Rutledge v. Workman
| Decision Date | 10 July 1985 |
| Docket Number | No. 16582,16582 |
| Citation | 332 S.E.2d 831,175 W.Va. 375 |
| Court | West Virginia Supreme Court |
| Parties | Phyllis J. RUTLEDGE, etc. v. Margaret WORKMAN, Judge, etc. |
Syllabus by the Court
1. It was the intention of the framers of the judicial article (Article VIII) of the W.Va. Const. that the clerk of a circuit court, although an independently elected, public official, be subject to the direction and control of the circuit court of the county in which she serves or of the chief judge of that county's circuit court with regard to her court-related duties.
2. The judicial article (Article VIII) of the W.Va. Const. creates the office of clerk of the circuit court and the circuit clerk is an officer within the judicial system; therefore, the hierarchy of administrative control established by W.Va. Const. art. VIII, § 3 that reposes overall administrative authority for the entire judicial system in the Supreme Court of Appeals by and through its Chief Justice and Administrative Director, and thereafter reposes local administrative authority in the circuit court through the judge or chief judge of each circuit also controls the office of circuit clerk with regard to the clerk's judicial functions.
3. A circuit judge has complete control of the deputy circuit clerk assigned to her court and a circuit clerk may be removed from office under W.Va.Code 6-6-7 [1923] for failing to comply in the utmost good faith with the directions of the circuit court.
Michael R. Cline, Charleston, for petitioner.
Allan H. Masinter, Lewis, Ciccarello, Masinter & Friedberg, Charleston, for respondent.
The issues presented by this case concern the role of the Clerk of the West Virginia Circuit Court, the proper exercise of the Court's jurisdiction and administrative authority, and the inherent dignity of the circuit court itself. The petitioner, Phyllis J. Rutledge, is the Clerk of the Circuit Court of Kanawha County and the respondent, Margaret Workman, is a Judge of that Circuit Court.
This novel prohibition proceeding arose when Judge Margaret Workman entered an order prohibiting the transfer of Ms. DeeAnn Hill, one of Mrs. Rutledge's Deputy Circuit Clerk's, out of Judge Workman's court to other duties. Judge Workman's order was then ratified by an order of the Chief Circuit Judge, A. Andrew MacQueen. Although Mrs. Rutledge admits that W.Va.Code 6-3-1(a)(1) [1971] requires Court approval before she may hire personnel initially, she asks us to vindicate her position that she has absolute, complete, and unfettered discretion to fire, assign, and reassign personnel in the office of the circuit clerk.
The record before us consists of depositions of Chief Judge A. Andrew MacQueen, Mrs. Rutledge, Deputy Clerk DeeAnn Hill, and Judge Workman's verified answer to the petition. From these documents we glean that the Circuit Court of Kanawha County and the office of its circuit clerk is a daily battleground for sordid, unnecessary, and debilitating political in-fighting. This particularly concerns us because Kanawha County has a population of roughly 231,414 inhabitants, is the seat of State government, is the largest county in the State, and is the residence of most state officials. Accordingly its court is crowded with important government matters arising in mandamus, prohibition or certiorari, and appeals from administrative agencies.
Kanawha County has seven circuit judges who run initially at-large in party primary elections and then run again at-large in general elections. The judges have eight-year terms and the clerk of the circuit court, who is also nominated and elected in partisan elections, has a six-year term. This selection process for judges and clerks thrusts the court system, albeit much to the court system's chagrin, into the daily give and take of both party politics and factional politics.
The Governor appointed Judge Margaret Workman to office in November, 1981 and at that time Mrs. Rutledge was already the elected circuit court clerk. During the first months of her tenure, Judge Workman labored without the benefit of a courtroom clerk until March 1982 when Mrs. Rutledge assigned Mrs. Iris Brisendine. Mrs. Brisendine performed capably and to Judge Workman's complete satisfaction. After a year, however, Mrs. Rutledge re-assigned Mrs. Brisendine to the court of Judge Robert K. Smith and assigned Ms. Louise Owenby, who had been Judge Smith's clerk, to Judge Workman. Both Judge Workman and Judge Smith objected in writing to this exchange of clerks, but Mrs. Rutledge ignored their request for cooperation. In her deposition, Mrs. Rutledge acknowledged that Ms. Owenby was "not a good courtroom clerk," but Mrs. Rutledge made no attempt to discharge Ms. Owenby or to re-assign her to other duties. Nonetheless, Judge Workman worked with Ms. Owenby and after awhile found her courtroom work acceptable.
Chief Judge MacQueen testified that he attempted to intercede at the time Mrs. Rutledge transferred Mrs. Brisendine and replaced her with Ms. Owenby, but that Mrs. Rutledge refused to reconsider the matter. Furthermore, according to Judge MacQueen, Mrs. Rutledge's reason for making the transfer was that Ms. Brisendine's loyalties were being transferred to Judge Workman and it was necessary for Mrs. Rutledge to re-establish "who was boss."
In February 1984, Mrs. Rutledge transferred Ms. Owenby from Judge Workman's court and replaced her with Ms. Jacqueline Ray. Judge Workman soon discharged Ms. Ray for rank insubordination and disrespect to the judge in the presence of others. Nevertheless, three days later Mrs. Rutledge re-employed Ms. Ray as a staff assistant without any serious inquiry into the circumstances surrounding Ms. Ray's dismissal by Judge Workman.
After Judge Workman had Ms. Ray removed as an officer of her court, there was a period between February and May 1984, during which Judge Workman was without a regularly assigned courtroom clerk. Because she often was forced to work with more than one clerk during the course of a single judicial day, Judge Workman repeatedly asked Mrs. Rutledge's administrative assistant to assign a deputy clerk to her court on a permanent basis. Finally in May, 1984, Ms. DeeAnn Hill was assigned to Judge Workman.
In November 1984, however, Mrs. Rutledge notified the judges that she would transfer various courtroom clerks, including Ms. Hill. Upon receiving that notice, Judge Workman entered her order prohibiting the transfer of Ms. Hill without the court's approval, and the record clearly shows that from the point of view of proper judicial administration, the order was more than justified. Not only was Judge Workman's efficiency impaired by the assignment of incompetent clerks to her court, and the transfer of competent clerks out of her court, but also on many occasions her court's efficiency was impaired by the absence of any clerks whatsoever.
Other events add credence to Judge Workman's side of the case. Judge MacQueen testified that Mrs. Rutledge transferred Ms. Micky Amick, Judge MacQueens' courtroom clerk, and replaced her with Mr. Joseph Schirrman, Mrs. Rutledge's son-in-law. Judge MacQueen described Ms. Amick as "probably the best clerk I have ever had ... because of her proficiency, her willingness to learn, ... and her ability to work together with me, with my secretary, my bailiff, and my court reporter." According to Judge MacQueen, the performance of Mrs. Rutledge's son-in-law has been less than stellar.
The record in this case is replete with accusations, counter-accusations, and other billingsgate concerning the relation of personnel decisions in the circuit clerk's office to factional politics in Kanawha County. None of that information, however, is relevant to the disposition of this case. We are asked only to decide today whether the clerk of a circuit court is part of that court and subject to the direction of the chief circuit judge, or, on the contrary, whether the clerk is an independent, elected official with unbridled discretion over the administration of her office. The respective merits of political positions in a county have no bearing on a principled resolution of that issue. We find that the law on this subject is clear: the circuit clerk, although elected by the voters, is completely subject to the control of the chief circuit judge of the circuit court and failure to follow to the letter and in the utmost good faith the direction of the judge or chief circuit judge is grounds for removal from office. Furthermore, a circuit judge has complete control of the deputy circuit clerk assigned to her court.
As this case presents a question of first impression, there is only a small corpus of case law to guide our decision. But this is not to say that we are without instruction. The structure of our judiciary, as prescribed by the Constitution of the State of West Virginia, provides us with both a compass and a command.
The paucity of authority on the subject in this jurisdiction is related to the fact that the problem was unlikely to have arisen before the Judicial Reorganization Amendment of 1974 that rewrote our Constitution's judicial article. Before 1974 there was but one circuit judge in each of West Virginia's fifty-five counties, and that allowed for little confusion about who was in charge of the court system. W.Va. Const. art. VIII, §§ 10-15 (1880, amended 1974). A circuit clerk ignored the directions of the circuit judge at considerable peril. In some counties the legislature had, indeed, created inferior courts such as criminal courts, domestic relations courts, or common pleas courts, but the supreme judicial power within the county was held by one elected circuit court judge who was responsible for initial appellate review of the decisions of all statutory courts and controlled the judges of inferior courts through writs of prohibition and mandamus. W.Va. Const. art. VIII, §...
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