Court Opinion

ID: 9768671
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 13:43:13.041377+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:43.014508
License: Public Domain

HENRY, Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent.
Linda K. Pittman was what we quaintly call a “guest passenger” riding in an automobile operated by her husband.
It is my understanding of the law that a guest riding in an automobile is not required to use the same care and diligence as the operator but is required to use only that degree of care that an ordinarily prudent person would have observed under the same or similar circumstances, Talley v. Dalton, 10 Tenn.App. 597 (1928); that the law imposes a substantially higher burden upon the driver than is placed upon the passenger, Rogers v. Bouchard, 60 Tenn.App. 555, *317449 S.W.2d 431 (1970); that a guest has the right to assume that the driver will exercise proper care and caution until he has notice to the contrary, Chickasaw Wood Products Co. v. Lane, 22 Tenn.App. 596, 125 S.W.2d 164 (1938), and where no previous conduct or events occur to alert the guest to the danger, Smith v. Bullington, 499 S.W.2d 649 (Tenn.Ct.App.1973); and, of course, it is fundamental to our law that the negligence of the driver is not imputed to the passenger.
The majority opinion quotes from Carman v. Huff, 32 Tenn.App. 687, 227 S.W.2d 780 (1949) holding that a passenger could be guilty of contributory negligence as a matter of law only if it appears that she knew or should have known of the danger and there was time to make an effective protest. The next sentence reads as follows:
Until that time she could rely upon the assumption that the driver of the automobile would exercise proper care and caution, the danger not being obvious or known. 227 S.W.2d 784.
When we apply these legal principles to the facts of this case I find no escape from the conclusion that, as a matter of law, the guest was not guilty of contributory negligence.
It is obvious that the jury, after finding both drivers guilty of negligence, visited upon the passenger, Mrs. Pittman, the negligence of her husband. The majority opinion, in my view, falls into the same error.
A clear case of negligence is made out against the driver and an effort is made to show that Mrs. Pittman was also guilty of negligence. But even my esteemed colleague, Justice Harbison, with his recognized ability to marshall facts and present them with clarity, was unable to document negligence upon her part.
The opinion charges her with negligence in failing to see the Harrison automobile, and in failing to make outcry. I find this to be of no significance.
The undisputed proof shows that the driver stopped at the intersection.1 Whether he did or not, however, is of no significance to the passenger’s suit.
Let us assume that he did not stop. The record shows he was approaching an intersection, and there is absolutely nothing in the record to suggest any conduct on his part which would have caused her to believe that he would not come to a stop. Most assuredly, a wife, riding in an automobile with her husband, is not required to say to her husband, “You are approaching an intersection, you be sure to stop.” If this were required, a cross-town trip would be a nightmare; and many marriages — if not wives — would become casualties of an unreasonable construction of the duty to warn.
Let us assume that he did stop at the intersection, surely the wife is not required to say, “Now, honey, you stay stopped.” The law does not require that wives be “back-seat drivers” to the extent of becoming stop sign naggers.
There is absolutely nothing in this record to put her on notice. Had she seen the approaching automobile, she had the right to assume that her husband would not pull out into its pathway.
But let us assume that, for some undisclosed reason, she should have been on notice. The law requires time for an effective protest. I assume a driver would accelerate from a dead stop at a rate of 10 to 15 miles per hour. At 10 miles per hour a vehicle moves 14.66 feet in one second; at 15 it moves 22 feet in one second. The driver’s reaction time is approximately three fourths of one second.2 Had the wife real*318ized that her husband would not “stay stopped” and warned him the very instant he started to move, allowing no reaction time on his part, he would not have had time to even apply his brakes. Again, she simply did not have time to make an effective protest.
To validate the majority opinion, we must infer (1) that the driver was guilty of some undisclosed act of negligence in advance of either running the stop sign or not staying stopped, (2) that the passenger knew or should have known of this unknowable danger, and (4) that she had time to protest against the danger.
It is only after pyramiding these unsupported inferences that contributory negligence on the part of Mrs. Pittman can be established. I am unwilling to assume that she knew of the existence of any danger and that she knew or should have known that her husband would drive into the pathway of an oncoming car and that there was reason or opportunity for effective protest.
In my view the Court of Appeals reached the correct conclusion and I would affirm.

. She testified positively that he stopped; his testimony by inference, is to the same effect. There was not a shred of evidence to the contrary.

. The driver’s reaction or “thinking” distance is ordinarily about a car length or 15 feet at 20 miles per hour. See Tennessee Driver’s Manual. At 10 miles per hour dur*318ing the reaction time an automobile would travel approximately 11 feet; at 15 approximately I6V2 feet. Either distance would terminate at or near the point of impact.