39 Ga. 361 | Ga. | 1869
Lead Opinion
.This was an action by the plaintiff in the Court below against the defendant as indorser upon the following described written paper : “ Atlanta, Geo., August 4th, 1866. Georgia National Banlc of Atlanta, Geo. Ninety days after date pay to F. R. Bell, or order, one thousand dollars. Signed Massey & ITerty.” The paper was endorsed by F. R. Bell and John D. Pope, the defendant. The paper was protested for non-payment on the 2d day of November, 1866, and the question in the ease is, whether the paper sued on is, in law, an inland bill of exchange, and therefore entitled to the days of grace allowed by law on paper of that description before protest for the non-payment thereof.
According to the legal definition of a bill of exchange, the paper set forth in the record comes fully within that definition, and as such was entitled to the days of grace allowed by law before being protested for non-payment. A bill of exchange, as defined by Blackstone, “ is an open letter of request from one man to another, desiring him to pay a sum named therein to a third person on his account.” 2d Bl. Com., 466. In the case of Harker vs. Anderson, (21st Wendell’s Rep., 372,) the authorities bearing on the question whether a check is a bill of exchange, were elaborately examined and reviewed by Mr. Justice Cowen. Chancellor Kent defines a bill of exchange to be “ a written order, or request, by one person to another, for the payment of money absolutely and at all events.” 3d Kent’s Com., 74. A check, he says, partakes more of the character of a bill of exchange than of a promissory note. It is in form and effect a hill of exchange. Ibid, 75. When a bill is payable at a certain time after date or sight, or after demand, it is not payable at the precise time mentioned in the bill, days of grace being allowed, but in the case of bills payable on demand, no such days are allowed: Chitty on Bills, 263.
The 2749th section of the Revised Code declares that “bills, notes, or other paper, payable on demand, are due immediately.
When this case was called upon the docket, a motion was made to dismiss it for want of jurisdiction. Upon that question this Court are not unanimous, the majority of the Court being of the opinion the motion to dismiss should be overruled. The 340th section of the Code declares that “ when from any cause the Judge of the Superior Court is disqualified from presiding he shall procure the services of a J udge of another circuit to try said cause, if he has to appoint an adjourned term for that purpose. If the parties litigant consent thereto, and select any attorney practicing in the Court, to preside in such a case, the Judge shall have such consent entered on the minutes, and the attorney so selected shall exercise all the fimetions of a Judge in that case.” The defendant in this case was a Judge of the Superior Court, duly commissioned and qualified as such, according to the Constitution and laws of the State, and was in the discharge of, and performing the duties and functions of such Judge in holding the Superior Court of Fulton county, in which Court this suit was instituted by plaintiff against the defendant. It is a fundamental principle of the law that no man can be a judge in his own ease. This is a case in which the
The General Assembly had the power to make all laws and ordinances consistent with the State Constitution, and
Dissenting Opinion
dissenting on the question of jurisdiction.
The Judge of the Superior Court being a party to this case, it was agreed, in conformity to the statute, that Hon. Dennis F. Hammond, an attorney of said Court, should preside and try the case. A bill of exceptions was taken to his rulings on the trial, and a motion is now made to dismiss the case here, because this Court has no jurisdiction of it.
It will not, I suppose, be denied that this is a Court of limited jurisdiction, and that it must find the grant of its powers in the Constitution and laws of the State. Our jurisdiction is thus defined, in article 5, section 2, paragraph 2} of the Constitution: “The Supreme Court shall have no original jurisdiction, but shall be a Court alone for the correction of errors, from the Superior Courts, and from the City Courts of Savannah and Augusta, and such other like Courts as may be hereafter established in other cities.’*
What is necessary, under the Constitution, to make a Superior Court ? The first, and indeed the only indispensable pre-requisite is, that there be a Judge of the Superior Courts present presiding, at the proper place, and at the time fixed by law, and that there be parties litigant. The Constitution declares that the Superior Courts shall sit in each county, not less than twice in each year, at such times as have been or may be appointed by law. Again, it declares, that the Court shall render judgment, without the verdict of a jury, in all civil cases founded on contract, where an issuable defense is not filed on oath. In the class of cases to which this belongs, it is not necessary, to constitute a Superior Court, that there be a jury in attendance, unless an issuable plea is filed on oath. Nor is the presence of a Clerk or a Sheriff indispensably necessary to the validity of a judgment of the Superior Court. But there can be no legal judgment of the Superior Court without the presence of a Judge of the Superior Court.
The important inquiry then is, what is necessary to make a Judge of the Superior Court, and how, and by whom must he be appointed. The law prescribes certain qualifications which he must have. He must have been ten years a citizen of this State, and one year an inhabitant of the circuit over which he is to preside. He must have been five years at the bar, etc. So much for his qualifications. Now as to his appointment. Article 5, section 9, of the Constitution, declares that the Judges of the Supreme and Superior Courts shall be appointed by the Governor, with the advice and consent of the Senate. There is no exception made to this rule,‘save in case of appointments to fill vacancies, which may be made by the Governor alone in the absence of the
But I am met with sections 240 and 241 of the Code, which are in these words: “ When from any cause, the Judge of the Superior Court is disqualified from presiding, he shall procure the services of a Judge of another circuit to try said cause, if he has to appoint an adjourned term for that purpose. If the parties litigant consent thereto, and select an attorney practising in the Court to preside in suck a case, the Judge shall have such consent entered on the minutes, and the attorney so selected shall exercise all the functions of Judge in that case.” “If any Judge does not comply with the provisions of the preceding section, within a reasonable time, when it is in his power to do so, it is a ground of impeachment.”
Now, it is claimed that the attorney selected under section 240 is, pro hac vice, a Judge of the Superior Coqrts in that case, and that the Court held by him is the Superior Court. Let us examine this position, and see if it is sound. The statute does not declare that the attorney so’selected shall be a Judge of the Superior Courts for the occasion, but that he shall exercise the functions of Judge in that case.
But suppose I admit that the language of the Act is broad enough to cover it, and that it was the intention of the Legislature that he shall be Judge of the Superior Courts; then the question arises, is that Act constitutional ? I think not. It is clearly in conflict with the Constitution, so far as
But it may be claimed that the .consent of the parties makes it legal. The consent of the parties may give the Judge power to render a judgment binding upon them, but consent of the parties in the Court below cannot make a man a Judge of the Superior Courts who is not such, nor can it confer jurisdiction on this Court in a case where it is not given by the Constitution.
But it is said that there must be some way of disposing of cases where the Judges ai’e interested or disqualified. Two remedies are already provided within the constitutional limits. First, it is made the duty of the Judge of the circuit so disqualified, to hold an adjourned term and procure the services of another J udge to try the case, if in his power, on pain of impeachment. It may be replied, however, that the other Judge may refuse to hold the Court out of his circuit. This is not a reasonable supposition. It is his duty to do it, and the law presumes that every officer will faithfully discharge his official duties till the contrary is made to appear. The Constitution says of a Judge of the Superior Courts: He may act in other circuits when authorized by law. And it is no strained construction undei; well known rules, to construe may in this Act, prescribing the duties of a public officer, to mean shall. As it is made the duty of the Judge who is disqualified to procure the services of another Judge to try the cause, it is certainly the duty of that other Judge to do it. The law, in other words, makes it the duty of one'
But the Act under consideration gives another remedy, not by a legal appointment of a Judge of the Superior Courts, for the particular occasion, but by constituting another Court —a special Court — for this very purpose. For it must be borne in mind that I am not denying the legality of this Court. I only deny that it is the Superior Court, and I also deny that a writ of error lies from it to the Supreme Court. The Constitution declares that, the judicial powers of this State shall be vested in a Supreme Court, Superior Courts, Courts of Ordinary, Justices of the Peace, Commissioned Notaries Public, and such other Courts as have been or may be established by law. Now this is clearly one of these other Courts established by law for the trial of this particular class of cases.
This question is decided by this Court in the case of Taylor vs. Smith, 4¿h Qa. Ii., 133, which arose under the Act of 1801. That Act was in these words: In all cases brought in said Superior Courts, or either of them, when either of the Judges thereof shall be a party or interested therein, it shall be the duty of three or more of the Justices of the Inferior Court to preside on the trial of the same. What substantial difference between that Act and the one now under consideration ? In both the case must be brought and pending in the Superior Court, and the Judge must be disqualified to preside. In the one case three or more Justices of the Inferior Court preside on the trial. In the other, an attorney selected by the parties under the authority of the Act of the Legislature presides. In both cases those presiding have, as a necessary consequence, all the functions of a Judge in that case. In one case it is so expressed. In the other, the authority to preside in the case without qualification carries with it all the functions of a Judge for that case. Now let us see
It is true the Supreme Court entertained a writ of error'in that case, just as we have done m several cases under this statute at this term, after announcing doubts as to our jurisdiction, because no objection was made to the jurisdiction. Indeed the parties in the cases heard by us requested that no such objection should be raised, except in the case where but two Judges presided, and in that case the bill of exceptions was signed by the Judge of the Superior Court. If the Court in the case cited was one of those other Courts provided for by the Constitution, and established by the Legislature, and was not the Superior Court, how can this be held to be the Superior Court of Fulton county ?
But it was objected that it could not be intended by the Legislature that a Court be established with jurisdiction to try causes, without a provision for the correction of its errors by this Court. Important rights have often been adjudicated
In that case #800 00 of the estate of the deceased was disposed of by the commissioners, who returned their award into the' Ordinary’s office, who recorded the same; but this was held not to be the judgment of the Ordinary from which an appeal lay, nor were the commissioners, thus disposing of the estate of the deceased, to be considered the Ordinary for the occasion, as the Constitution had prescribed who should be Ordinary. The commissioners performed functions which properly pertain to the Ordinary’s office in the disposition of the estate of a deceased person, but as they were not ike Ordinary no appeal lay from their decision, as from a decision of the Ordinary.
The objection that there is no mode prescribed by law for
Section 237 of the Code defines some of the powers of the Judge of the Superior Court, and among others reiterates that he may grant writs of certiorari. Section 238 then declares that the authority, granted in the preceding section to each Judge in his own circuit, may be exercised by any Judge of another circuit, whenever the resident Judge is absent from the circuit so that the business cannot be done as speedily as necessary, or is indisposed, or interested, or is laboring under any disqualification or inability to serve, or in case the circuit should be from any cause without a Judge.
Here then is a legal Court, inferior to the Superior Court, a tribunal created by the Legislature with special jurisdiction to try this very class of cases, and here is the power, plainly given to any Judge of the Superior Courts of this State, to grant a writ of certiorari, to correct the errors committed by this special tribunal; and the Constitution provides for a writ of error from the decision of the Judge of the Superior Courts to this Court, to correct his errors upon the decision which he may make on the writ, of certiorari.
In this manner the whole system harmonizes, and there is no encroachment by one department of the Government upon the power conferred by the Constitution upon another. This also harmonizes with the former decisions of this Court, while it affords two remedies for the enforcement of contracts, 'or the redress of wrongs, in the class of cases to which this belongs, which are not only plain and simple, but full and complete.
The defendant in error having raised the question of jurisdiction, and having objected to the hearing of this Court, it follows from the reasons already given, that, in my judgment this writ of error ought to be dismissed.