84 Cal. App. 425 | Cal. Ct. App. | 1927
Prohibition. Petitioners seek to prevent the respondent Municipal Court of the City of Los Angeles from proceeding further in an action pending in said court, in which action respondent Dietterich is the plaintiff and petitioners herein are the defendants.
Other than that the action was brought in the Municipal Court of the City of Los Angeles, in the county of Los Angeles, the facts material to this decision are that each of the defendants is a resident of the city of South Pasadena, in the county of Los Angeles, and that the amount involved in the action is the sum of eight hundred dollars.
[1] As related to the constitution of the state of California, petitioners attack generally the constitutionality of the statute under which the action was brought (Stats. 1925, p. 648), and cite many authorities in support of their contention. In view of the fact, however, that since each of the cases to which the attention of this court is directed was decided, by appropriate amendments to the constitution of this state, the constitution was specifically amended for the very purpose of providing for the creation of municipal courts, and that the statute in question was enacted by the legislature pursuant to such constitutional authority, it becomes apparent that the authorities to which petitioners refer are inapplicable to the present situation and that the contention of petitioners in regard to the constitutionality of the statute cannot be sustained.
[2] It is further urged by petitioners that no territorial jurisdiction exists in the Municipal Court of the City of Los Angeles outside the boundaries of said city of Los Angeles. *427
Section 11a of article VI of the constitution, among other things, provides that: "In any city and county and in any city which is governed under a charter framed and adopted under the authority of this Constitution containing a population of more than forty thousand inhabitants, . . . a municipal court may be established as in this article provided, anything in this Constitution to the contrary notwithstanding, . . . Municipal courts shall have original jurisdiction, . . . in all cases at law in which the demand, exclusive of interest, . . . amounts to one thousand dollars or less, . . . and in all criminal cases amounting to misdemeanor. . . ."
Said section also provides in part that: "The legislature shall provide by general law for the constitution, regulation, government and procedure of municipal courts, and for the jurisdiction thereof. . . ." And section 29 of the Municipal Court Act (Stats. 1925, p. 648) contains the following language: "Each municipal court shall have concurrent original jurisdiction with the superior court or the justices' courts of all such cases arising within the county in which such court is situated. . . ."
Section 5 of article VI of the constitution provides in part that "The process of any municipal court shall extend to all parts of the county in which the city is situated where such court is established, . . ."
Construing such constitutional provisions in the case entitledIn the Matter of the Application of Luna,
[3] Petitioners also suggest that the constitutional provisions affecting the question are violative of article XIV of the constitution of the United States, in that they abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States, for the reason that the provisions of our constitution and the statute in question, each respectively providing for the optional creation of a Municipal Court in any city of the state having a population of more than forty thousand inhabitants, do not act uniformly as to all citizens of the state and are not general in their operation. The case entitled In re Brady,
In the case of Martin v. Superior Court,
Several reasons for the denial of the writ for which petitioners pray are assigned by respondents, but because of the authorities hereinbefore cited, it is considered unnecessary to devote further attention to the questions thus suggested.
A demurrer having been interposed to the petition herein, it is ordered that the demurrer be and it is sustained; further, that the alternative writ issued herein be and it is discharged, and that petitioners take nothing by this proceeding.
Conrey, P.J., and York, J., concurred.
A petition by appellant to have the cause heard in the supreme court, after judgment in the district court of appeal, was denied by the supreme court on September 8, 1927. *430