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McFadden v. Dryvit Systems5/26/2005
purported to "construe [previous legislative enactments] and to declare their meaning validating appeals, notices of which had been theretofore served." Macartney, 60 Or at 143. According to the court, that effort to validate pending appeals that had been filed late was "plainly an invasion of the judicial power by the legislative assembly, and is not admissible." Id.
As is evident from the foregoing, the court's holding in Macartney is not inconsistent with this court's later decision in Sulmonetti. As discussed above, the legislation at issue in Sulmonetti left intact existing rulings by the courts. It merely gave litigants a second opportunity to litigate their claims under new standards. As such, that legislation was an effort to "declare what the law shall be." Macartney, 60 Or at 142. By contrast, the legislation at issue in Macartney purported to construe existing legislation in a way that "validated" appeals then pending. As such, it was an effort to "declare what the law has been." Id.
It follows that Macartney is inapposite here. As discussed above, in enacting the 2003 amendment to ORS 30.905, the legislature did not retroactively "declare what the law has been." That is, the legislature was not declaring what the previous statute of limitations meant; that was done by the court in dismissing plaintiff's first case under the earlier statute of limitations. Neither did the amendment "operate to annul or set aside a final judgment of a court" on the merits. Rather, it gave litigants with product liability claims a new right to file an action. In so doing, the legislature performed the legislative function of "declar what the law shall be" with respect to newly filed claims. That choice was within the legislature's power to make.
Based on the foregoing, we hold that, in enacting the 2003 amendment to ORS 30.905 and thereby reviving certain product liability actions for which a court had entered a final judgment of dismissal before the effective date of the amendment, the legislature did not violate the separation of powers provision of Article III, section 1 of the Oregon Constitution. As discussed above, we also hold that the legislature did not violate Article VII (Amended), section 1, of the Oregon Constitution in enacting that amendment.
Certified question answered.
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