declining to reach constitutional question where issue may be resolved via statutory construction
How later courts described this case
- declining to reach constitutional question where issue may be resolved via statutory construction
- “we can see no good reason why the ordinary meaning should not be given” to the phrase “personal property” in the Survival Act
- "personal property” as used in statute includes a cause of action on behalf of next of kin to recover for loss of support
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
Mr. Justice Underwood, dissenting:
I would have no hesitation in joining the majority opinion if the Illinois law upon this question were unsettled. But it is not. Wilcox v. Bierd, 330 Ill. 571 , decided in 1928, interpreted the survival statute and squarely held the cause of action did not survive the death of the next of kin. There has been no intervening amendment of the statute from which it can be concluded that the legislature has discerned a desire by the people for a change in this rule of law.
Justification for the change wrought by the majority opinion is found in the “19th century” thinking and “archaic conceptions” said to form the basis for the decisión in Wilcox, and it is said that these must give way to the objects of modern society and the conditions of present-day life. I have no quarrel with this, but I do disagree with the majority as to the proper forum for a determination of the changes best suited to serve the objects of modern society and conditions of present-day life.
In my judgment stability in judicial interpretations of the law is still sufficiently desirable to preclude the reversal here accomplished without benefit of legislative encouragement.
I would affirm the trial court ruling.