Court Opinion

ID: 9579295
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:53:23.444042+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:35:25.530962
License: Public Domain

Lewis, Chief Justice
(dissenting):
*250The majority reverses the judgment of the trial court by raising the constitutional issue on its own motion, without affording the respondent an opportunity to be heard in the lower court on the factual and legal issues involved in a determination of the constitutionality of Act 1177 of the 1974 Acts of the General Assembly. Settled appellate procedure dictates that respondent be given the opportunity, as it has requested, to be so heard. The constitutional issue raised and considered by the majority was decided by this Court in Rowell v. Harleyville Mutual Insurance Company, 272 S. C. 108, 250 S. E. (2d) 111. No fact or circumstances has been presented, or even intimated, which would require reconsideration of Rowell without affording to the litigants full opportunity to address the underlying factual issues and principles which may affect whether a constitutional issue exists in this case and, if so, whether a proper application of the statute violates any constitutional principle. I would accordingly reverse the judgment under appeal and remand to the lower court for a de novo determination of the issues, including any constitutional question presented.
If the case is not reversed and remanded, as proposed hereinabove, I would hold that the constitutional issue is controlled by the prior decision of this Court in Rowell, arguments advanced in the dissent in Rowell, finding comfort in the subsequent equally unpersuasive opinion in Garris v. Hanover Insurance Company, 630 F. (2d) 1001.
Gregory, J., concurs.