Court Opinion

ID: 9655845
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 19:23:34.094389+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:13:22.490520
License: Public Domain

Gordon, J.
(dissenting). Unfortunately, I was not able to be more persuasive with my colleagues in Rudzinski v. Warner Theatres (1962), 16 Wis. (2d) 241, 114 N. W. (2d) 466. Although my concurring opinion in that case expressed an approach adopted by such scholars in evidence as Wigmore and McCormick, as well as by the holdings of several other courts, only one other member of this court joined me in the view that the admissions of the employee in that case should have been accepted as competent evidence against his employer.
The effect of the holding in the case at bar is to broaden that exclusion so that now a person who is a managerial employee may not bind his employer by parol admissions. The employee involved in the Rudzinski Case was a theater usher; in the instant case, however, it is reasonably clear that Don Halron holds important executive functions with the Halron Oil Company.
It is true that there is no direct proof in the record as to the title of Don Halron’s position. However, evidence as to his managerial status is clearly implicit from the following facts which do appear in the record:
1. Don Halron has been in the oil and gas business for eighteen years (Record, p. 145).
2. Don Halron is the son of the owner of the company (Record, p. 145).
*4443. When Mr. Wierichs discovered an apparent error in the delivery, he telephoned his complaint to the company and presented his problem to Don Halron (Record, p. 65: “. . . immediately I called Don Halron . . .”).
4. Don Halron checked with the errant driver and fired him (Record, p. 65).
5. Wierichs testified that the discharged driver came to him a week later “begging me to ask Don to reinstate him to his job.” (Record, pp. 65, 75).
From the foregoing I conclude that the record shows that Don Halron had hire-fire power and possessed other important indicia of managerial status. By its decision the majority has retreated from the statement in Rudzinski (at page 245) that an agent’s statement against his principal is admissible when “spoken within the scope of the authority of the agent.”
When Don Halron told the plaintiff that a driver of the defendant company had placed fuel oil in the gasoline tank, this was, as the trial court expressly held, “an admission on the part of the defendant.” The majority of this court, however, now holds that the admission by such an agent is not admissible against the employer. This is simply bad law, as outlined in Rudzinski, starting at page 249.
If I am in error as to the nature of Don Halron’s position, it should nevertheless be remembered that the trial court permitted this evidence to come in, and there was therefore no occasion for the plaintiff to qualify him further. The' dismissal of the complaint on its merits unjustly forecloses the plaintiff from offering additional proof as to Don Halron’s position. For all that the members of the supreme court know, Don Halron was, in fact, the operating manager of his father’s company.
I would hold that there is probative evidence which would warrant a new trial on the question of negligence and therefore must respectfully dissent.
I am authorized to state that Mr. Justice Beilfuss joins in this dissent.