Davis v. Frederick County Bd. of County Com'rs

• Citation: 25 Md.App. 68,334 A.2d 165
• Decision Date: 12 March 1975
• Docket Number: No. 148,148
• Parties: Louise G. DAVIS et al. v. FREDERICK COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS et al.
• Court: Court of Special Appeals of Maryland

Page 68

25 Md.App. 68

334 A.2d 165

Louise G. DAVIS et al. v. FREDERICK COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS et al.

No. 148.

Court of Special Appeals of Maryland.

March 12, 1975.

Certiorari Denied June 25, 1975.

Herbert D. Morrison, Frederick, with whom was W. Milnor Roberts, Frederick, on the brief, for appellants.

Joseph S. Kaufman, Baltimore, with whom were Ralph L. Gastley, Jr., Frederick and Peter Max Zimmerman, Baltimore, on the brief, for appellees.

Argued before ORTH, C. J., and POWERS and DAVIDSON, JJ.

DAVIDSON, Judge.

Justice Benjamin N. Cardozo wrote in United States v. Memphis Cotton Oil Co., 288 U.S. 62, 67-68, 53 S.Ct 278, 280, 77 L.Ed. 619 (1933) that:

'A 'cause of action' may mean one thing for one purpose and something different for another. It may mean one thing when the question is whether it is good upon demurrer, and something different when there is a question of the amendment of a pleading or of the application of the principle of res judicata. . . . At times and in certain contexts, it is identified with the infringement of a right or the violation of a duty. At other times and in other contexts, it is a concept of the law of remedies, the identity of the cause being then dependent on that of the form of action or the writ. Another aspect reveals it as something separate from writs and remedies, the group of operative facts out of which a grievance has developed. This Court has not committed itself to the view that the phrase is susceptible of any single definition that will be independent of the context or of the relation to be governed.' (Citations and footnotes omitted.)

This case turns upon the definition of 'cause of action' as that term relates to the doctrine of res judicata.

The appellants, homeowners in the Urbana region of Frederick County, allege that they were injured and aggrieved when on 31 July 1973 the Frederick County Commissioners (Commissioners) enacted Ordinance P.U.D. 73-2 (P.U.D. Ordinance). This P.U.D. Ordinance approved the first stage of a planned unit development to be built on property (subject property) adjoining that of the appellants, which land had formerly been classified in the A-1 Agricultural zone. It was adopted pursuant to Frederick County Code, Article I, § 40-23, as amended (Enabling Act), which the Commissioners enacted originally in 1959. The Enabling Act authorized the Commissioners, in accordance with designated procedures and standards, to approve applications for planned unit developments within specified zoning classifications existing in Frederick County.

On 31 August 1973 in the Circuit Court for Frederick County, the owners of homes on property adjacent to the subject property and the Urbana Civic Association filed a 'petition for appeal' alleging insofar as here relevant that the Commissioners had employed improper procedures at the hearings on the application for the P.U.D. Ordinance, and that the action of the Commissioners in granting the P.U.D. Ordinance was unsupported by the evidence and was, therefore, arbitrary and capricious. The relief prayed was that the P.U.D. Ordinance be rescinded. That petition for a direct appeal was dismissed on 6 December 1973 for lack of jurisdiction, because the Enabling Act did not provide a right of appeal from the grant or denial of a planned unit development application. See Urbana Civic Association v. Urbana Mobile Village, Inc., 260 Md. 458, 463, 272 A.2d 628, 631 (1971).

On the same date the same adjacent property owners and the Civic Association filed a 'bill of complaint for declaratory relief.' Combined demurrers and answers were filed by the appellees, the Commissioners and the owners and developers of the subject property, which Judge Samuel W. Barrick sustained with leave to amend. An amended bill of complaint was then filed on 14 December 1973 which alleged, insofar as here relevant:

1. that the P.U.D. Ordinance was adopted pursuant to the Enabling Act;

2. that the adjoining property owners were aggrieved by the P.U.D. Ordinance as it 'will affect the quiet enjoyment and safety of their property by increasing traffic, noise and air pollution and by placing an intolerable strain on the natural water supply of the area all of which will result in greatly decreased property resale value as well as financial loss in drilling deeper wells on their properties'; and

3. that the Enabling Act was unconstitutional and/or violative of state statutes because it provided no right of appeal, was enacted in a closed executive session, and constituted 'spot zoning.'

The prayers for relief were as follows:

'1. To declare the Frederick County Ordinance codified at Article I, Chapter 40, § 40-23, of the Frederick County Regulations (the Enabling Act) to be invalid, null and void as being unconstitutional and improperly drawn and enacted.

'2. To declare the Ordinance of July 31, 1973, (the P.U.D. Ordinance) to be invalid, null and void.

'3. And for such other and further relief as to this Court may seem just and proper.' (Emphasis added.)

A demurrer was interposed which came on for hearing on 11 January 1974 before Judge John F. McAuliffe. In a memorandum opinion dictated from the bench Judge McAuliffe found, among other things, that 'by reason of the adoption of P.U.D. 73-2' the adjoining property owners had standing to challenge the validity of the Enabling Act. ¹ He concluded that a summary judgment should be granted since, there being no dispute as to the facts alleged, those facts, even if proven, would be insufficient to establish that the Enabling Act was invalid. On the same day he entered an order sustaining the demurrer and dismissing the bill of complaint. ²

On 18 January 1974 the same adjoining property owners filed a bill of complaint in which they again alleged that they were aggrieved as homeowners by the approval of the P.U.D. Ordinance. They further alleged that the Commissioners' approval of the planned unit development application was invalid because:

1. A finding of change and/or mistake, required by the Enabling Act, was not based upon substantial evidence and was arbitrary and capricious;

2. A finding that water and sewer facilities were available to the subject property, required by the Enabling Act, was not made, and could not have been made since the approved master water and sewer plan for the county did not show such facilities;

3. The phase one approval of this planned unit development was premture; and

4. Their procedural rights to a fair hearing had been violated.

The relief prayed was for the court to 'judicially review and rescind' the P.U.D. Ordinance. On 19 February 1974 the Commissioners and the owners and developers of the subject property filed an answer denying all of the allegations regarding the invalidity of the P.U.D. Ordinance and raising as special defenses the doctrines of collateral estoppel, election of remedies and res judicata. On that same day the appellees filed a motion for summary judgment. On 20 March 1974, after a hearing, Judge Barrick entered an order granting the motion for summary judgment. ³ It is from this order that the present appeal is taken.

The conclusive question to be decided here is whether under the doctrine of res judicata the judgment in the original declaratory judgment action, which upheld the constitutionality and validity of the Enabling Act, constitutes an absolute bar to the subsequent suit involving the same parties, which was brought to determine whether the P.U.D. Ordinance had itself been properly enacted. ⁴ We here hold that it does. ⁵

The doctrine of res judicata is designed to insure that litigation is brought to an end and to prevent harassment of an adversary by a multitude of actions. In Maryland the doctrine of res judicata, or estoppel by judgment, consists of two branches, direct estoppel by judgment and collateral estoppel by judgment. ⁶ Sterling v. Local 438, 207 Md. 132, 140, 113 A.2d 389, 393, cert. denied, 350 U.S. 875, 76 S.Ct. 119, 100 L.Ed. 773 (1955). The doctrine of direct estoppel is predicated upon the policy of the English common law that once a given matter becomes the subject of litigation in and of adjudication by a court of competent jurisdiction, the parties must bring forward their whole case and may not subsequently reopen the same subject of litigation in respect of another matter which might have been but was not brought forward. See Mettee v. Boone, 251 Md. 332, 341, 247 A.2d 390, 395 (1968); Alvey v. Alvery, 225 Md. 386, 391, 171 A.2d 92, 94 (1961); Henderson v. Henderson, 3 Hare 100, 115 (Eng.Chancery Ct.) (1843).

The doctrine of direct estoppel by judgment has been expressed in Maryland in different ways. While it has been said in Maryland that res judicata applies not only to the issues expressly decided in a prior case between the same parties but to every matter which might have been presented in that prior case, Garrett Park v. Montgomery County, 257 Md. 250, 257, 262 A.2d 568, 572 (1970), A. B. Veirs, Inc. v. Whalen, 256 Md. 162, 167, 259 A.2d 516, 519 (1969), Nutter v. Baltimore, 232 Md. 210, 213, 192 A.2d 477, 479 (1963), the doctrine of direct estoppel by judgment is not so broadly applicable. In several cases the Court of Appeals has defined the doctrine of direct estoppel somewhat more rigidly. Thus, in Sterling, supra, at 207 Md. 140-41, 113 A.2d 393, the Court of Appeals said:

'If the second suit is between the same parties and is upon the same cause of action a judgment in the earlier case on the merits is an absolute bar, not only as to all matters which were litigated in the earlier case, but as to all matters which could have been litigated.' (Emphasis added.)

See also Alvey, supra, at 225 Md. 390, 171 A.2d 94; Roberts v. Gates, Md.App., 330 A.2d 705, 710 (#391, September Term, 1974, filed 20 January 1975). In Lebrun v. Marcey, 199 Md. 223, 226-27, 86 A.2d 512, 514 (1952), the same concept was expressed in slightly different words when the Court...