pa. 409, 269 A.2d 476 (1970). The Court abrogated the principle which imputed the contributory negligence of a driver to an owner-passenger.
Falco v. Pados, 444 Pa. 372, 282 A.2d 351 (1971). The Court abrogated the doctrine of parental immunity.
Ayala v. Philadelphia Board of Public Education, 453 Pa. 584, 305 A.2d 877 (1973). The Court abolished the doctrine of governmental immunity.
Hopkins v. Blanco, 457 Pa. 90, 320 A.2d 139 (1974). The Court established the right of the wife to recover for loss of consortium.
Mayle v. Pennsylvania Department of Highways, 479 Pa. 384, 388 A.2d 709 (1978). The Court abolished the doctrine of sovereign immunity.
Speck v. Feingold, 497 Pa. 77, 439 A.2d 110 (1981). The Court held that the parents of a genetically defective child, born due to the negligence of physicians in performing vasectomy and abortion procedures, had a cause of action in tort against the physicians for the recovery of expenses attributable to the birth and raising of the child, and for the mental stress and physical inconvenience attributable to the birth of the child.
Almost two decades ago our Supreme Court declared that the infliction of an injury upon an individual causes the spouse of the injured individual to suffer every bit as much when the spouse is the wife of the injured party as when the wife is the injured party. Hopkins v. Blanco, supra. When a woman is injured and is both wife and mother, it is difficult to understand that, while her husband is entitled to a recovery for the suffering imposed upon him by the injury inflicted upon his wife, her children are precluded from recovery for the suffering imposed on them by the injuries inflicted upon their mother. Such a preclusion simply cannot stand the scrutiny *197of logic. Surely the child of an injured party is as much a victim of tortious behavior as the spouse.
The legislature reflected just such a perspective when in 1989 it spurned the inane palaver of the new sociology and redeclared a commitment to the concept that the family is the foundation of society by proclaiming in the Family Preservation Act:2
§ 2172. Legislative findings and declarations of policy
(a) Findings. — The General Assembly finds and declares that:
(1) The family is the basic institution in society in which our children’s sense of self-esteem and positive self-image are developed and nurtured. These feelings and values are essential to a healthy, productive and independent life during adulthood.
(b) Declarations. — It is therefore the policy of this Commonwealth that:
(1) The unique bond which exists between parent and child must be recognized as fundamental to the growth and development of children.
62 P.S. § 2172(a)(1) and (b)(1).
§ 2174. Family Preservation Program
(b) Purpose. — The Family Preservation Program shall be designed to preserve families through the creation, within families, of positive, long-term changes which will enable children who are victims of neglect or abuse or whose parents lack the ability to control their child’s behavior without in-home family support to remain with their families, thereby reducing the more expensive and potentially *198psychologically damaging incidence of out-of-home placement in foster care or group homes.
62 P.S. § 2174(b).
It is asserted that the decision to consider the child of an injured party as much a victim of tortious behavior as the spouse and to confer upon the child a right of recovery for the sadness and suffering a tortfeasor inflicts upon the family, will effect an increase in the cost of insurance. Proposed revision of the law invariably triggers dire intonement of fearful consequences. A review of the aforecited litany of decisions reveals that the proponents of revision were consistently confronted by a vested choir rendering in crescendo a familiar score of woeful consequences, including a flood of litigation, the sad abandonment of stare decisis, and the feast supplied to the schemer sector of the populace. The Supreme Court was impervious to these challenges. Once again, the cries are heard, though the wolf be nowhere near for, in this instance, application of cost/benefit principles will demonstrate that the cost factor, namely, the premium increase, is so minimal as to enable sole focus upon the worthiness of the concept of child consortium.
Nor may it be validly asserted that the Pennsylvania Supreme Court would thereby usurp the function of the legislature since the concept of loss of consortium has its origin in the common law. As our Supreme Court stated in clear and emphatic fashion:
In response to arguments that the Court should defer to legislative action, we stated in Flagiello v. Pennsylvania Hospital, [417 Pa. 486, 508, 208 A.2d 193, 202 (1965)]: “[T]he controverted rule [charitable immunity] is not the creation of the Legislature. This Court fashioned it, and what it put together, it can dismantle. ” (Emphasis added.) Again in Falco v. Pados, 444 Pa. 372, 382, 282 A.2d 351, 356 (1971) (quoting Badigian v. Badigian, 9 N.Y.2d 472, 481, 174 N.E.2d 718, 724, 215 N.Y.S.2d 35, 43 (1961)), we said: “ ‘... it is urged, that, if there is a remedy it must be given by the Legislature, if there is to be a change, it may *199not be effected by the courts. This court has heard such arguments before and has answered them by saying that, where the rule is court made, it may be court modified if reason and a right sense of justice recommend it (citations omitted).’ So too, in recent years this Court has had the fortitude and wisdom to effectuate changes in the law where ‘reason and a right sense of justice’ recommend it.”
Ayala v. Philadelphia Board of Public Education, supra 453 Pa. at 600, 305 A.2d at 885. Moreover, the decisions of the Supreme Court upon governmental and sovereign immunity, by reason of the subsequent attention of the legislature, proved more essentially to be invitations to the legislature to address those areas of the law than an unconstitutional intrusion by the judiciary upon a companion branch of government.
Thus it is that, during the final decade of this century of the ascendancy of the individual, the Supreme Court might discern it appropriate to revisit this issue and conclude that the suffering reflected by the notion of consortium is intrinsic to the individual as family member and not simply as spouse.

. It might even be said that the straggle is of so recurring a nature as to seem constant:
The whole history of the progress of human liberty shows that all concessions yet made to her august claims, have been bom of earnest struggle____ If there is no straggle there is no progress---This struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, and it may be both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.
Remarks of Frederick Douglass on August 4, 1857, reprinted in 2 Philip S. Foner, The Life and Writings of Frederick Douglass 437 (1950). It was with a brogue and within but a decade that this very message inspired the Molly Maguires to confront their oppressors in the coal counties of Pennsylvania and thereby spark the organization of labor in this country.

. Act of July 7, 1989, P.L. 218, No. 35, § 1, 62 P.S. §§ 2171 et seq.