Following a serious car accident, Ken and Francesca Bragg, individually and co-administrators of the estate of their stillborn daughter, sued Oxford Construction Company for negligent construction of the road where the accident took place. The trial court granted summary judgment to Oxford based on Georgia’s “acceptance doctrine,1″ and the Court of Appeals affirmed. Bragg v. Oxford Constr. Co. , 289 Ga. App. 638 658 SE2d 198 2008. We granted certiorari in this case to determine whether the acceptance doctrine should remain viable in Georgia. As explained more fully below, because it makes perfect sense to apply the acceptance doctrine to the facts of this case, and because the dissent’s proposed change to this longstanding Georgia law is unwarranted, we affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals. The record reveals that Dougherty County contracted with Oxford to repave and overlay asphalt patches on a road that was owned and maintained by the County. An engineer employed by the County and who directed Oxford’s work ordered Oxford to place a “spot overlay patch” on the area of the road where the Braggs’ car accident later took place. Oxford followed the specific instructions given to it in performing its work and performed its work to the satisfaction of the County. It is undisputed that Oxford was not responsible for the design of the road, nor did it hold itself out as an expert on such design. Oxford just did what it was instructed to do by the County, and the County accepted Oxford’s work when the work was completed. Oxford even observed a problem with the finished product and sought permission to attempt to remedy it, which was denied. Because Oxford performed the requested work according to the specifications given to it by the County, and because there is no evidence that Oxford performed the assigned work in a negligent manner, it cannot be held liable for injuries resulting from its employer’s allegedly defective design of the work. David Allen Co. , supra, 260 Ga. at 558. Under such circumstances, liability, if any, should rest with the entity that hired Oxford, ordered it to patch the road, and accepted Oxford’s completed work. See Flagler Co. v. Savage , 258 Ga. 335 1 “if it appears that the contractor has followed the plans and directions of his employer and injury has resulted, the employer, and not the contractor, is to be held liable” citation and punctuation omitted. If Oxford had somehow been negligent in the performance of the requested work such that its work fell within one of the exceptions to the acceptance doctrine, it could still have been subjected to liability under Georgia law regardless of whether or not the County accepted its work. See David Allen Co. , supra, 260 Ga. at 558.2
Application of the acceptance doctrine makes sense in this case. In fact, the dissent makes no effort to explain why the facts of this case would dictate that a change to this longstanding law needs to be made. Instead, the dissent takes this case as an opportunity to reject this established principle of law, and to propose the ad hoc invention of a new legal doctrine, merely because the acceptance doctrine itself is implicated in this case. This is exactly the manner in which new law should not be created, because it is not the role of this Court to formulate new law in the abstract, as the dissent has proposed here. To the contrary, the law as it exists should be applied to the realities of the case presently before the Court. See, e.g., Brawner v. Sterdevant , 9 Ga. 69 1850. Instead of focusing on the facts of this particular case, however, the dissent would choose to abandon the longstanding Georgia rule here simply because several of “our sister states have rejected the acceptance doctrine.” The fact that other jurisdictions have rejected the rule, however, does not mandate that Georgia do the same. See generally Robeson v. Intl. Indem. Co. , 248 Ga. 306 282 SE2d 896 1981. Indeed, “although it is true that the doctrine is of common-law origin, it is of long-standing application in Georgia; and it is not unrealistic to presume that people have come to rely on it.” Id. at 309 4 b. As such, where, as here, Georgia’s common law acceptance doctrine has not “been changed by express statutory enactment or by necessary implication,” it should remain in force. Id. at 307 1. For this reason, the dissent has provided an insufficient basis for this Court to reject this “common-law rule . . . of long-standing application in Georgia . . . that people have come to rely on.” Id.
