Clerk of Court's Compensation for Lyon County v. Lyon County Com'rs

• Decision Date: 16 April 1976
• Docket Number: No. 45514,45514
• Citation: 241 N.W.2d 781,308 Minn. 172
• Parties: . LYON COUNTY COMMISSIONERS, Appellants. Supreme Court of Minnesota
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

Page 781

241 N.W.2d 781

308 Minn. 172

In Re The Matter of the CLERK OF COURT'S COMPENSATION FOR

LYON COUNTY, Minnesota,VS v. LYON COUNTY COMMISSIONERS, Appellants.

No. 45514.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

April 16, 1976.

Syllabus by the Court

1. Inherent judicial power grows out of express and implied constitutional provisions mandating a separation of powers and a viable judicial branch of government. It comprehends all authority necessary to preserve and improve the function of deciding cases, but it may not be asserted unless constitutional provisions are followed and reasonable legislative-administrative procedures are first exhausted. Intragovernmental cooperation remains the best means of resolving financial difficulties in the face of scarce societal resources and differences of opinion regarding judicial procedures.

2. The test to be applied when inherent power is asserted is whether the relief requested by the court or aggrieved party is necessary to the performance of the judicial function as contemplated in our state constitution. The test is not relative needs or judicial wants, but practical necessity in performing the judicial function. The test must be applied with due consideration for equally important executive and legislative functions.

3. Under the circumstances in this case, the action of the district court in setting the salary of the clerk of court was not a proper exercise of inherent power because: (1) Minn.Const. art. 6, § 4, expressly provides that the clerk's salary be controlled by the legislature; and (2) the legislature has provided a reasonable procedure in Minn.St. 485.018, subd. 7, whereby the clerk may appeal to the district court from the resolution of the county board establishing the salary and, after hearing, that court may adjust the salary. That reasonable procedure was not followed in this case.

Patrick J. Leary, County Atty., Marshall, for appellants.

Robert E. Schmidt, Judge of District Court, Rochester, seeking affirmance for Judges of 3rd Judicial District.

William J. Nierengarten, Austin, seeking affirmance for Minn. Assn. for Court Administration.

Heard and decided by the court en banc.

KELLY, Justice.

The members of the Lyon County Board of Commissioners appeal from an order of the judges of the Fifth Judicial District purporting to set the minimum annual salary of the clerk of the District Court of Lyon County at $16,700. ¹ We reverse.

The commissioners' dispute with the district judges raises an important issue of first impression in this state: Does the district court have the authority to set the minimum salary of the clerk of district court? Although the issue is a narrow one and of little apparent public significance, it contains within its compass the operation of the separation of powers within our state government. Our discussion of the issue begins with an examination of our Minnesota Constitution, which at the time of the order provided in art. 6, § 4:

'There shall be in each county one clerk of the district court, whose qualifications and duties shall be prescribed by law, and who shall serve at the pleasure of a majority of the judges of district court in each district. His compensation shall be provided by law.' ² (Italics supplied.)

Despite some early cases to the contrary, ³ it is now settled that 'by law' in the above-quoted section means by legislative enactment. See, State ex rel. Hennepin County Bar Assn. v. Amdahl, 264 Minn. 350, 353, 119 N.W.2d 169, 171 (1962). ⁴ It is beyond dispute that this was the intention of the framers of the judiciary article. Judicial Committee, Minn.Const.Comm., Preliminary Report on Revision of the Judiciary Article of the Minnesota State Constitution, 32 Minn.L.Rev. 458; Pirsig, The Proposed Amendment of the Judiciary Article of the Minnesota Constitution, 40 Minn.L.Rev. 815.

Pursuant to the above-quoted section, the legislature acted to provide for the clerk's salary in Minn.St. c. 485. ⁵ Minn.St. 485.018, subd. 1, establishes minimum annual salaries for clerks in counties of less than 75,000 population. For Lyon County (population 20,000 to 30,000), the minimum salary figure is $7,000. The county board of each county must set the clerk's salary annually by resolution according to § 485.018, subd. 2. If the clerk is dissatisfied with his salary as set by the board, he may appeal to the district court on the grounds that the board acted in an 'arbitrary, capricious, oppressive or unreasonable manner or without sufficiently taking into account the (extent of the) responsibilities and duties of the office of the clerk * * *.' § 485.018, subd. 7. Under an identical appeal statute governing salaries of sheriffs and their deputies, this court has held that the district court has broad discretion to adjust disputed salaries on appeal. In re Petition of Zillgitt v. Goodhue County Board, 295 Minn. 9, 202 N.W.2d 378 (1972); Cahill v. Beltrami County, 224 Minn. 564, 29 N.W.2d 444 (1947).

The judges of the fifth judicial district did not conform to the procedure set forth above, but chose to set the clerk's salary directly by order. Unless their action was authorized by some other statutory or constitutional source of power, it must be reversed. Two potential sources of power must be considered: (1) The district court's statutory authority to fix the clerk's salary on appeal; (2) the district court's inherent authority to provide for the salaries of its employees.

Amicus curiae Minnesota Association for Court Administration (whose brief has been adopted by the respondent district judges) ⁶ argues that since the district court has the statutory authority to set its clerk's salary on appeal, it may therefore do so directly by order. This is a non sequitur. Under Minn.Const. art. 6, § 4, the legislature is vested with the authority to set the clerk's salary. If it can set that salary absolutely, certainly it can prescribe the procedure by which that salary is set and mandate that the procedure be followed. State v. Town of Lake, 28 Minn. 362, 364, 10 N.W. 17 (1881).

The more serious question, as advanced by both amici curiae, ⁷ is whether the inherent power of the district court may serve as a basis for the order entered herein. We must consider this question in greater depth.

While the use of inherent judicial power to set the salary of a court employee would be new to Minnesota, the concept of inherent judicial power is not. This court described inherent judicial power in the following terms in In re Disbarment of Greathouse, 189 Minn. 51, 55, 248 N.W. 735, 737 (1933):

'The judicial power of this court has its origin in the constitution, but when the court came into existence, it came with inherent powers. Such power is the right to protect itself, to enable it to administer justice whether any previous form of remedy has been granted or not. This same power authorizes the making of rules of practice.'

Inherent judicial power governs that which is essential to the existence, dignity, and function of a court because it is a court. In re Integration of Nebraska State Bar Assn., 133 Neb. 283, 288, 275 N.W. 265, 267, 114 A.L.R. 151, 154 (1937). Its source is the constitutional doctrine of separation of powers as expressed and implied in our constitution. See, Minn.Const. art. 3, § 1; ⁸ art. 6, § 1. ⁹ Its scope is the practical necessity of ensuring the free and full exercise of the court's vital function--the disposition of individual cases to deliver remedies for wrongs and 'justice freely and without purchase; completely and without denial; promptly and without delay, conformable to the laws.' Minn.Const. art. 1, § 8; Galloway v. Truesdell, 83 Nev. 13, 20, 422 P.2d 237, 242 (1967).

At bottom, inherent judicial power is grounded in judicial self-preservation. Obviously, the legislature could seriously hamper the court's power to hear and decide cases or even effectively abolish the court itself through its exercise of financial and regulatory authority. If the court has no means of protecting itself from unreasonable and intrusive assertions of such authority, the separation of powers becomes a myth. Commonwealth ex rel. Carroll v. Tate, 442 Pa. 45, 55, 274 A.2d 193, 199, certiorari denied, 402 U.S. 974, 91 S.Ct. 1665, 29 L.Ed.2d 138 (1971). The recognition of these truisms has made the doctrine of inherent judicial power established law in virtually every American jurisdiction. ¹⁰ However, as with many legal doctrines, to uphold the existence of inherent judicial power in the extreme case does little to guide us in applying it to the numerous and varied financial and regulatory pressures imposed upon the courts. ¹¹

The focus in the instant case is upon a particularly important and sensitive aspect of inherent judicial power--the power to compel the payment of public funds for judicial purposes. While many cases have recognized that power in various contexts, ¹² two are particularly significant: O'Coin's, Inc. v. Treasurer of County of Worchester, 362 Mass. 507, 287 N.E.2d 608 (1972); Commonwealth ex rel. Carroll v. Tate, supra.

In O'Coin's, the petitioner, a retail appliance store, sought a writ of mandamus directing the county treasurer to pay $86 for a tape recorder and tapes it had sold to a trial judge for use in recording criminal trials. The judge had certified that the tape recorder was necessary to prevent closing of the criminal court because no reporter was available to record the proceedings. The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts issued the writ, holding:

'* * * (A)mong the inherent powers possessed by every judge is the power to protect his court from impairment resulting from inadequate facilities or a lack of supplies or supporting personnel. To correct such an impairment, a judge may, even in the absence of a clearly applicable statute, obtain the required goods or services by appropriate means, including arranging himself for their purchase and ordering the responsible...