Hauch v. Connor

Eldridge, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. The Maryland Workmen’s Compensation Act permits an employee, suffering a compensable injury because of the negligence of a fellow employee, to bring a personal injury action against that co-employee. Leonard v. Sav-A-Stop Services, 289 Md. 204, 208 , 424 A.2d 336 (1981); Hutzell v. Boyer, 252 Md. 227, 232 , 249 A.2d 449 (1969). The Delaware Workmen’s Compensation Act, however, prohibits such co-employee actions.

Groves v. Marvel, 59 Del. 73 , 213 A.2d 853, 855 (1965). The choice of law question presented in this case is whether Maryland residents, who sustained injuries in an automobile accident in Delaware while temporarily there in furtherance of their employer’s business, and who claimed no benefits under the Delaware workmen’s compensation law, may maintain in Maryland courts a personal injury action against the co-employee who operated the employer’s automobile in which the plaintiffs were passengers. The plaintiffs, Alan G. Connor and Carolyn Mclntire, and the defendant, Laurie Ann Hauch, are residents of the State of Maryland. During the relevant period of time, they all were employees of the Hertz Corporation.

The record indicates that the plaintiffs’ employment contracts were made in Maryland and that Maryland was their regular place of employment. On February 6, 1980, the three ¹²² employees departed in their employer’s automobile from Baltimore-Washington International Airport, located in Maryland. They were bound for Dover, Delaware, where they were to pick up rental motor vehicles for Hertz and return them to the airport. Hauch was driving the automobile, with Connor and Mclntire as passengers.

While traveling in an easterly direction on a highway in Kent County, Delaware, the automobile in which they were riding collided head-on with another vehicle. Immediately following the collision the three parties were treated for their injuries in a nearby Delaware hospital. They later received more extensive treatment in Maryland. Connor and Mclntire applied for and were granted benefits under the Maryland workmen’s compensation statute.

Neither applied for benefits under the Delaware workmen’s compensation statute. Thereafter, Connor and Mclntire brought this action against their co-employee Hauch in the Circuit Court for Anne Arundel County, alleging negligence in the operation of the automobile. Following a deposition and interrogatories, the defendant Hauch filed a motion for summary judgment, with an accompanying affidavit, taking the position that the Delaware workmen’s compensation law applied to bar the action because the act giving rise to the injuries occurred in Delaware. In their opposition to the motion, the plaintiffs contended that the Maryland workmen’s compensation statute should govern under the facts of the case.

The circuit court granted the motion for summary judgment. Treating the matter as a question of tort choice of law, the circuit court applied the doctrine of lex loci delicti and held that the bar of the Delaware workmen’s compensation statute was applicable. Connor and Mclntire appealed, and the Court of Special Appeals reversed. Relying on public policy grounds, the Court of Special Appeals held that the defendant could not invoke the Delaware workmen’s compensation statute to defeat the action.

Connor v. Hauch, 50 Md. App. 217, 225 , 437 A.2d 661 (1981). ¹²³ The defendant Hauch then filed a petition for a writ of certiorari which we granted. In this Court, the defendant argues that the circuit court correctly applied the Delaware workmen’s compensation law barring actions between co-employees for injuries arising out of and in the course of employment. She contends that the tort doctrine of lex loci delicti, which requires a tort action to be governed by the substantive law of the state where the wrong occurred, is dispositive. On the other hand, the plaintiffs argue that this Court should abandon the rule of ¡ex loci delicti for determining which state’s tort law should govern and that we should adopt the significant contacts test as enunciated in the Restatement (Second) of Conflict of Laws, § 145 (1971). 1 Alternatively, the plaintiffs argue that the Maryland Workmen’s Compensation Act governs this case because the legislature intended that employees not be precluded from suing fellow employees under circumstances like those here.

I. With regard to tort conflicts principles, we reject the position of the Restatement and adhere to the rule that the substantive tort law of the state where the wrong occurs governs. The rule of lex loci delicti is well established in Maryland. When its rationale has been put into question, ¹²⁴ "this Court has consistently followed the rule,” White v. King, 244 Md. 348, 352 , 223 A.2d 763 (1966). White involved a suit in Maryland by injured automobile passengers who alleged that their injuries were caused by the negligence of the driver.

The automobile collision giving rise to the injuries occurred in Michigan. The State of Michigan has a guest passenger statute as part of its tort law, while Maryland does not, and the Court held that the Michigan statute governed. Following a discussion of criticisms and alternatives to the rule of lex loci delicti, the Court stated that it was "not constrained] ... to find that lex loci delicti should be overruled. * * * "In what we have said, we do not intend any implication that lex loci delicti is, in general, in our opinion, an unjust rule. Hardship may result in a particular case, but that, unfortunately, is true under any general legal principle.

Certainty in the law is not so common that, where it exists, it is to be lightly discarded.” White v. King, supra, 244 Md. at 355 . Since White , we have continued to adhere to the rule of lex loci delicti. Frericks v. General Motors Corp., 274 Md. 288 , 336 A.2d 118 (1975), and Frericks v. General Motors Corp., 278 Md. 304 , 363 A.2d 460 (1976), are recent reaffirmations of the rule. The Frericks cases involved a suit by a passenger who alleged that the injuries he sustained in an automobile collision in North Carolina were caused or enhanced by defects in the vehicle.

We held that under the rule of lex loci delicti, the product liability principles of North Carolina tort law governed. Frericks v. General Motors Corp., supra, 274 Md. at 296 , and Frericks v. General Motors Corp., supra, 278 Md. at 306, 316-319 . Other recent cases in which we have applied the rule of lex loci delicti include Brady v. State Farm Mut. Insur.

Co., 254 Md. 598 , ¹²⁵ 255 A.2d 427 (1969); Cook v. Pryor, 251 Md. 41 , 246 A.2d 271 (1968); Harford Mutual v. Bruchey, 248 Md. 669 , 238 A.2d 115 (1968); Earl v. Anchor Pontiac, 246 Md. 653 , 229 A.2d 412 (1967); Mroz v. Vasold, Jr., 228 Md. 81 , 178 A.2d 403 (1962); Doughty v. Prettyman, 219 Md. 83 , 148 A.2d 438 (1959). In addition to the principle of stare decisis, other reasons support our adherence to the rule of lex loci delicti for determining the applicable tort law. A virtue of the rule, for the courts and all parties concerned, is the predictability and certainty as to which state’s tort law will govern. See White v. King, supra, 244 Md. at 355 .

Furthermore, lex loci delicti recognizes the legitimate interests which the foreign state has in the incidents of the act giving rise to injury. Daily v. Somberg, 28 N.J. 372, 380 , 146 A.2d 676 , 69 A.L.R.2d 1024 (1958). The foreign state’s resources in the form of police protection, medical assistance and highway maintenance, to mention a few, are expended whenever an automobile collision occurs within its borders. Also, when wrongful conduct occurs in a foreign state, it poses a direct threat to persons and property in that state.

It follows that the citizens of the foreign state should be the ones to determine, through their tort law, whether particular conduct is tortious and the extent of the monetary sanction. Consequently, in the instant case all questions concerning substantive tort law are to be governed by the law of Delaware, as it is the state where the collision occurred.

II

Our continued adherence to the rule of lex loci delicti, however, does not end the inquiry in the present case. Here we are concerned not with differences between Maryland and Delaware tort law, but with differences in the workmen’s compensation law of the two states. In the prior cases reaffirming and applying lex loci delicti, the applicable foreign law was substantive tort law. As previously mentioned, a guest passenger statute was ¹²⁶ involved in White v. King, supra, 244 Md. 348 .

Such statutes were, also involved in Brady v. State Farm Mut. Insur. Co., supra, 254 Md. 598 ; Cook v. Pryor, supra, 251 Md. 41 ; and Mroz v. Wasold, Jr., supra, 228 Md. 81 . A husband’s action for loss of consortium, recognized as a tort in Maryland, 2 was barred in Harford Mutual v. Bruchey, supra, 248 Md. 669 , because the tort law of Virginia, where the automobile collision occurred, did not recognize the cause of action.

As earlier discussed, the Frericks cases, 274 Md. 288 , 278 Md. 304 , involved an action against an automobile manufacturer, based on alleged defects in an automobile causing so-called "second collision” injuries, and the issue was whether the products liability law of North Carolina recognized such a tort cause of action. In contrast, the present case concerns Delaware workmen’s compensation law completely barring the "courthouse door” to employees for any and all causes of action they may have against co-employees for injuries sustained in the course of employment, and Maryland workmen’s compensation law which does not impose such a threshold bar. In an earlier period of American legal history, workmen’s compensation choice of law questions were often resolved by reference to tort conflicts principles. Occasionally, contract conflicts principles were employed. § 87.22 (c) at 16-57 — 16-58.

Thus, when workmen’s compensation statutes were first enacted, many courts applied tort conflicts principles and the rule of lex loci delicti to claims for compensation benefits. 4A. Larson, Workmen’s Compensation Law §§ 87.21, 87.22 (c) at 16-54, 57, 58 (1982). This approach was quickly disapproved by state legislatures. As a result, virtually all workmen’s compensation statutes today contain their own choice of law provisions and cover out-of-state injuries.

For the applicable provision of the Maryland Workmen’s Compensation Act, see Maryland Code (1957, 1979 Repl. Vol.), Art. 101, § 21 (c) (4). With regard to workmen’s compensation law bars against third party tort actions by employees, a similar phenomenon ¹²⁷ occurred. Some courts applied the tort rule of lex loci delicti.

Mitchell v. J. A. Tobin Const. Co., 236 Mo.App. 910 , 159 S.W.2d 709 (1942); Pendar v. H. & B. American Mach. Co., 35 R.I. 321 , 87 A. 1 (1913). Other courts employed a contract approach.

Scott v. White Eagle Oil & Refining Co., 47 F.2d 615 (D. Kan. 1930); Barnhart v. American Concrete Steel Co., 227 N.Y. 531 , 125 N.E. 675 (1920). Today, however, many courts recognize that workmen’s compensation law conflict issues present distinct policy questions and should not be treated as tort or contract matters for choice of law purposes. We agree with this approach. Suits by employees against their immediate employers for injuries arising out of and in the course of employment are now barred by virtually all workmen’s compensation statutes in this country.

Nevertheless, "because of varying rules as to the availability of the exclusive-remedy defense to the statutory employer,” choice of law issues arise with respect to suits against statutory employers. 4 A. Larson, Workmen’s Compensation Law, supra, § 88.10 at 16-131 to 16-132. In these suits, it is generally held that the forum state will enforce a bar created by the exclusive remedy statute of any state in which the employer may be liable for workmen’s compensation benefits. Id. at 16-132. Although the outcome in some of these cases is the same as it would be if the rule of lex loci delicti were applied, the underlying rationale in holding the employer immune is different.

The rationale is that the employer has undertaken the burden of supplying workmen’s compensation insurance in return for immunity from suit. Jonathan Woodner Co. v. Mather, 210 F.2d 868, 873-874 (D.C. Cir. 1954); Wilson v. Faull, 27 N.J. 105, 118-119 , 141 A.2d 768 (1958). Moreover, in several cases this rationale has been used to bar an action which would not be barred under the rule of lex loci delicti. 3 ¹²⁸ The rationale for precluding employee-employer suits, however, does not apply in actions by employees against fellow employees. 4 A. Larson, Workmen’s Compensation Law, supra, § 88.21 at 16-145. Consequently, where actions by injured employees have been brought against co-employees in one state for wrongs committed in another state, courts, even in traditional lex loci delicti jurisdictions, have applied the workmen’s compensation law of the forum state.

In Simaitis v. Flood, 182 Conn. 24 , 437 A.2d 828 (1980), an injured employee brought an action in Connecticut against a co-employee based upon the alleged negligent operation of an automobile in Tennessee. Both the plaintiff and defendant were residents of Connecticut; they were hired in Connecticut, and their principal place of employment was in Connecticut. Each of the parties received workmen’s compensation benefits under the Connecticut statute for ¹²⁹ their injuries sustained in Tennessee. Since Tennessee law did not allow an employee to sue a co-employee for compensable injuries, and the Connecticut workmen’s compensation law did permit such suits, the defendant argued that the law of Tennessee applied because that is the state where the alleged wrong occurred.

In determining which state’s law should apply, the Supreme Court of Connecticut first rejected a contract choice of law rule, even though it observed that such rule would be "certain” and "easily applied.” 437 A.2d at 830. 4 Next, it rejected the tort choice of law rule because, "like the contract choice of law approach, the place-of-the-injury rule affords only an unsatisfactory resolution to the workers’ compensation choice of laws problem.” Id. at 831. 5 Finally, the court held that the "proper choice of law rules to apply . . . are the rules ¹³⁰ traditionally