Hanson v. N. Dakota Workmen's Comp. Bureau

• Decision Date: 20 May 1933
• Docket Number: No. 6008.,6008.
• Citation: 63 N.D. 479,248 N.W. 680
• Parties: HANSON v. NORTH DAKOTA WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION BUREAU.
• Court: North Dakota Supreme Court

63 N.D. 479

248 N.W. 680

HANSON

v.NORTH DAKOTA WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION BUREAU.

No. 6008.

Supreme Court of North Dakota.

May 20, 1933.

Syllabus by the Court.

H., a claimant against the Workmen's Compensation Fund, appealed to the district court from adverse action of the Workmen's Compensation Commissioners and there obtained an award “together with interest thereon.” The judgment was appealed to the Supreme Court, where it was attacked on its merits but not specifically as to the provision for interest, and it was affirmed.

(1) Under section 396a17 of the 1925 Supplement to the Compiled Laws of 1913, it is the duty of the Workmen's Compensation Bureau to pay final judgments out of the Workmen's Compensation Fund in the same manner as awards are paid by the bureau, and additional proceedings before the bureau may not affect matters that are concluded in a final judgment.

(2) Jurisdiction is the power to decide, and it does not depend upon whether the decision be right or wrong.

(3) Assuming that interest is not allowable under the terms of the Workmen's Compensation Act as a part of an award, the judgment of a court awarding interest is not void by reason of employing a wrong measure, and it is not subject to collateral attack.

(4) The continuing jurisdiction of the Workmen's Compensation Bureau, under section 396a18 of the 1925 Supplement to the Compiled Laws of 1913, to end, diminish, or increase compensation previously awarded, is a jurisdiction to modify awards with respect to payments falling due in the future in accordance with facts later found to exist, and, where an award has been made by a court and incorporated in a judgment, the continuing jurisdiction of the bureau must be exercised pursuant to and consistent with the judgment rendered and the continuing obligations and duties imposed upon the bureau.

(5) In the exercise of its continuing jurisdiction, the Workmen's Compensation Bureau may not review a final judgment of award, in so far as such judgment determines the right of the claimant up to the date of the judgment, and correct the same for errors of law inherent in its rendition.

(6) Chapter 286 of the Session Laws of 1927 and chapter 260 of the Session Laws of 1929, which contain the proviso “that if the disability be permanent total disability, the total amount payable shall not exceed ($15,000) fifteen thousand dollars,” are construed and held to limit the amount that may be paid out of the Workmen's Compensation Fund on account of any permanent total disability without regard to whether the same be paid out as compensation proper or as interest on a claim that did not ripen into an award until long after the filing thereof.

Appeal from District Court, Cass County; A. T. Cole, Judge.

Mandamus proceeding by Chris B. Hanson against the North Dakota Workmen's Compensation Bureau. From an order granting its peremptory writ, the defendant appeals.

Cause remanded with directions.

BURKE, J., dissenting.

Thomas J. Burke, of Bismarck, for appellant.

Lemke & Weaver, of Fargo, for respondent.

BIRDZELL, Judge.

Upon an appeal to the district court of Cass county from action of the board of compensation commissioners, the claimant Hanson obtained an award. From the judgment in his favor, an appeal was taken to this court. Hanson v. North Dakota Workmen's Compensation Bureau, 60 N. D. 220, 233 N. W. 900. Upon that appeal the judgment was attacked upon the ground that no order had been made by the commissioners from which an appeal to the district court was authorized. No other question concerning the judgment or award of the district court was raised. This court affirmed the judgment. The judgment provided as follows:

“That the plaintiff have and does hereby have and recover from the defendant compensation at the rate of $20.00 per week from September 28, 1920, together with interest thereon at the rate of 6% per annum and which compensation amounts to the sum of $12,281.10; further that he recover of the defendant his costs and disbursements as have been taxed and allowed by the Clerk of the above named Court in the sum of $332.50; further that the plaintiff recover from the defendant the sum of $500.00 as and for attorneys fees for his attorneys Lemke & Weaver, making a total judgment in the sum of $13,113.60 that the plaintiff does hereby have and recover of the defendant.”

A new judgment was entered on the remittitur on January 5, 1931, for $13,113.60, plus $37 costs, together with interest at the rate of 6 per cent. per annum on the prior judgment from December 26, 1929, until paid. Thereafter in January, 1931, the defendant paid a very substantial amount, apparently as compensation (the record before us is not clear as to the amount), and placed the plaintiff upon the “pension roll” for the payment of $20 per week for life but subject to the limitation in the Workmen's Compensation Act (§ 3, subd. c. as amended by Laws 1929, c. 260), which fixes $15,000 as the maximum amount payable from the fund under any award. The plaintiff brought the instant mandamus proceeding to compel the payment of the balance of the judgment and obtained a peremptory writ. The defendant appeals.

The basic contention of the appellant here is that the award made by the judgment of the district court, which was affirmed in this court, is subject to modification by the Workmen's Compensation Commissioners to the end that it may be made to conform to the law in respect to matters embraced within it which were not questioned on the former appeal. More specifically, the appellant questions so much of the judgment as is represented by interest on unpaid compensation prior to the making of the award.

The appellant concedes that, if the action of the court in awarding interest was erroneous merely and did not transcend the jurisdiction of the court, the judgment became final; but it is argued that the court had no jurisdiction to impose interest and that, consequently, the judgment including it was to that extent void and is, hence, subject to collateral attack, though subsequently affirmed by this court. Upon the hypothesis that the foregoing contentions be not sustainable, the further contention is advanced that under the continuing jurisdiction, provided for in section 18 of the Compensation Act (Comp. Laws Supp. 1925, § 396a18), the commissioners “have the right to review and disregard said judgment upon the matter of interest, or upon any other matter going to the administration of the act, except Hanson's right to participate in the fund.”

Section 396a17, 1925 Supplement to the Compiled Laws of 1913, in providing for judicial review in cases where a claim is denied upon any ground going to the basis of the claimant's right, makes it the duty of the court to “determine the right of the claimant; and if it determines the right in his favor, [it] shall fix his compensation within the limits prescribed in this act”; and then it is provided that any final judgment so obtained shall be paid by the Workmen's Compensation Bureau out of the Workmen's Compensation Fund in the same manner as awards are paid by such bureau. This language is so plain that argument is not needed to demonstrate that the jurisdiction of the court to fix compensation in any case properly before it is as extensive as the jurisdiction of the bureau. It does not contemplate additional proceedings before the bureau affecting matters determined in a final judgment. The duty of the bureau is to pay such judgment as it pays its own awards. We shall hereinafter consider the scope of the continuing jurisdiction of the bureau in such cases. The first question is the extent to which the judgment of the court is binding.

It is said that the act nowhere provides for the allowance of interest as part of the compensation to be awarded, and that hence the court, in awarding it, acted beyond its jurisdiction in that it did not fix the compensation “within the limits prescribed” by the act. The duty of the court to fix compensation necessarily involves a judicial determination of the limit prescribed for the case in hand and, inasmuch as the act defines the measure of the compensation, the court, in applying such measure, under the appellant's argument, determines a question of jurisdiction.If it be assumed, then, that the court exceeds the jurisdiction conferred when fixing a measure of compensation in excess of that provided in the law, it errs in the decision of a jurisdictional question. In entering up its judgment, the court could not avoid defining the limit of the claimant's compensation. If it thought that a prescribed measure of compensation had been unduly withheld and that therefore the general statute (section 7142, Compiled Laws of 1913), under which interest is recoverable as compensatory relief, was applicable, it would at most have made an erroneous decision as to the measure of the recovery, or it would have misconstrued the power intended to be conferred–but not the power to decide the question as to the measure of compensation.

[1] Jurisdiction is the power to decide and it does not depend upon whether the decision be right or wrong. 15 C. J. 729; Christenson v. Grandy, 46 N. D. 418, 426, 180 N. W. 18;Calhoun v. Bryant et al., 28 S. D. 266, 133 N. W. 266. The following expression from the opinion of the court in Calhoun v. Bryant et al., supra, page 271 of the state report and page 269 of the Northwestern Reporter, aptly expresses the doctrine applicable to the case in hand: “When parties are before the court and present to it a controversy which the court has authority to decide, a decision not necessarily correct, but appropriate to that question, is a proper exercise of judicial power or jurisdiction. So far as the jurisdiction itself is concerned, it is wholly immaterial whether the decision upon the particular question be correct or incorrect. Were it held that a court had ‘jurisdiction’ to render only correct decisions, then, each...