la Fera v. Watts, 225.

• Decision Date: 03 December 1931
• Docket Number: No. 225.,225.
• Citation: 157 A. 672
• Parties: LA FERA, Overseer of the Poor v. WATTS et al.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

157 A. 672

LA FERA, Overseer of the Poor

v. WATTS et al.

No. 225.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

Dec. 3, 1931.

Bastardy proceedings by Frank La Fera, Overseer of the Poor, in behalf of Elizabeth Finhandler, against William Sherwood Watts. From judgment for defendant (7 N. J. Misc. R. 889, 148 A. 180), plaintiff brings certiorari.

Writ dismissed.

Argued May term, 1931, before TRENCHARD, DALY, and DONGES, JJ.

Joseph A. Fuerstman, of Newark (M. M. Albach, of Newark, of counsel), for prosecutor.

Edward Al. & Runyon Colie, of Newark, for defendant William Sherwood Watts.

PER CURIAM.

This writ, sued out by the overseer of the poor, brings up an order and judgment made by the Essex county Juvenile court finding the defendant in a bastardy proceeding not guilty and discharging him.

By the first and second reasons, the constitutionality of section 1, of chapter 175 of P. L. 1922 (Comp. St. Supp. § 53—215a(7), purporting to confer jurisdiction on the Juvenile Court, is challenged: First, on the ground that the Bastardy Act (P. L. 1898, c. 241, p. 959) and the supplements or amendments thereto (1 Comp. St. 1910, p. 184, § 1 et seq., and Supplements) conferred no jurisdiction on said court to try bastardy cases; second, because it does not express in its title that it is an amendment or supplement to the act of 1898, chapter 241; third, because it constituted an amendment of the Bastardy Act by reference to title only; fourth, because it is unworkable, unintelligible, and inoperative.

The singular feature of this case is that the prosecutor challenges the jurisdiction of the court whose aid he invoked by his complaint.

The act in question has been construed by this court and the first section thereof sustained as constitutional. The second section was declared unconstitutional because it undertook to give the juvenile court cognizance of a complaint by the mother of the child or by two disinterested persons without the intervention of the overseer of the poor, while the Bastardy Act provides that the complaint must be made by the overseer of the poor, and this provision was not disclosed by the title. This was decided in Fautz v. Juvenile Court in and for Essex County, 142 A. 350, 352, 6 N. J. Misc. R. 586. That must be taken in this court as settling the question of the constitutionality of the act, exclusive of the second section, as to which the court said: "We think the second section of the statute may be exscinded, in that it was enacted in violation of the constitutional provision above referred to, and the first section, conferring jurisdiction on the juvenile court, in bastardy cases, be permitted to stand."

As construed in Fautz v. Juvenile Court, supra, the act gives to the judge of the juvenile court, sitting as a magistrate, concurrent jurisdiction with the magistrates who...