Court Opinion

ID: 9771606
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 16:48:46.547597+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:33.785932
License: Public Domain

*533. Neil, Chief Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent from the majority opinion which relieves the plaintiff in error, Insurance Company, from any and all liability for damages resulting from the negligence of the policyholder.
The question of whether or not the vehicle that was being towed by the defendant’s automobile is a trailer is not a factual issue. All parties in interest concede that it was not a trailer, but was an automobile. In the light of this admitted fact the case should not be decided upon a mere dictionary definition as was the case in Waddey v. Maryland Gas. Co., 171 Tenn. 112, 100 S. W. (2d) 984, 109 A. L. R. 654.
It is further conceded by the majority opinion that the policy provision, upon which the insurance company relies as relieving it from liability, is ambiguous. This being the case there can be no serious dispute as to the correctness of the Court of Appeals’ opinion, which reads as follows:
“But if there be any ambiguity in the use of the word ‘trailer’, this was of the insurer’s own making, thus calling into play two well known rules of construction: (1) that all ambiguities will be resolved in favor of the insured, and (2) that all limitations of liability are to be construed strongly against the insurer. Laster v. American Nat. Ins. Co., 170 Tenn. 689, 98 S W. 2d 1068, 108 A. L. R. 878; Hahn v. Home Life Ins. Co., 169 Tenn. 232, 84 S. W. 2d 361; Universal Life Ins. Co v. Lillard, 190 Tenn. 111, 228 S. W. 2d 79; National Bank of Commerce v. New York Life Ins. Co., 181 Tenn. 299, 181 S. W. 2d 151.”
The exclusion in the instant case could have been made certain beyond any doubt by the use of simple words.
*534It is wrong, in my Irumble opinion, to allow this insurance company to escape liability by invoking an ambiguous phrase, which was of the company’s own making. For the foregoing reasons I am compelled to disagree with the majority.