Court Opinion

ID: 9657162
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 20:16:18.747516+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:13:41.638533
License: Public Domain

SHIRLEY S. ABRAHAMSON, J.
(concurring). I agree with the result the majority reaches, but I disagree with the majority’s reliance on the cause of action concept. This court has never clearly indicated what it means by "cause of action” in the context of the statute limiting municipal tort liability1 and has, in its prior opinions, adopted a more helpful method of analysis that is masked by its use of the cause of action language. I write separately to set forth the analysis that I think the court has effectively employed and should continue to employ when faced with the question of calculating the amount of damages a person is entitled to recover under sec. 893.80(3), Stats.
The place to begin is with the words of sec. 893.80(3). The statute simply limits to $50,000 "[t]he *66amount recoverable by any person for any damages, injuries or death in any action founded on tort against” a municipality. The statute uses the word "action,” not the phrase "cause of action,” and not the phrase "a person who has a cause of action.” The question in this case is whether the insurance company is a person seeking to recover damages in an action founded on tort against a municipality.
The use of the cause of action concept to interpret sec. 893.80(3) can be traced to Schwartz v. Milwaukee, 54 Wis. 2d 286, 195 N.W.2d 480 (1972). In that case the court held that a husband suing for loss of consortium resulting from the wife’s personal injuries in an automobile accident could recover damages up to the statutory limit, while his wife could also recover damages up to the statutory maximum for her personal injuries suffered in an automobile accident. In reaching this conclusion the Schwartz court said that it would "apply the $25,000 limitation to each person asserting a cause of action for damages regardless of whether the cause of action is separate and independent or separate and derivative as a split-off of another cause of action.” 54 Wis. 2d at 295. This is the language from Schwartz that appears in Wood v. Milin, 134 Wis. 2d 279, 285, 397 N.W.2d 479 (1986), where it is characterized as the "key to the court’s interpretation of the statute.” Quoted with approval at slip opinion at page 62.
The Schwartz court, however, appears to have rejected the notion that the statute should be interpreted by resorting to the niceties of a cause of action analysis. Immediately preceding the cause of action language quoted above, the Schwartz court said: "No doubt these sections [imposing a limitation on recovery from a municipality] could have been written so *67the limitation would apply to a cause of action and encompass within one limitation the split-off causes for consequential damages. The present broad language of these sections does not seem to reach that result. ... These statutes refer to the amount each person is limited in his recovery, not to how many injuries, accidents or causes of action.” 54 Wis. 2d at 295.
The analysis the court actually undertook in Schwartz was to examine the nature of the husband’s consortium interest for which he sought compensation. 54 Wis. 2d at 293. As a later case put it, "loss of consortium is a direct injury to the spouse who has lost the consortium.” Peeples v. Sargent, 77 Wis. 2d 612, 643, 253 N.W.2d 459 (1977). Accordingly the husband and wife were both persons seeking to recover damages for a direct invasion of each of their legally recognized interests in an action founded on tort against a municipality. Both the husband and wife could recover up to the statutory maximum.2
The majority attempts to determine whether the insurance company’s claim in this case constitutes a cause of action which is separate from the insured’s *68claim.3 Nevertheless, the majority does not define cause of action and must in the end rely on an interest analysis.4 The interest analysis in this case is, however, buried in the discussion of the separate cause of action concept.
The majority resolves this case by building upon the Heifetz case which described the insurance company subrogee as "an assignee of part of a claim.”5 The majority moves from this description to the conclusion that "one who owns only part of a claims does not own a separate cause of action from the owner of the other *69part of the claim." Majority opinion page 64. The majority then holds, on the basis of there being no "separate cause of action,” that the insured and the insurance company are one person for purposes of sec. 893.80(3). The majority fails to explain why the insurance company and the insured are treated as two persons having separate fates in litigation in Heifetz and Lambert,6 even though they have only one cause of action, and are treated as one person in this case, with one cause of action, sharing a common fate for purposes of sec. 893.80(3).
The results in the Heifetz and Lambert cases and in this case can be explained satisfactorily through an analysis of the interests of the insured and the insurance company in the context of the issues involved in each case.
The insured’s claim is based on the municipality’s breach of a duty of due care which interfered with the insured’s interests in person and property. The insurance company’s claim, on the other hand, rests on the doctrine of subrogation. The purpose of subrogation is to prevent the insured from being unjustly enriched. Under the doctrine of subrogation the insurance company, the subrogee, steps into the shoes (in whole or in part) of the insured and receives all or part of the money that would go to the insured in the absence of subrogation.
As the majority points out, "subrogation confers no greater rights on the subrogee than the subrogor had at the time of the subrogation.” Majority opinion page 63. This court has explained that the subrogee succeeds only to the rights of the insured as follows:
*70"Subrogation rests upon the equitable principle that one, other than a volunteer, who pays for the wrong of another should be permitted to look to the wrongdoer to the extent he has paid and be subject to the defenses of the wrongdoer. ... Subrogation has also been described as putting one to whom a particular right does not legally belong in the position of the legal owner of the right. Insofar as a new right is created in favor of the subrogee, 'the original right measures the extent of the new right.'" Garrity v. Rural Mut. Ins. Co., 77 Wis. 2d 537, 541, 253 N.W.2d 512 (1977) (citations omitted).
Applying this analysis of the interests of the insured and the insurance company, this court held in Heifetz v. Johnson, 61 Wis. 2d 111, 211 N.W.2d 834 (1973), among other things, that although the statute of limitations had run on the insurance company’s subrogated claim, the insured could nevertheless continue his own suit against the tortfeasor. In Lambert v. Wrensch, 135 Wis. 2d 105, 399 N.W.2d 369 (1987), this court reaffirmed another of Heifetz’s holdings, namely that when the statute of limitations barred the insurance company subrogee from asserting the amount owed it, the insured could recover only his share of the total amount the tortfeasor owed; the insured could not recover the insurance company’s subrogated claim from the tortfeasor. In both these cases the court held that the insured and the insurance company — each entitled to part of the insured’s recovery from the tortfeasor — may pursue separately their shares of the total amount that can be recovered from the tortfeasor. The failure of the insurance company to pursue its share would not affect the recovery of the insured. The results in these cases are *71consistent with preserving the insured’s rights even though there has been subrogation and at the same time not giving the insured an unjust enrichment.
In this case the question is what amount can the insurance company and the insured together recover from the tortfeasor. The court treats the insured and the insurance company as one person having only one recovery against the tortfeasor for purposes of applying the maximum amount recoverable from the municipality tortfeasor under sec. 893.80(3). The court’s decision, in my opinion, rests on an analysis of the interests of the insured and the insurance company: the insured in this case is a person under sec. 893.80(3) seeking damages in an action founded on tort and is entitled to recover up to $50,000; the insurance company is essentially asserting the insured’s right to recover damages against the municipality. Because the insurance company as subrogee is merely a substitute for the insured, the majority concludes that the legislature could not have intended the insurance company to be an additional person entitled to recover up to the maximum limit under sec. 893.80(3). For these reasons, I concur in the result.

"Cause of action” is already a heavily burdened concept that must perform many tasks in various contexts. What constitutes a cause of action may depend on the purpose for which the concept is invoked. As the United States Supreme Court has said,
"A 'cause of action’ may mean one thing for one purpose and something different for another .... At times and in certain contexts, it is identified with the infringement of a right or the violation of a duty. At other times and in other contexts, it is a concept of the law of remedies, the identity of the cause being then dependent on that of the form of action or the writ. Another aspect reveals it as something separate from writs and remedies, the group of operative facts out of which a grievance has developed. This court has not committed itself to the view that the phrase is susceptible of any single definition that will be independent of the context or of the relation to be governed.” United States v. Memphis Cotton Oil Co., 288 U.S. 62, 67-68 (1933). See also Davis v. Passman, 442 U.S. 228, 237-40 (1979).

 Since Schwartz was decided, other cases inquiring into the nature of loss of consortium have abjured Schwartz’s use of the concept of cause of action and fine distinctions between derivative, independent, and separate causes of action. In White v. Lunder, where this court had to decide whether under the comparative negligence statute a husband’s recovery for loss of consortium and medical expenses would be discounted not only by his negligence but also by his wife’s negligence, this court noted that the cases discussing the nature of a claim for loss of consortium were "confusing.” White v. Lunder, 66 Wis. 2d 563, 574, 225 N.W.2d 442 (1975). See also Wangen v. Ford Motor Co., 97 Wis. 2d 260, 316, 294 N.W.2d 437 (1980).

The majority uses the terms "claim” and "cause of action” throughout its opinion. This court described "claim for relief’ as the substantial equivalent of "cause of action” in Tamminen v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Co., 109 Wis. 2d 536, 556, 327 N.W.2d 55 (1982). The majority does not explain its use of these terms. For a discussion of the two terms, see Wright, Miller & Cooper, Federal Practice and Procedure, Civil secs. 1216, 4407 (1981).

 In Wood v. Milin, this court decided that joint tenants suing a municipality for damage to their property held in joint tenancy were each entitled to separate damage limitations. Although the court made reference to the separate cause of action analysis, it never defined cause of action, but rather, in my opinion, rested its conclusion that each joint tenant could recover the maximum statutory limit on an analysis of the interests of the joint tenants. The court said, "Essentially each has a cause of action for damages because the real interests of each have been damaged. The fact that Elaine and Walter Wood joined their claims in prosecuting this suit in no way affects the fact that they each have an interest which has been damaged.” Wood v. Milin, 134 Wis. 2d 279, 284, 397 N.W.2d 479 (1986) (emphasis added).

 61 Wis. 2d 111, 211 N.W.2d 834 (1973). In describing the insurance company as an assignee of part of a claim, the Heifetz court was contrasting the insurance company’s interest with that of a joint owner of a claim. "Thus it is better to think of the insurer as an assignee of part of the claim than to speak of the insured and the insurer as joint owners of the claim.” 61 Wis. 2d at 120.

 Lambert v. Wrensch, 135 Wis. 2d 105, 399 N.W.2d 369 (1987).