Thеse consolidated actions arise from an automobile collision that resulted in the death of William Fox (Fox). Plaintiff, who is the personal representative of Fox’s estate, asserts that defendants are obligated to pay benefits to the estate under the uninsured and underinsured motorist (UM) coverage in defendants’ automobile insurance policy. 1 The Court of Appeals held that defendants had no such obligation, because the collision that killed Fox was not “caused by an accident” within the meaning of defendants’ policy. 2 As a consequence, the Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court’s summary judgment for defendants. We reverse the decision of the Court of Appeals.
On appellate review of a summary judgment, we view the evidence and all reasonable inferences that may be drawn from the evidence in the light most favorable to the party that opposes the motion for summary judgment.
Jones v. General Motors Corp.,
In 1990, Vincent, a high school student, decided to wreck his pickup truck intentionally in order to collect the insurance proceeds. Fox, who was Vincent’s friend and classmate, agreed to be present during the event, but the record reflects a discrepancy concerning Fox’s potential involvement in Vincent’s scheme. Fox told a witness shortly before the collision that he would act merely as a lookout while Vincent wrecked the truck. Vincent testified, in contrast, that Fox changed his mind before the wreck and chose to remain in the truck, and believed that his seat belt would save him from injury during the crash. The parties disagree about whether Vincent had a motive to lie, and did lie, in giving that testimony. According to plaintiff, the record supports an inference *503 that Vincent refused to stop the truck so that Fox could get out before the crash.
We do not resolve whether the foregoing factual disputes would preclude summary judgment, because it is unnecessary to do so. The evidence is uncontradicted with respect to one fact that unquestionably is material and dis-positive: Vincent intended to crash the truck, but Fox did not intend to cause any injury to himself in the crash.
On the night of August 27,. 1990, Vincent drove his truck off Seven Devils Road near Bandon. Fox was a passenger, not a lookout. Vincent survived, but Fox died. At the time, defendants provided automobile liability insurance to Fox’s family, including Fox.
In 1992, plaintiff brought an action against Vincent for the wrongful death of Fox, and later settled the action. Plaintiff then filed these actions against defendants seeking, among other things, a declaration of defendants’ liability for UM coverage for the fatal injury to Fox.
ORS 742.504 provides, in part:
“Every policy required to provide the coverage spеcified in ORS 742.502 shall provide uninsured motorist coverage which in each instance is no less favorable in any respect to the insured or the beneficiary than if the following provisions were set forth in the policy. However, nothing contained in this section shall require the insurer to reproduce in such policy the particular language of any of the following provisions:
“(l)(a) The insurer will pay all sums which the insured, the heirs or the legal representative of the insured shall be legally entitled to recover as general and special damages from the owner or operator of an uninsured vehicle because of bodily injury sustained by the insured caused by accident and arising out оf the ownership, maintenance or use of such uninsured vehicle. * * (Emphasis added.)
That statute obligates defendants to provide UM coverage to plaintiff under the statute’s terms whether or not UM coverage appears in defendants’ policy. 3
*504 The trial court granted a summary judgment in favor of defendants, although it did not explain its reason for that action. The Court of Appeals affirmed, reasoning that Fox’s death was not caused by an accident under the policy’s UM coverage. As a consequence, the Court of Appeals did not address the parties’ other arguments regarding summary judgment.
The lynchpin of the Court of Appeals’ opinion is its сonclusion that, in applying the policy’s UM provision, the central issue was whether Fox intended or expected to occupy the truck while Vincent drove it off the road, not whether Fox intended to cause a bodily injury to himself. The court stated that plaintiffs reliance on the “intended injury” test, as described
in Allstate Ins. Co. v. Stone,
Plaintiff argues that the reasoning of the Court of Appeals contradicts the rule, discussed by this court in several cases, that a policy requirement that a personal injury be caused by an accident will preclude coverage only if the insured intended to cause both the event that produced the harm and the resulting injury or harm itself. Among other cases, plaintiff relies on
Ledford v. Gutoski,
*505
At the outset, we note our agreement with one premise expressed by the Court of Appeals—that in analyzing this case, the court must view the event from the perspective of Fox, not Vincent. This is a first-party claim for recovery of damages for personal injury to Fox under a policy that his parents purchased from defendants. This is not a claim for coverage to protect Fox against liability claims asserted against him by a third party.
See Davis v. State Farm Mut. Ins.,
“[t]he purpose of the [UM] coverage is not protection from liability. This portion of the policy, therefore, resembles an accident policy for the victim of the uninsured motorist.”
In Davis, the question was whether UM coverage was applicable to аn injury intentionally inflicted on the plaintiff by a third party who, by virtue of the intentionality of his act, was uninsured. The UM insurer argued that the plaintiffs injury was not subject to UM coverage because it was not caused by accident. This court rejected that view, stating:
“Whether the occurrence is accidental depends entirely upon the point from which the question is viewed. If the occurrence is looked at from the point of view of the person who inflicts the harm or of his liability insurer, it is intentional. On the other hand, if it is looked at from the victim’s standpoint, it is unforeseen, unintended, unexpected, and has every aspect of an accident as long as the occurrence was not provoked. Therefore, it is necessary to decide which point of view is the proper one from which to solve the present question.
“The third party who inflicted the harm and his insurer are not parties to the policy upon which this action is brought. The money which will reimburse the plaintiff (if he is successful here) will not come from them. Defendant, if required to pay plaintiff, will be subrogated to any rights plaintiff has against the third party. The liability of the third party will be unaffected by the outcome of this case and no public policy will be offended because he will receive no protection from the consequences of his unlawful act. Certainly, thеre is no reason to consider the matter from the viewpoint of the third party and of his insurer. They are unconcerned and unaffected by the present litigation. The proper points of view are those of plaintiff and defendant. *506 The occurrence was accidental as far as plaintiff is concerned. Defendant points to no qualifying definition of‘accident’ and any ambiguity is construed against defendant.”
Davis,
ORS 742.504 requires defendants to include in their policy UM coverage that “in each instance is no less favorable in any respect to the insured or the beneficiary” than if the statutory coverage provision were reproduced in the policy. Because defendants must satisfy that statutory coverage obligation, the answer to the issue that the parties raise turns on the proper interpretation of ORS 742.504(l)(a). Consequently, we attempt to determine the legislature’s intention in enacting that statute rather than the parties’ contractual intention in entering into the insurance contract.
See Vega v. Farmers Ins. Co.,
We discern the legislature’s intention in adopting a statute by examining, first, the text and context of the statute.
PGE v. Bureau of Labor and Industries,
*507 ORS 742.504(l)(a), quoted above, was enacted in 1967. Or Laws 1967, ch 482, § 3. ORS 742.500(1) specially defines the term “uninsured motorist coverage” as follows:
“As used in ORS 742.500 to 742.506:
“(1) ‘Uninsured motorist coverage’ means coverage within the terms and conditions specified in ORS 742.504 insuring the insured, the heirs or legal representative of the insured for all sums which the insured or they shall be legally entitled to recover as damages for bodily injury or death caused by accident and arising out of the ownership, maintenance or use of an uninsured motor vehicle in amounts or limits not less than the amounts or limits prescribed for bodily injury or death under ORS 806.070.” (Emphasis added.)
The legislature has not altered ORS 742.504(l)(a) or ORS 742.500(1) materially since their enactment in 1967. The uninsured motorist coverage statutes contain no special definition of the phrase “caused by accident.”
In the absence of a legislatively prescribed definition, we ordinarily resort to the common meaning of statutory terms in deciding whether the facts portray an injury or death caused by accident. As the court noted in
Botts v. Hartford Acc. & Indent. Co.,
“* * * [W]e are guided by the principle that it is the common understanding of the term which must be used and not its technical meanings. [Citations omitted.] The insurance company may, of course, insert in its policy any definition of ‘accident’ it chooses but, in the absence of doing so, it must accept the common understanding of the term by the ordinary member of the рurchasing public. There are probably not many words which have caused courts as mucb trouble as ‘accident’ and ‘accidental.’ See Kisle v. St. Paul Fire & Marine Ins.,262 Or 1 , 5,495 P2d 1198 (1972). They are not words which lend themselves to specific or exact meanings [citations omitted], yet, everyone thinks he knows an accident when he sees one. In our prior decisions we have endeavored, by emphasizing the foreseeability of the injury *508 and the intent with which it was produced, to develop definitions which best effectuate the reasonable expectations of the insured. * * *.
;}< * * *
“* * * As previously indicated, the difficulty is in the tendency to think that there is one all-encompassing definition of‘accident’ which accommodates all circumstances. There is no such thing.” 6
In
St. Paul Fire v. McCormick & Baxter Creosoting,
This court reversed. First, the court quoted a dictionary definition of “accident,”
7
but concluded that the dictionary definition did not resolve the parties’ dispute
*509
about whether “accident” referred solely to the contaminating events or solely to the injurious consequences of contamination. The court said that the dictionary definition was “broad enough to cover the proposed definitions of both sides.”
8
St. Paul Fire,
We reach a similar conclusion here. Our examination of the dictionary definition of the term “accident” indicates that that term incorporates the familiar requirement that a loss be fortuitous. 9 However, the definition does not make clear whether the legislature intended that term to bar coverage because the insured’s intentional act caused an injurious event to occur, or because the insured intended to inflict the type of injury that resulted.
We proceed to consider the context of ORS 742.500(1) and ORS 742.504(l)(a). As noted above, the context of those statutes includes other statutes that address related subjects and relevant judicial constructions of those statutes.
*510 Before enactment of the UM statutes in 1967, the legislature had enacted the Financial Responsibility Law, ORS 486.011 (1963) et seq. 10 In summary, those statutes required the driver and owner of a motor vehicle, upon occurrence of an automobile accident causing property damage, injury, or death, to pay a security deposit for the damages and to maintain, for five years, “proof of future responsibility.” ORS 486.021(2) (1963). ORS 486.011(7) (1963) provided the following definition of “future responsibility”:
“ ‘Future responsibility’ means the ability to respond in damages for liability, on account of accidents occurring subsequent to the effective date of the proof thereof arising out of the ownership, operation, maintenance or use of a vehicle * * (Emphasis added.)
The Financial Responsibility Law permitted a person to give proof of financial responsibility in several ways, including by filing a certificate of insurance that provided coverage for “damages arising out of the ownership, operation, use or maintenance” of a motor vehicle. ORS 486.411(l)(a) (1963). ORS 486.541 (1963) also provided:
“Every vehicle liability policy for which a certificate of insurance is given to prove future responsibility shall state the name and address of the named insured, the coverage afforded by the policy, the premium charged therefor, the policy period, and the limits of liability, and shall contain an agreement or indorsement which provides that the insurance is provided thereunder in accordance with the coverage defined in this chapter as respects bodily injury and death or property damage, or both, and is subject to all the provisions of this chapter.” (Emphasis added.)
In enacting the UM statutes in 1967, the legislature incorporated several concepts and important legal terminology from the Financial Responsibility Law. Each statutory scheme authorized the issuance of a policy insuring against particular risks and required all policies to provide insurance consistent with the statutory specification of minimum coverage. Each statutory scheme required insurance policies to cover liability caused by accident arising out of the ownership, operation, maintenance, or use of a vehicle.
*511 We recognize the obvious distinctions in those statutory schemes. Insurance claims arising under policies issued pursuant to the Financial Responsibility Law typically involved a third-party claim against an insured person. In contrast, an uninsured motorist claim typically involves a first-party claim by the insured person against the insurer, asserting the liability of an uninsured driver. Despite those distinctions, the important similarities in the way the two statutory schemes describe the required coverage for a particular risk, i.e., liability caused by accident arising out of the use of a vehicle, justify the assumption that the legislature meant to use the term “accident” in the same sense in each statutory scheme. For purposеs of legal analysis, we assume that the term “accident” in each scheme represented the same legislative policy choice. The parties offer no basis for adopting a contrary assumption. It remains to be seen what the legislature’s policy choice was.
In
Snyder,
On appeal, the insurer made alternative arguments. First, the insurer contended that the policy afforded no coverage, because Nelson had injured Snyder intentionally. Second, the insurer argued that a factual question existed about whether Nelson intended to cause Snyder’s injuries and, consequently, summary judgment was inappropriate. Nelson argued, in contrast, that the legislature had intended that policies issued pursuant to the Financial Responsibility Law should cover intentionally inflicted injuries.
*512 The court began by rejecting the insurer’s first argument that no coverage existed because Nelson’s conduct was “intentional”:
“Garnishee’s answer to plaintiffs allegations in the garnishment proceeding affirmatively alleges that the acts giving rise to Nelson’s liability to plaintiff were his intentional rammings of plaintiffs automobile and that the policy of insurance issued to Nelson did not insure against ‘intentional acts.’ Garnishee’s position, if interpreted literally, is, of course, not well taken. What garnishee really contends, however, as is shown by its memorandum of law filed with the trial court, is that the policy does not cover intentionally inflicted injuries or damages. Most, if not all, negligently inflicted injuries or damages result from intentional acts of some kind, but coverage still exists under normal policy provisions if there was no intention to cause, by the commission of the acts, the resulting injuries or damages. Although the policy provisions involved are somewhat different from those under consideration in City of Burns v. Northwestern Mutual,248 Or 364 , 369,434 P2d 465 (1967), the following language from that case is appropriate here:
“ ‘* * * The policy exclusion relates to injury caused intentionally. It is not sufficient that the insured’s intentional, albeit wrongful, act has resulted in unintended harm; it is the harm itself that must be intended before the exclusion will apрly. An act may be so certain to cause a particular kind of harm that it can be said that a person who did such an act intended the harm. * * *.’ (Emphasis in original.)”
Snyder,
The court next analyzed the language in the policy, which, the court noted, was provided for by the Financial Responsibility Law.
Snyder,
“* * * Thus, the policy by its terms does not cover intentionally inflicted injuries or damages. In any event, under usual circumstances it is against public policy for a tortfeasor to insure against liability for intentionally inflicted injury or damage. Isenhart v. General Casualty Co.,233 Or 49 ,377 P2d 26 (1962).”
Snyder,
*513 The court next examined the statute’s text, and found no support for Snyder’s argument thаt the statute required coverage for intentionally inflicted injuries:
“* * * Plaintiff points to no particular part of the Law as indicating that a policy issued pursuant to it provides coverage for intentionally inflicted injuries and damages. The thrust of the Law apparently is to make certain that an insured has coverage of normal scope which cannot be voided subsequent to an accident by the insured’s own statements or lack of cooperation. It is, therefore, our conclusion that the Financial Responsibility Law was not intended to require coverage for intentionally inflicted personal injuries or property damages.”
Id. at 414-15.
The court was not persuaded to change its construction of the statute by two cases that the plaintiff cited. The court said that it read
Hartford Accident & Indemnity Co. v. Wolbarst,
95 NH 40,
“* * * [TJhere was a finding of fact that although the insured had intended to bump the rear of the vehicle in which the parties who were injured were riding, he had not intended thereby to inflict injuries upon them.”
Snyder,
The court observed that, in
Davis,
“* * * [hjeld that there is no public policy against such coverage because the wrongdoer is not being protected thereby from the consequences of his intentional infliction of the injuries. The insured was merely insuring himself against (among other things) the possibility of being intentionally injured by an uninsured motorist.”
Snyder,
Finally, the court agreed with the insurer’s alternative argument that the trial court erred in entering summary judgment. The court said that a jury could find that Nelson intentionally injured Snyder and damaged her vehicle, but that a jury need not necessarily draw that inference. Because
*514
there was “a legitimate question of fact as to whether Nelson intended the injuries and damage,”
id.
at 416, the court reversed the summary judgment.
Snyder
confirms that, in enacting the Financial Responsibility Law, the legislature intended that coverage for liability caused by accident would extend to the consequences of intentional conduct by the insured unless the insured, as this court explained in
Snyder,
The legislature incorporated the pivotal requirement of the Financial Responsibility Law—financial responsibility, including insurance coverage, for accidents arising out of the ownership, operation, maintenance, or use of a vehicle—when it enacted the UM statutes in 1967. Snyder is an authoritative interpretation by this court of the legislature’s intention in enacting that requirement in the Financial Responsibility Law.
Defendants fail to acknowledge the significance of Snyder to our statutory analysis. First, they seek to distinguish Snyder factually, arguing that, in contrast to the circumstances in Snyder, “Fox was killed by an act which was intentional when viewed from his standpoint.” That argument is inсorrect because it ignores the holding in Snyder that statutory coverage for harm caused by “accident” exists unless the insured intentionally inflicted the injuries for which he demands coverage, and that the presence of intentional, and even unlawful, conduct by the insured is not sufficient to exclude coverage.
Second, defendants present no argument that would justify this court in reconsidering
Snyder.
They make no claim that, in
Snyder,
this court failed to consider the relevant statutory text, context, and legislative history, or that the court ignored legal arguments advanced in the prior case that would have led to a different outcome.
See Carlson v. Blumenstein,
*515 Finally, defendants do not contend that Snyder construed a statutory policy that is different substantively than that embodied in the phrase “caused by accident” in ORS 742.504(l)(a). As noted above, there are minor textual differences between the Financial Responsibility Law and the UM statutes, and they address related but not identical subjects. Those differences are not pertinent here. None of the distinctions between the statutes leads to the conclusion that, by incorporating the similar terminology regarding an “accident” in each statute, the legislature nevertheless intended to adopt different definitions of that term and to produce different legal interpretations.
We conclude that our review of the text and context of ORS 742.500(1) and ORS 742.504(l)(a) identifies the legislature’s intention in enacting those statutes. The legislature intended that the phrase “caused by accident” in ORS 742.504(l)(a) would incorporate the same standard that it had incorporated into the similarly worded Financial Responsibility Law. That standard is the one that this court identified in Snyder. 11 Because our review of statutory text *516 and context makes the legislature’s intention clear, the task of statutory interpretation is at an end.
We next apply the UM statutes to the facts of this сase. The specific injury for which plaintiff seeks uninsured motorist coverage is a personal injury, i.e., the death of Fox. Viewing the accident, as we must, from the perspective of Fox, the issue is whether the evidence demonstrates as a matter of law that, by his conduct on the night he died, Fox intended or expected to cause an injury to himself of the kind that occurred, consistent with this court’s discussion of the intentional infliction of harm by an insured in Snyder.
The evidence suggests that Fox, along with Vincent, intended to cause property damage to the truck. However, there is no evidence that Fox intended to cause any harm to himself, let alone to end his life in the аccident. He wore his seatbelt in the expectation that he would receive no injury. Defendants offer no facts that suggest that Fox was bent on suicide. We cannot say that Fox’s act of accompanying Vincent in damaging the truck was so certain to cause an injury to Fox of the kind that occurred that Fox must have intended such a consequence. 12 To paraphrase the discussion of Davis in Snyder, there is no public policy against uninsured motorist coverage here for Fox’s death, because the alleged wrongdoer, Fox, is not being protected by such coverage from the consequences of his intentional infliction of injury on himself.
The foregoing discussion identifies the only facts on which defendants rely for their contention that Fox’s death was not caused by accident. After reviewing those facts in light of the legal principles discussed above, we conclude that the Court of Appeals erred in sustaining summary judgment for defendant on the theory that Fox’s death was not “caused by accident” under the coverage required by ORS 742.504-(l)(a).
*517 Because of its disposition, the Court of Appeals did not address plaintiffs other assignments of error and defendants’ responsive arguments. For that reason, we must remand this case to the Court of Appeals for further consideration.
The decision of the Court of Appeals is reversed. The case is remаnded to the Corut of Appeals for further proceedings.
Notes
Our disposition of this case turns on our interpretation of ORS 742.504. ORS 742.504 applies, according to its terms, to uninsured motorist coverage. ORS 742.502(4) provides that ‘Tu]nderinsurance coverage shall be subject to ORS 742.504 * * Because defendants’ obligation under ORS 742.504 applies equally to uninsured and underinsured motorist coverages, we do not separately analyze plaintiffs claim for those coverages in this opinion.
The decision of the Court of Appeals recites the procedural history of the consolidated actions.
Fox v. Country Mutual Ins.
Co.,
Defendants’ policy provides that the insurer
“will pay damages which an insured is legally entitled to recover from the owner or operator of an uninsured or underinsured motor vehicle because of bodily injury sustained by an insured and caused by an accident.”
*504 The terms of defendants’ policy deviate from the coverage description stated in ORS 742.504(l)(a), but the parties raise no issue on review concerning the legal effect of those discrepancies.
In
Allstate,
this court construed an exclusion for intentionally caused injuries in a liability insurance policy, and held that an intentional injury exclusion bars coverage under such a policy only if the insured tortfeasor intended to injure the victim.
Davis addressed an issue that arose under Michigan law, but the court’s discussion of the proper analysis of whether an injury is caused by accident, or is inflicted intentionally, under UM coverage also is a correct statement of Oregon law.
Botts
noted that some earlier cases had focused on linguistic distinctions in policy terms that referred to “accidental cause” and “accidental injury,” and had led to different and confusing results depending on whether the court categorized the policy as one covering accidental means or accidental results. The court in
Botts
concluded that it would lay the means-result distinction to rest, because the ordinary purchaser of insurance would not expect the concept of “accident” to have different meanings depending on whether the policy purported to require accidental means or accidental results.
Botts,
St. Paul Fire states:
“The word ‘accident’ commonly means, as pertinent:
“ Ta : an event or condition occurring by chance or arising from unknown or remote causes * * * b : lack of intention * * * 2a: a * * * sudden event or change occurring without intent or volition through carelessness, unawareness, ignorance, or a combination of causes and producing an unfortunate result * * * c: an unexpected happening causing loss or injury which is not due to any fault or misconduct on the part of the person injured but from the consequences of which he may be entitled to some legal relief.’ Webster’s [Third New Int’l Dictionary] at 11 [(unabridged ed 1993)].”
The court in
St. Paul Fire
determined that an earlier case,
Ramco, Inc. v. Pacific Ins.,
One commonly cited treatise in this field states:
“One of the fundamental principles of insurance law is that insurance contracts should only provide coverage for losses that are fortuitous. In many types of insurance policies, the importance of fortuity is manifested by coverage terms which define the risks that are transferred by using the term ‘accidental’ or some variation of that term. In addition, many insurance policies also include provisions that set forth in more explicit detail restrictions or limitations on the type of loss-producing circumstances that will be regarded as accidental, or clauses that specifically exclude coverage for injuries which are intentionally caused.”
Alan I. Widiss, 1 Uninsured and Underinsured Motorist Insurance § 10.1 at 509 (2d ed 1992) (footnotes omitted).
The financial responsibility stаtutes now appear at ORS 806.010 et seq.
This court’s construction of the phrase “caused by accident” in ORS 742.504(l)(a) aligns the fortuity requirement in that statute with the same fortuity requirement that this court has discerned in insurance policy clauses covering losses caused by accident, or excluding coverage for losses caused intentionally.
See Nielsen v. St Paul Companies,
Our conclusion here also is consistent with the rationale of
St. Paul Fire,
although the context there—environmental pollution—was different and the intentional injury requirement was not discussed. In that case, the court determined that the harm resulting from the insured company’s business practices was causеd by accident because the pollution-causing spills and the consequent harm to the groundwater were unintended by the insured.
St. Paul Fire,
As we noted in
A-1 Sandblasting,