Bud Hoard Co. v. F. Berg & Co.

• Decision Date: 28 May 1929
• Docket Number: Case Number: 19037
• Citation: Bud Hoard Co. v. F. Berg & Co., 278 P. 273, 137 Okla. 16, 1929 OK 215 (Okla. 1929)
• Parties: BUD HOARD CO. v. F. BERG & CO. et al.
• Court: Oklahoma Supreme Court

1929 OK 215

278 P. 273

137 Okla. 16

BUD HOARD CO. v. F. BERG & CO. et al.

Case Number: 19037

Supreme Court of Oklahoma

Decided: May 28, 1929

Syllabus

¶0 Justices of the Peace--Maximum Jurisdictional Amount--Nullity of Judgment on Account for $ 200 Plus Interest Accruing Before Suit.

In an action before a justice of the peace wherein the plaintiff claims and recovers judgment on open account for $ 200 and interest thereon for a period antedating suit, such court is without jurisdiction and said judgment is a nullity under sections 5352and5353,Rev. Laws of Oklahoma 1910(Harris-Day Code), which sections are brought forward in C. O. S. 1921, as section 896and897.

Commissioners' Opinion, Division No. 2.

Error from District Court, Carter County; John B. Ogden, Judge.

Action by the Bud Hoard Company against F. Berg & Company et al., to enjoin execution under a judgment claimed to be void.Temporary order issued, and, later, upon motion of defendant, vacated by the trial court, from which Bud Hoard Company appealed.Reversed.

Sigler & Jackson, for plaintiff in error.

Potterf, Gray & Poindexter, for defendants in error.

BENNETT, C.

¶1 This is an appeal from the district court of Carter county, Okla.The parties occupy the same relative positions here, as plaintiff and defendant, as in the trial court, and they will be so referred to.

¶2Plaintiff's petition, in substance, alleged that F. Berg & Company, as plaintiff, sued Bud Hoard Company, as defendant, before a justice of the peace in Carter county, Okla., on or about September 1, 1927, on an account for $ 200, and interest thereon from April, 1927, and promptly secured judgment for the amount sued for; that F. Berg & Company had caused an execution to be issued on said judgment and placed in the hands of a constable for the purpose of collection, and that, unless restrained, such execution would be levied upon the goods of plaintiff; that irreparable damage would be done him, and that plaintiff had no adequate remedy at law.

¶3 It was further alleged that said judgment was void for that the justice of the peace who rendered same was without jurisdiction for the reason that the amount claimed, sued for, and recovered in said justice court, was in excess of its jurisdiction.

¶4 On September 28th plaintiff herein applied to the district court in the action at bar for a temporary restraining order, and at that time the parties stipulated that about September 1, 1927, plaintiff, in justice court, sued for and recovered judgment on account for $ 200, with interest thereon at six per cent. from April, 1927.

¶5November 29, 1927, the court entered an order granting a temporary injunction on behalf of plaintiff, restraining the execution of said judgment.On December 1, 1927, and without further proof, the court sustained defendant's motion to dissolve such temporary injunction, from which action plaintiff prosecutes this appeal.

¶6Plaintiff assigns as error: (1) That the judgment of the court is not supported by the law.(2) Errors of law occurring at the trial to which the plaintiff excepted.

¶7 There is but one question for determination: Did the justice have jurisdiction in an action brought in September, 1927, on account for $ 200 and interest thereon at six per cent. from April, 1927, to render judgment for the amount claimed?The determination of this point requires the construction of section 18, article 7, of the Constitution of the state of Oklahoma, and the construction of section 897,C. O. S. 1921.The applicable part of such constitutional provision is as follows:

"The office of justice of the peace is hereby created, and, until otherwise provided by law, courts of justices of the peace shall have, co-extensive with the county, jurisdiction as examining and committing magistrates in all felony cases, and shall have jurisdiction, concurrent with the county court in civil cases, where the amount involved does not exceed $ 200, exclusive of interest and costs. * * * "

¶8 It will be observed that by the words of this constitutional provision jurisdiction was made to depend upon the amount involved, which must not exceed $ 200, exclusive of interest and costs.It should be conceded that the suit in controversy would fall within the plain terms of the constitutional provision if it were final and controlling; but it will be noted that this provision of the Constitution is not in terms necessarily final, and by its very words discloses that the jurisdiction of justice courts as therein defined should be effective only until otherwise provided by law.The word "until" is a word of limitation and presupposes that when the condition following such word shall become operative, that the precedent condition or status shall fall.In short, that when the jurisdiction of a justice court shall be changed by law, the constitutional limitation shall give way.

¶9 The construction of this clause, it seems to us, giving the words their ordinary meaning, is not difficult.

"The object of construction, as applied to a written Constitution, is to give effect to the intent of the people in adopting it.In the case of all written laws, it is the intent of the law-giver that is to be enforced.But this intent is to be found in the instrument itself.It is to be presumed that language has been employed with sufficient precision to convey it, and unless examination demonstrates that the presumption does not hold good in the particular case, nothing will remain except to enforce it.'Where a law is plain and unambiguous, whether it be expressed in general or limited terms, the Legislature should be intended to mean what they have plainly expressed, and consequently no room is left for construction.'(CitingU.S. v. Fisher, 2 Cranch 358, 2 L. Ed. 304;Bosley v. Mattingly, 14 B. Mon. 89;Sturges v. Crowninshield, 4 Wheat. 122, 4 L. Ed. 529). Possible or even probable meaning, when one is plainly declared in the instrument itself, the courts are not at liberty to search for elsewhere.'Whether we are considering an agreement between parties, a statute, or a Constitution, with a view to its interpretation, the thing which we are to seek is the thought which it expresses.To ascertain this, the first resort in all cases is to the natural signification of the words employed, in the order of grammatical arrangement in which the framers of the instrument have placed them.If, thus regarded, the words embody a definite meaning, which involves no absurdity and no contradiction between different parts of the same writing, then that meaning, apparent on the face of the instrument, is the one which alone we are at liberty to say was intended to be conveyed.In such a case there is no room for construction.That which the words declare is the meaning of the instrument, and neither courts nor Legislatures have a right to add to or take away from that meaning.'"Cooley's Constitutional Limitations (8th Ed.) vol. 1, pp. 124-7, and cases cited.

¶10 Nor is it strange that the power to finally determine the jurisdiction of the justice court should have been left to the Legislature, because it has been held that under section 36, art. 5, Oklahoma Constitution, the authority of the Legislature shall extend to all rightful subjects of legislation, etc.State ex rel. Short, Attorney General, v. Johnson, 90 Okla. 21 at 21-23, 215 P. 945.In fact, it may be stated generally that the stateLegislature is not limited in its power to pass laws, except in so far as such power is limited either by the state or federal Constitution.

¶11Revised Laws 1910, commonly known as the "Harris-Day Code," was adopted as a whole by chapter 75, page 116, Sess. L. 1913, which amended chapter 39, p. 70, Sess. L. 1910-11, and this the Legislature could do in virtue of section 57, art. 5, of the Constitution; and it was only necessary to read the act adopting the Code, and not the Code, to legally comply with section 34, art. 5, of the Constitution.There was adopted as a part of such Code, Rev. Stat. 1910, by the Legislature of Oklahoma, the section and its title brought forward in C. O. S. 1921, as section No. 897, entitled "jurisdictional amount," as follows:

"When the balance claimed to be due on any open or unsettled account, or on any bill, note, or bond, shall not exceed $ 200, the party by whom such balance shall be claimed may commence his action therefor, before the justice of the peace, who shall have power, and he is hereby authorized, to hear and determine the matters in controversy, without regard to the amount of the original account or contract, and he may render judgment for any balance found due, not exceeding $ 200."

¶12This section brought forward in C. O. S. 1921, as a part of chapter 4, entitled "Procedure, Civil--Before Justice," and as part of article 1 of said chapter, which is entitled "Jurisdiction."

¶13 What is the force and effect of the adoption of this provision as a part of the Code?Quoting from the Supreme Court of Georgia in the case of Central of Georgia R. Co. v. State of Georgia, 104 Ga. 831, 31 S.E. 531:

"(2) The intention of the act of December 16, 1895, adopting the present Code, and making the same of force, as the Code of Georgia, is to enact into one statute all provisions embraced in that Code. * * *

"(5) The effect of this act is to make a part of the law of the state all new matter embodied in the Code of 1895, which could be constitutionally enacted by the Legislature. * * *

"Whenever the Legislature, therefore, employs such words as 'adopting a Code,' no other legitimate or reasonable construction can be given the language itself than an intention to enact and make of force as a statute every provision in the entire work; * * * the legislative purpose being to enact into law every provision contained in the Code, including such new matter as was introduced as well as such changes and modifications as were clearly made in existing laws."

¶14 There is quite a difference between...