State v. Brown

• Decision Date: 27 August 1923
• Docket Number: 17945.
• Court: Washington Supreme Court
• Parties: STATE ex rel. WORSHAM v. BROWN, Mayor, et al.

218 P. 9

126 Wash. 175

STATE ex rel. WORSHAM v. BROWN, Mayor, et al.

No. 17945.

Supreme Court of Washington

August 27, 1923

Department 2.

Appeal from Superior Court, King County; Griffiths, Judge.

Mandamus by the State, on the relation of W. E. Worsham, against Edwin J. Brown, Mayor of City of Seattle, and others. From a judgment of dismissal, relator appeals. Affirmed.

E. F Kienstra, of Seattle, for appellant.

Thos J. L. Kennedy, of Seattle, for respondents.

MAIN C.J.

The relator brought this action in mandamus in the superior court, seeking to compel the allowance and payment of a claim for salary. From the judgment entered, dismissing the proceeding, this appeal is prosecuted.

The appellant for some time prior to April 6, 1922, was a detective in the police department of the city of Seattle under the classified civil service, and on this day was discharged for cause by the then chief of police. After being discharged, he brought the matter before the civil commission of the city, and a hearing was had before that body, at which witnesses were sworn and testimony taken, with the result that on May 23, 1922, the commission entered an order sustaining the cheif of police in the removal of the appellant. Some time thereafter, and on October 11 1922, the appellant filed a motion for a new trial or rehearing with the commission. At this time one of the members of the commission at the time of the original hearing had been supplanted by the appointment of a new member. On December 12, 1922, the commission set the rehearing for the 19th day of that month, and at this time the appellant appeared with his counsel and witnesses, and the commission proceeded to hear the newly discovered evidence submitted by him, and an order was entered setting aside the previous order of May 23d, by which the appellant had been discharged, and reinstating him in his former position. On January 4, 1923, the police pay roll for the last two weeks of the previous month was submitted to the civil service commission and approved by that body. By this pay roll the compensation which the appellant had earned during the portion of the preceding month which he had served in his original position, after reinstatement, was allowed. Thereafter the matter of the allowance of the pay roll came before the auditing committee of the city, and the salary allowance to the appellant was by that committee disallowed and his name was stricken from the pay roll. The appellant then brought this action, seeking, as above stated, to require the approval of his claim for salary during the time that he had served after his reinstatement by the commission.

The sole question here to be determined is whether the civil service commission had the power, after entering a final order dismissing the appellant from the service, to entertain a motion for new trial or rehearing and review and set aside its prior order. If it had such power, the appellant is entitled to have his claim approved; if it did not have such power, the judgment of the superior court should be sustained. The civil service commission is created by and derives its authority from the city charter. It has only such powers as are there enumerated. There is no provision in the charter authorizing the commission to entertain motions for a new trial or grant rehearings after having once finally determined a matter. The question is then reduced to whether the commission had the inherent power to grant a new trial or a hearing, it not having expressly by the charter been given that power. The rules by which a court of general jurisdiction, either at common law or under a statute, may grant new trials are not controlling here, since the commission is not a court of general jurisdiction, but is a body of limited jurisdiction which acts in a quasi judicial capacity. The general rule is that courts of special and limited jurisdiction cannot sit in review of their own orders or vacate or annual them. McCoy v. Bell, 1 Wash. 504, 20 P. 595; State ex rel. Grimmer v. Spokane, 64 Wash. 388, 116 P. 878; Hitchcock v. Genesee Probate Judge, 99 Mich. 128, 57 N.W. 1097; Conley v. Upson, 197 A.D. 815, 189 N.Y.S. 473; People ex rel. Swedish Hospital in Brooklyn v. Leo, 120 Misc. 355, 198 N.Y.S. 397.

Under the rule stated, the civil service commission, having been created by the charter of the city of Seattle and not having been given power by the charter to grant new trials or rehearings, did not have the inherent power to do so. While it may be said that there is not unanimity in the authorities in making this application of the general rule, we are of the opinion that those authorities which hold that the civil service commission has not the inherent power to grant rehearings or new trials after once having finally disposed of a matter are better supported in reason. In volume 2 of McQuillin on Municipal Corporations...