Buscaglia v. District Court of San Juan

Decision Date02 January 1945
Docket NumberNo. 4022.,4022.
Citation145 F.2d 274
PartiesBUSCAGLIA, Treasurer of Puerto Rico, et al. v. DISTRICT COURT OF SAN JUAN et al.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

David L. Kreeger, and Irwin W. Silverman, both of Washington, D. C., E. Campos del Toro, of San Juan, Puerto Rico, E. Ramon Antonini, of Ponce, Puerto Rico, and Victor Gutierrez Franqui, of San Juan, Puerto Rico, for appellants.

F. Fernandez Cuyar, of San Juan, Puerto Rico, for Celestino Iriarte, appellee.

Before MAGRUDER, MAHONEY and WOODBURY, Circuit Judges.

Writ of Certiorari Denied January 2, 1945. See 65 S.Ct. 434.

WOODBURY, Circuit Judge.

This is a suit by a Puerto Rico taxpayer to enjoin certain Puerto Rican officials from making any further allocation of insular funds for emergency relief purposes on the ground that no valid legislative appropriation exists therefor. The case comes to us on appeal by the defendants from an order of the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico entered on July 28, 1944, annulling a writ of certiorari previously issued by that court, restoring in all its force and effect a restraining order issued on July 12, 1944, by the District Court of the Judicial District of San Juan, and remanding the case to the latter court for further consistent proceedings.

To understand the questions of law before us on this appeal the facts and pleadings must be stated in considerable detail.

On November 27, 1942, the Governor of Puerto Rico approved Act No. 16 of the Insular Legislature of that year. Laws of Puerto Rico, Second and Third Special Sessions, 1942, p. 52 et seq. In this bill the Legislature declared that because of the war there existed in the island "a state of grave emergency" "characterized by a huge increase in unemployment, and a great scarcity and an extraordinary increase in the prices of subsistence staples," and that in consequence "A serious threat of starvation and despair now hovers over our people." To meet this emergency it created an Insular Emergency Council composed of the Governor of Puerto Rico as president and the heads of the eight departments of the Puerto Rican government as members, and gave to this council comprehensive powers including, among others, the power to inaugurate "an ample emergency work program through which employment will be provided to the largest possible number of unemployed persons in the towns and fields of Puerto Rico," and the power to inaugurate "unemployment compensation projects to provide subsistence relief for those unemployed persons to whom no work can be offered at the moment, or who cannot obtain same because of illness, physical disability, or any other justified cause." In § 14 the Legislature provided: "To carry out the purposes of this Act, the sum of ten million (10,000,000) dollars is hereby appropriated out of any funds in the Treasury of Puerto Rico not otherwise appropriated, plus seventy (70) per cent of the revenues of the Insular Treasury from the proceeds of the Federal Internal-Revenue Tax on distilled spirits shipped or which may be shipped from Puerto Rico to the United States from and after November 1, 1942," and it allocated this appropriation in specific amounts to the various phases of its relief program. In conclusion the legislature provided that the act, "being of an urgent and necessary character," should take effect immediately upon its approval, and that it should continue in effect until either the Governor, or the Insular Legislature by concurrent resolution, should declare that the state of emergency had ended.

Some six months after the passage of this Act, specifically on May 15, 1943, the Governor of Puerto Rico approved Act No. 181 of that year, Laws of Puerto Rico, 1943, p. 654, which amended, inter alia, § 14 of Act No. 16 of the previous year to read as follows: "To carry out the purposes of this Act, the sum of sixteen million (16,000,000) dollars, or such part thereof as may be necessary in any fiscal year, in the judgment of the Insular Emergency Council, is hereby appropriated out of any funds in the treasury of Puerto Rico, not otherwise appropriated; Provided, That of the total amount of this appropriation, the sum of four million (4,000,000) dollars shall not be available until July 1, 1943."1 In this amendment, as in the original section, funds were specifically allocated and the amendment was made retroactive to the effective date of Act No. 16, "Provided, That any amount which has been set up on the appropriation books in accordance with said Act No. 16, approved November 27, 1942, shall be considered as part of the total amount appropriated by this Act."

Approximately a year later, (during February and March, 1944), bills to appropriate further sums for the use of the Emergency Council were introduced in each house of the Puerto Rican Legislature, but neither house would concur in the other's bill and in consequence no appropriation was made before the Legislature adjourned.

This was the state of affairs on June 29, 1944, when the plaintiff, Celestino Iriarte Miro, alleging that he is a citizen of Puerto Rico and of the United States, a voter in Puerto Rico, and an owner of real and personal property situated there who pays regular and special taxes assessed thereon into the insular treasury, filed a verified petition in the District Court of the Judicial District of San Juan for an injunction against the insular treasurer and the insular auditor in their respective official capacities and against them and the other members of the Insular Emergency Council in their official capacities as such. In this petition the plaintiff alleges the passage of Act No. 16 of 1942, its amendment by Act No. 181 of 1943, and the failure of the Puerto Rican Legislature to agree during February and March 1944 on any bill making further appropriations to carry on the work of the Insular Emergency Council. The petition then continues as follows:

"7. The plaintiff further alleges that the sum of $16,000,000 appropriated by Act No. 16 of 1942, as amended by Act No. 181 of 1943, is already totally exhausted, the Insular Emergency Council having disposed of the total amount for projects and expenses, so that from July 1, 1944,2 the Insular Emergency Council will not have at its disposal any money coming from the said sum of $16,000,000.

"8. The plaintiff further alleges that the Insular Emergency Council and the Treasurer and the Auditor of Puerto Rico intend, propose, and are going to utilize the additional sum of $16,000,000 from the regular funds of the Treasury of Puerto Rico, which sum is to be placed at the disposal of the Insular Emergency Council to be expended from and after July 1, 1944, for the ends and purposes determined by Act No. 16 of 1942, as amended, this in spite of the fact that there exists no legislative appropriation of said additional sum of $16,000,000 and in spite of the fact that the Legislature of Puerto Rico twice refused to appropriate any additional funds for the ends or purposes enumerated in Act No. 16 of 1942."

Then the plaintiff alleges that "such allotment or appropriation of public funds * * * is illegal and contrary to the Organic Act of Puerto Rico," that "the additional sum of $16,000,000 which the defendants thus seek to allot, appropriate, and utilize for purposes of the Insular Emergency Council, shall be taken from the regular funds of the Treasury of Puerto Rico, said funds having been raised for the public treasury through the levying and collection of regular and special taxes on the plaintiff and other taxpayers of Puerto Rico," that the "illegal use of said sum of $16,000,000 will cause irreparable damages to all taxpayers in Puerto Rico in general, and to the plaintiff in particular as a taxpayer, since all will have to contribute new taxes to cover the deficiency created by the illegal use of said funds" and finally that "in order to prevent the illegal, extravagant, and unconstitutional utilization or appropriation of public funds aforesaid, he has no other adequate, rapid, and efficacious relief than that of the injunction here requested."

The relief asked for is threefold: First, the plaintiff asks for a permanent injunction to restrain the defendants in their official capacities, either by themselves or through their subordinates, from making "any allotment, appropriation, or use whatsoever of any item of money from the regular funds of the Insular Treasury of Puerto Rico or from any other funds of the insular treasury, in order to place same at the disposal of the Insular Emergency Council for the ends and purposes stated in Act No. 16 of 1942, as amended by Act No. 181 of 1943." Next he asks for a "preliminary injunction containing the prohibitions aforesaid," to continue in effect "until the permanent injunction requested has been tried and decided," and finally he "requests that, pending the hearing of the request for injunction pendente lite" the court, upon the filing of a bond, issue "a restraining order containing the said prohibitions * * * in order to maintain the status quo" until the court "takes cognizance of the request for preliminary injunction, weighs the merits of the present relief, and renders the pertinent decision."

The Insular District Court did not give the plaintiff the instantaneous ex parte relief for which he asked, but instead, immediately upon the filing of the petition, ordered that notice thereof be served on the defendants and that they be summoned to appear on July 7, 1944, at 9 a. m. "to show cause, if any there be, why this court should not order the issuance of the preliminary writ of injunction requested." At the same time the district court ordered the parties to "come prepared to show to the court the legal basis, or lack of legal basis, for issuing immediately a restraining order, such as requested by the plaintiff, in the event that the court should reserve its...

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  • United States v. Baxter, Criminal No. 2017-24
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    ...of powers into the law of the territory' (quoting Kendall v. Russell, 572 F.3d 126, 135 (3d Cir. 2009)); Buscaglia v. Dist. Court of San Juan, 145 F.2d 274, 283 (1st Cir. 1944) ("We concede that the doctrine of separation of powers is implicit in the Organic Act of Puerto Rico[, which divid......
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