Court Opinion

ID: 9544904
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:03:14.553026+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:13:46.150600
License: Public Domain

*570TANZER, J.,
concurring.
I concur generally, but add these few words of qualification.
The majority reasons that the anticipated effect of our holding on insurance rates is immaterial to our decision and I agree. I do not wish to be understood, however, as holding that economic realities relevant to assignment of risk are never relevant in making policy judgments as discussed in Ore-Ida Foods v. Indian Head, 290 Or 909, 627 P2d 469 (1981).
Also, I am hesitant to create judicially an entitlement as unpredictable, formless and limitless as compensation of children for psychic losses due to nonfatal injury to their parents. Unlike the courts, the legislature has the power to create not only new bases for recovery but also appropriate procedures to account for all affected interests. The legislature did so with the current wrongful death statutes, for example. ORS 30.020. Thus, I do not necessarily reject the Iowa approach; rather I recognize that practical limits sometimes render judicial power an unsuitable means for the recognition of new theories of recovery.
Campbell and Carson, JJ., join in this opinion.