Hoopes v. Bradshaw
| Decision Date | 01 May 1911 |
| Docket Number | 201 |
| Citation | 80 A. 1098,231 Pa. 485 |
| Parties | Hoopes, Appellant, v. Bradshaw |
| Court | Pennsylvania Supreme Court |
Argued October 12, 1910
Appeal, No. 201, Oct. T., 1910, by plaintiff, from judgment of C.P. Beaver Co., June T., 1910, No. 192, for defendant on case tried by the court without a jury in suit of Charles Hoopes v. Charles W. Bradshaw, Prothonotary of Beaver County. Reversed.
Petition for mandamus. Before HOLT, P.J.
The case was tried by the court without a jury under the Act of April 22, 1874, P.L. 109.
The case turned upon the constitutionality of the Act of May 8 1909, P.L. 475.
Error assigned was in entering judgment for defendant and refusing mandamus.
The judgment is, therefore, reversed and the record remitted with direction that the mandamus issue as prayed for.
William B. Cuthbertson, with him Agnew Hice, Robert Ritchie, Frank E Reader and George A. Baldwin, for appellant.
Frank H. Laird for appellee. -- The admission of an attorney is a judicial act: Com. ex rel. v. Judges of Common Pleas of Cumberland County, 1 S. & R. 187; Com. ex rel. v. Judges of the District Court for the City and County of Phila., 5 W. & S. 272; Greenough v. Greenough, 11 Pa. 489; Ervine's App., 16 Pa. 256; Com. v. Aul, 18 Pa. Dist. Rep. 1040.
Before FELL, C.J., BROWN, MESTREZAT, POTTER, ELKIN, STEWART and MOSCHZISKER, JJ.
The appellant, a member of the bar of the Allegheny county courts and of this court, in good standing, presented his praecipe to the prothonotary of the court of common pleas of the court below for his appearance for the defendant in a certain proceeding therein pending. With his praecipe he exhibited a certificate of his admission on October 5, 1905, as a practitioner before this court. The prothonotary having refused to accept the praecipe and to recognize the appellant as a member of the bar of Beaver county, he applied to the court below for a mandamus directing that officer to do so. He based his application for the writ upon the Act of May 8, 1909, P.L. 475, which provides that admission "to practice as an attorney at law in the Supreme Court of this commonwealth shall of itself, without more, operate as an admission of such attorney as an attorney at law in every other court of this commonwealth, without any other or further action by such other courts or by such attorney." The writ was denied because in the judgment of the court below the act of 1909 was an unconstitutional interference by the legislature with a purely judicial function.
Nothing is clearer in the constitution than the separation of the legislative and judicial branches of our state government. Neither possesses the powers of the other, and any power inherent in the one cannot be exercised by the other. Judicial powers and functions are to be exercised by the judiciary alone, and a century ago in Commonwealth ex rel. Brackenridge v. Judges of Common Pleas, 1 S. & R. 187, it was held that the admission of an attorney to practice before a court is a judicial act. This has never been doubted or questioned since, and, if the act of 1909 is an encroachment upon the judiciary, it must be regarded as a vain attempt by the legislature to exercise a power which it does not possess. The learned court below, being of opinion from what was said in Splane's Petition, 123 Pa. 527, that the act was such an encroachment, pronounced it null and void.
What this court had before it in Splane's Petition was the Act of May 19, 1887, P.L. 131, which provided that any attorney at law duly admitted to practice in any court of common pleas and in the Supreme Court of this commonwealth should be admitted to practice in any other court of the commonwealth upon motion simply, by exhibiting to the court a certificate of admission to the Supreme Court and filing a certificate of the presiding judge of the county or district from which he came, setting forth that he was of reputable professional standing and of unobjectionable character. The question of the constitutionality of the act was not raised, and the mandamus for which Splane applied was refused because he had not complied with its provisions. The question before the court, as stated in the opinion denying the writ, was: "Whether the petitioner, after having twice presented himself before the duly constituted board of examiners, and having been twice rejected by them as not properly qualified to practice law, can, by procuring his admission in another county, aided by the act of assembly, compel his admission in the court where he has been rejected for incompetency." Upon two occasions Splane had been before the board of examiners of the county, and in each instance had been rejected as not being properly qualified to practice as an attorney. Subsequently he was admitted to practice in the court of common pleas of Cambria county, but it did not appear that he had ever resided or practiced in that county, or that he was even a citizen of the state. It was further discovered that the order admitting him to practice in this court had been improvidently made. The reason for denying him the writ is thus given in the opinion of the court: ...
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