Court Opinion

ID: 9529286
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:49:29.882227+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:27:43.727475
License: Public Domain

ATTACHMENT A
My opinion in Hartley v. Miller-Stephan, 107 Idaho 688, 692 P.2d 332 (1984), was as follows:
BISTLINE, Justice,
dissenting:
The majority today holds that a personality disorder, at least in the absence of physical symptoms or manifestations, does not qualify as a preexisting physical impairment for purposes of imposing liability on the Industrial Special Indemnity Fund. On that basis the majority reverses the Industrial Commission determination that claimant is 100% permanently disabled. Because I disagree with both the analysis employed by the majority and its conclusion even given that analysis, I respectfully dissent.
The majority correctly concludes that I.C. § 72-332, dealing with the payment obligations of the Industrial Special Indemnity Fund, incorporates by reference *469I.C. § 72-422, which defines permanent impairment. I.C. § 72-422 provides as follows: “72-422. Permanent Impairment.— ‘Permanent impairment’ is any anatomic or functional abnormality or loss after maximal medical rehabilitation has been achieved and which abnormality or loss, medically, is considered stable or non-progressive at the time of evaluation____” (Emphasis added) However, the majority nonetheless persists in reading into this seemingly clear statement a non-existent requirement that the permanent impairment be physical in nature. I believe that the majority, in so doing, makes egregious error.
The legislature is, of course, free to define for itself the preexisting permanent impairments which it will consider in its compensation of disabled individuals — and it has done so quite clearly in this instance. In Curtis v. Shoshone County Sheriff's Office, 102 Idaho 300, 629 P.2d 696 (1981), this Court stated the following after noting that there existed (at that time), three relevant statutory definitions regarding permanent impairment, permanent disability, and the liability for both by the I.S.I.F.:
“Since these three statutory definitions (I.C. §§ 72-332(2), -422, -423) were passed simultaneously by the legislature, we can only conclude that the legislature intended that they define three different, but related, classifications. 1971 Idaho Session Laws, Ch. 124.” Id. at 304, 629 P.2d 696.
However, I.C. § 72-332 was subsequently amended in 19811 to incorporate by specific reference the definition of “permanent impairment” contained in I.C. § 72-422. I cannot therefore but conclude that the legislature intended to supplant its original definition of what composed such a permanent impairment for purposes of the I.S.I.F. with that contained in I.C. § 72-422. That is, instead of “three different, but related; classifications,” we now have but two— and the classification which the legislature acted to delete from its scheme, i.e., that classification speaking in terms of a permanent physical impairment, is precisely the classification upon which the majority now relies.
Turning, then, as we must, to the definition of permanent impairment contained in I.C. § 72-422, there can be no doubt that the present claimant suffers from a compensable permanent impairment. As found by the Industrial Commission and conceded sub silentio by the majority, claimant’s personality disorder has acted as a functional abnormality which, in combination with other factors, has at least hindered and probably prevented his gainful employment. Because, under the clear import of I.C. § 72-422, this uncontroverted finding qualifies him as permanently impaired, I would affirm the award of the Industrial Commission.
However, even assuming that the phrase, permanent physical impairment,” should somehow be allowed to temper the very broad language of I.C. § 72-422, I must nonetheless disagree with the proposition that personality disorders *470should be excluded therefrom. We defined permanent physical impairment, in Curtis v. Shoshone County Sheriff's Office, supra, at 305, 629 P.2d 696, as follows:
“ ‘Permanent physical impairment’ is any permanent condition which reasonably could constitute a hindrance or obstacle to obtaining employment or reemployment. A hindrance or obstacle to obtaining employment or reemployment would exist if the preexisting permanent conditions would reasonably cause a potential employer to be reluctant to hire a person because of concerns such as the person’s preexisting condition made him a less capable worker, a greater risk in terms of the amount of potential permanent disability that the worker would suffer from an injury. Actual hindrance to one’s attempts at obtaining employment is not required.”
In other words, nothing whatsoever occurs in even our own prior definition of “Permanent physical impairment” to limit it to physical injury. Therefore, because the claimant in the present case meets all the criteria previously set forth by this Court and the legislature to “permanent physical impairment,” I would hold that, even under this rubric, the claimant qualifies to receive compensation for his preexisting personality disorder.
And finally, I believe this Court has today sadly failed in its role and the role of the law in this area. The major purpose of the workmen’s compensation law is to provide compensation to make good the loss or impairment of earning power which otherwise might (and in this case will), fall on the worker or his family. Brock v. City of Boise, 95 Idaho 630, 516 P.2d 189 (1973). The Workmen’s Compensation Act should be accorded a broad and liberal construction, and doubtful eases should be resolved in favor of compensation, and the humane purposes which the Act seeks to serve leave no room for narrow technical construction. Kiger v. Idaho Corp., 85 Idaho 424, 380 P.2d 208 (1963). In denying compensation for personality disorders on the grounds that they are not physical in nature, the Court has, in my view, fallen into precisely the type of narrow technical construction we have always sought to avoid. As Professor Larson points out in this regard, there can no longer be any excuse for “[t]his sort of compartmentalizing of the ‘physical’ and the ‘neurotic,’ as if the nerves and brain were less a part of the body than the bones and tissues____”2 IB Larson’s Workmen’s Compensation Law, § 42.22 (1982). I agree and would accordingly affirm the judgment and award of the Industrial Commission.

. At the time of Curtis v. Shoshone County Sheriff's Office, supra, I.C. § 72-332(2) provided the following:
"(2) As used in this law, ‘permanent physical impairment’ means any permanent condition, whether congenital or due to the injury or disease, of such seriousness as to constitute a hindrance or obstacle to obtaining employment or to obtaining reemployment if the employee should become unemployed."
I.C. § 72-332(2) was amended in 1981 to read the following:
“(2) 'Permanent physical impairment’ is as defined in section 72-422 Idaho Code, provided. However, as used in this section such impairment must be a permanent condition, whether congenital or due to injury or disease, of such seriousness as to constitute a hindrance or obstacle to obtaining employment or to obtaining reemployment if the claimant should become employed, [sic] This shall be interpreted subjectively as to the particular employee involved, however, the mere fact that a claimant is employed at the time of the subsequent injury shall not create a presumption that the preexisting permanent physical impairment was not of such seriousness as to constitute such hindrance or obstacle to obtaining employment."

. Professor Larson then goes on to state the following:
“[T]here is no really valid distinction between physical and ‘nervous’ injury, certainly modern medical opinion would support this view, and insist that it is no longer realistic to draw a line between what is ‘nervous’ and what is ‘physical.’ It is an old story, in the history of the law, to observe legal theory constantly adapting itself to accommodate new advances and knowledge in medical theory. Perhaps, in earlier years, when much less was known about mental and nervous injuries and their relation to ‘physical’ symptoms and behavior, there was an excuse, on grounds of evidentiary difficulties, for ruling out recoveries based on such injuries, both in tort and in workmen’s compensation. But the excuse no longer exists.” IB Larson’s Workmen's Compensation Law, § 42-23(a) (1982).