QOTD

Farmers Insurance Exchange v. Smith, 71 Cal. App. 4th 660, 668-69, 83 Cal. Rptr.2d 911 (Ct. App. 1999):

The Case That Was Relied On By the Case That Aguiluz Relied On

Aguiluz’ reliance on Miller which relied on General Exchange is rather reminiscent of the story of the husband who asked his wife why she always cut off the ends of the meatloaf she served for dinner. She answered that it was called for in a sacred family recipe handed down from her mother, who received it from her mother. When he inquired of her mother, she could provide no better explanation than that it was called for in the recipe given her by her mother. But when he inquired of the (now very aged) grandmother, he discovered that when she originally came up with the recipe, she simply didn’t have a serving tray big enough to accommodate the meatloaf, and wrote the recipe down that way.

Most of the time, of course, precedent and stare decisis work well enough that courts do not have to reinvent a rule that was handed down many years before. However, as the Miller-Brian and Zerin-Aguiluz splits demonstrate, on the narrow question we confront today (involving insurance claims against policyholders’ attorneys), there is still some foundational work to be done. We are entitled, given the split in authority, to question why the ends of the meatloaf must still be cut off.