17 Mass. App. Ct. 255 | Mass. App. Ct. | 1983
In Shea v. Neponset River Marine & Sport-fishing, Inc., 14 Mass. App. Ct. 121 (1982) (hereafter Shea),
In this case the plaintiff, on February 23, 1981, brought a summary process action in a District Court, pursuant to G. L. c. 239, in which it sought possession and rent in the amount of $14,850, and the defendant filed an answer. If the holding in Shea governs, the plaintiff thus waived its right to an appeal to the Superior Court for a trial de nova. G. L. c. 231, § 103. Likewise, the defendant, not having removed to the Superior Court a case in which the amount claimed was $7,500 or more, lost is right to appeal for a trial de nova. G. L. c. 231, § 104. See G. L. c. 231, § 97. Judgment entered in the District Court for the plaintiff for possession and rent in the amount of $6,825. Both parties filed appeals in the Superior Court in April of 1981. Citing Shea as controlling, a Superior Court judge, on October 8, 1982, ruled that the Superior Court lacked jurisdiction to hear the appeals (see Shea at 129), and a judgment of dismissal was entered on October 12, 1982.
Approved on July 9, 1982, four days before our decision in Shea, St. 1982, c. 304, § 1, effective August 8, 1982 (see art. 48 of the Amendments to the Massachusetts Constitution, The Referendum, III, § 2; G. L. c. 4, § 1), restored the exclusionary sentence in G. L. c. 231, § 103. (“This section and sections one hundred and four to one hundred and ten, inclusive, shall not apply to actions or counterclaims under the provisions of chapter two hundred and thirty-nine.”) Rights of appeal to the Superior Court in summary process actions begun in the District Court were thus, once again, governed by G. L. c. 231, § 97. See Shea at 124-126. Under that statute, since the waiver and removal provisions of G. L. c. 231, §§ 103 and 104, do not apply, any party may appeal to the Superior Court for a trial de nova.
1. The argument that the omission of the exclusionary clause in the 1975 amendment was unintentional was not made in Shea. There we concluded that the omission manifested a legislative intent that the provisions of G. L. c. 231, §§ 103 et seq., were to apply to summary process cases just as they apply to all civil actions. We are now asked to take a second look in view of the 1982 amendment, to reach back and supply an omission in the 1975 amendment which was allegedly inadvertent. “The views of a subsequent Legislature form a hazardous basis for inferring the intent of an earlier one” (citations omitted). Massachusetts Commn. Against Discrimination v. Liberty Mut. Ins. Co., 371 Mass. 186, 194 (1976). Compare Graci v. Damon, 6 Mass. App. Ct. 160, 170 (1978); Weston v. Maguire, 10 Mass. App. Ct. 540, 542 (1980). Moreover, what has been said with respect to a first look at an omission in a statute is equally applicable to a second look, and is dispositive: “[I]f the omission was intentional, no court can supply it. If the omission was due to inadvertence, an attempt to supply it . . . would be tantamount to adding to a statute a meaning not intended by the Legislature.” Cole v. Brookline Housing Authy., 4 Mass. App. Ct. 705, 708 (1976), quoting from Boylston Water Dist. v. Tabanto Regional Sch. Dist., 353 Mass. 81, 84 (1967). It was for the Legislature to insert any
2. Adherence to the holding in Shea, however, does not end the matter. The question remains whether the 1982 amendment applies to this case, so that the Superior Court has jurisdiction to hear the plaintiff s appeal. That issue is resolved by the application of familiar rules of statutory construction. “The general rule of interpretation is that all statutes are prospective in their operation, unless an intention that they shall be retrospective appears by necessary implication from their words, context or objects when considered in the light of the subject matter, the pre-existing state of the law and the effect upon existent rights, remedies and obligations. Doubtless all litigation commonly looks to the future, not to the past, and has no retroactive effect unless such effect manifestly is required by unequivocal terms. It is only statutes regulating practice, procedure and evidence, in short, those relating to remedies and not affecting substantive rights, that commonly are treated as operating retroactively, and as applying to pending actions or causes of action.” City Council of Waltham v. Vinciullo, 364 Mass. 624, 626 (1974), quoting from Hanscom v. Malden & Melrose Gas Light Co., 220 Mass. 1, 3 (1914).
In summary, we conclude that St. 1982, c. 304, § 1, applies to the plaintiff s claim of appeal from the summary process judgment of the District Court to the Superior Court; and that, therefore, the plaintiff has the right to a trial de nova in the Superior Court. The judgment of dismissal of the plaintiffs appeal to the Superior Court is reversed, and the case is remanded to that court for proceedings consistent with this opinion.
So ordered.
We are aware of some concern resulting from our holding in Shea. See Connors & Perlin, Summary Process Case May Have Serious Consequences, 10 Mass. Law. Weekly 1315, 1348 (1982). In their briefs the parties point out alleged pitfalls encountered by parties in summary process cases who assumed the long standing procedure remained the same after the 1975 amendment, and before Shea. The most serious issues affecting those cases do not arise on this appeal, and they are, possibly, for another day.
See for examples of cases where statutes have been found to be remedial and have been applied retroactively: Bemis v. Clark, 11 Pick. 452 (1831) (adding remedy of abatement in nuisance cases); Mulvey v. Boston, 197 Mass. 178, 180-181 (1908) (statute of limitations); Smith v. Freedman, 268 Mass. 38, 40-42 (1929) (statute dealing with burden of proof in tort actions); Welch v. Mayor of Taunton, 343 Mass. 485, 488 (1962) (statute providing for removal of certain public officials for wrongdoing in office); Kagan v. United Vacuum Appliance Corp., 357 Mass. 680, 684 (1970) (the long-arm statute, G. L. c. 223A); Massachusetts Bd. of Regional Community Colleges v. Labor Relations Commn., 377 Mass. 847, 850 (1979) (statute permitting Labor Relations Commission to order employee reinstatement with back pay); Zildjian v. Zildjian, 8 Mass. App. Ct. 1, 8-12 (1979) (statute eliminating defense of recrimination in divorce actions). Compare for examples of cases where statutes have been found to affect substantive rights and have been applied prospectively: Paraboschi v. Shaw, 258 Mass. 531, 533-534 (1927) (statute making the
Thus, in this case the doctrine is not applicable to the appeal of the defendant to the Superior Court, since the defendant did not appeal from the judgment of dismissal. This result has no practical effect, since the defendant did not counterclaim.
Despite the statement of the broad “workable rule” in Porter, the substantive-procedural analysis appears to have considerable vitality. See, e.g., Massachusetts Bd. of Regional Community Colleges v. Labor Rela