Dissent do-over

You'll recall that in this pub'd opinion here, Justice Dato began his noteworthy dissent like this:

One needn't have been a justice of the Court of Appeal for long—and I have not—to appreciate the prudential institutional limitations on an intermediate appellate court. Our primary role is to review final decisions of the superior court for prejudicial error. We generally avoid broad legal policy pronouncements, leaving that to the Supreme Court and the Legislature. Sometimes policy considerations can play an important part in our decisions, but even then we take pains to assure that the policy questions are squarely presented by the facts of the case and are necessary to the decision we are required to render.

I believe the majority's decision to issue writ relief in this case violates each of these salutary guidelines. The majority then compound these judgmental errors by deciding the ill-considered legal issue incorrectly in a manner that will materially impair the interests of California consumers by fundamentally altering the structure of consumer protection laws in this state. For these reasons, I respectfully dissent.

Well, today that opening has been revised to now read as follows:

As an intermediate appellate court, our primary role is to review final decisions of the superior court for prejudicial error. We generally avoid broad legal policy pronouncements, leaving that to the Supreme Court and the Legislature. Sometimes policy considerations can play an important part in our decisions, but even then we take pains to assure that the policy questions are squarely presented by the facts of the case and necessary to the decision we are required to render.

I believe the majority's decision to entertain the writ petition in this case violates each of these salutary guidelines. The majority then compound this error by deciding the ill-framed legal issue in a manner that will materially impair the interests of California consumers by fundamentally altering the structure of consumer protection laws in this state. For these reasons, I respectfully dissent.