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Everett v. State Farm Indemnity Co.12/31/2002
by the insurer to the insured or to someone on the insured's behalf. That plain meaning would render the bookkeeping adjustment made by State Farm against plaintiff's $250 deductible irrelevant. Without the actual expenditure of money, State Farm's ledger entry cannot be logically equated with a "payment" as that word is generally understood.
In ascertaining the meaning of a statute, courts adhere to the ordinary meaning of the words used unless that meaning can be shown to be at variance with the intention of the legislature or otherwise leads to a manifest absurdity. Schierstead v. Brigantine, 29 N. J. 220, 230 (1959); Essex Crane v. Director, Civ. Rights, 294 N.J. Super. 101, 106 (App. Div. 1996). Thomas Jefferson once wrote that laws are made for persons "of ordinary understanding, and should therefore, be construed by the ordinary rules of common sense. Their meaning is not to be sought for in metaphysical subtleties, which may make anything mean everything or nothing at pleasure." In a prior controversy about the meaning of the phrase "last payment of benefits" - where the issue related more to the word "last" than "payment" - we followed this philosophy by recognizing that N.J.S.A. 39:6A-13.1a should be given a "plain, literal and common-sense reading." Washington v. Market Transition Facility, 295 N.J. Super. 368, 372 (App. Div. 1996).
Stretching the word "payment" to encompass a circumstance in which no money is paid by the insurer places its meaning in sharp contrast with ordinary discourse. The connotation adopted by the majority constitutes an inaccurate or, at best, highly unusual meaning which, in my view, no person "of ordinary understanding" would likely assume. Similarly, in McBoyle v. United States, 283 U.S. 25, 26, 51 S. Ct. 340, 75 L. Ed. 816 (1931), Justice Holmes, speaking for the Court, rejected a claim that the phrase "motor vehicle" in a statute included airplanes, finding "it is possible to use the word to signify a conveyance working on land, water or air, and sometimes legislation extends the use in that direction . . .[,] ut in everyday speech 'vehicles' calls up a picture of a thing moving on land." Likewise, the word "payment," as used in N.J.S.A. 39:6A-13.1a, conjures up an image of money actually changing hands and not a mere adjustment in an insurance company's ledger.
III.
Our courts, in other contexts, have given "payment" a meaning consistent with the view urged by State Farm. For example, it has long been the common law understanding that the mere presentation of a check or promissory note "is not payment if not itself paid." Spiotta v. William H. Wilson, Inc., 72 N.J. Super. 572, 580 (App. Div.), certif. denied, 37 N.J. 229 (1962); Freeholders of Middlesex v. Thomas, 20 N.J. Eq. 39 (Ch. 1869). "Payment" has been identically defined in a manner consistent with this common law definition when found in other statutes. In construing the workers' compensation laws, it has been held that "'payment' means the act of paying, that is, to discharge indebtedness for; to make disposal of money; to make compensation for." Wager v. Burlington Elevators, Inc., 116 N.J. Super. 390, 397 (Law Div. 1971), certif. denied, 65 N.J. 273 (1974). See also Jos L. Muscarelle, Inc. v. Central Iron Mfg. Co., 379 F.2d 715, 718 (3d Cir. 1967) ("payment" as used within the New Jersey mechanic's lien statute does not mean the mere obtaining of a judgment without actual satisfaction). "Where words in a statute have received a judicial construction, the Legislature will be deemed to have used them in the sense that had been thus ascribed to them." Commercial Trust Co. v. Hudson County Bd. of Taxation, 87 N.J.L. 179, 183-84 (E. & A. 1915); River Dev. Corp. v. Li
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