Kreutner v. State

• Decision Date: 29 June 1918
• Docket Number: 3 Div. 369
• Citation: 202 Ala. 287,80 So. 125
• Parties: KREUTNER v. STATE.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

80 So. 125

202 Ala. 287

KREUTNER v. STATE.

3 Div. 369

Supreme Court of Alabama

June 29, 1918

Rehearing Denied Nov. 14, 1918

Certiorari to Court of Appeals.

Henry Kreutner was convicted of crime, and, the conviction being affirmed by the Court of Appeals, defendant brings certiorari. Judgment of Court of Appeals reversed, and cause remanded.

See also, 80 So. 127.

McClellan Gardner, and Thomas, JJ., dissenting.

Goodwyn & McIntyre, of Montgomery, for appellant.

F. Loyd Tate, Atty. Gen., and David W.W. Fuller, Asst. Atty. Gen for the State.

SAYRE J.

The act "to regulate and prescribe the method of securing jury trials in civil causes at law and in misdemeanors, and to prescribe how such causes shall be tried without the intervention of a jury and reviewed" (Acts 1915, p 939), was one of a number of acts passed at the same session of the Legislature through which ran a general purpose to provide a remedy for a situation described by the judiciary recess committee in part as follows:

"Our procedure is almost as varied as the number of courts and burdened by many technicalities which hamper rather than promote justice." House Journal, vol. 1, p. 1571.

Section 1 of the act provided:

"That in all civil causes at law in the circuit court the issue and question of fact shall be tried by the judge of the court without the intervention of a jury unless a jury trial be demanded," etc.

Section 2 of the act provided:

"That in all misdemeanor causes in the circuit court, the issue and question of fact shall be tried by the judge of the court without the intervention of a jury except in causes where a trial by jury is demanded," etc.

True, that about eight months previously, within five days of the beginning of its session, while there were in various parts of the state inferior courts, each with its own peculiar jurisdiction and procedure, and before the reform of our judicial system had gathered headway, the same Legislature had done its part in the passage of the act approved January 23d, 1915 (Acts, p. 8 et seq.), commonly known as the act for the enforcement of the prohibition laws of the state, section 32 of which provided that--

"If the prosecution is begun in a court in which jury trials are provided for, the defendant may at the time he gives bond or within five days thereafter file in the cause a demand for trial by jury, or if he does not give bond, he may within five days after his arrest file in the court a demand for a jury trial, in which event such jury trial shall be allowed."

There is also the rule of interpretation, referred to in City Council of Montgomery v. National Building & Loan Ass'n, 108 Ala. 342, 18 So. 816,

"things general do not derogate from things special"; but all such rules are useful only in cases of doubt, and in such cases other rules may come into play. To say that a general act is to be construed as not repealing a particular one--that is, one directed towards a special object or a special class of objects--is but to make a particular application of the general presumption against an intention to alter the law beyond the immediate scope of the statute. Endlich, Interp. Stat. § 223.

If the legislative intention were in doubt, another principle of construction would conduce to the conclusion that the later was intended to modify the earlier act in respect to the waiver of trial by jury, a principle founded in a proper and necessary judicial bias against the renunciation of a valuable common and constitutional right: Where such a right is involved, the construction must lean with all reasonable favor to the accused and the right asserted. Cross v. State, 78 Ala. 430; Curlee v. State, 75 So. 268. In Alford v. State ex rel., etc., 170 Ala. 178, 54 So. 213, Ann.Cas.1912C, 1093, Mayfield, J., has made a statement of the authorities which shows with what jealousy the courts have guarded the right of trial by jury in criminal cases. The construction here in question involves the right of trial by jury.

The question of implied repeal is one of implied intention, and the precise question at issue is whether the later statute intended to prescribe a uniform rule in cases of misdemeanor. The circumstances attending the passage of these two acts which are known of all men even where they are not matters of legislative record, the fact that the Legislature was engaged in a general effort to bring about uniformity in the courts of the state and in their procedure, add, if possible, to the force of the language of the latter act which in terms affects "all misdemeanor cas...