State v. Rowe
| Decision Date | 02 December 1930 |
| Citation | 131 So. 331,100 Fla. 1382 |
| Parties | STATE ex rel. MICKLE et al. v. ROWE, Judge. |
| Court | Florida Supreme Court |
Proceeding by the State, on the relation of E. L. Mickle, as liquidator of the Merchants' Bank & Trust Company, and others, for mandamus to be directed to M. G. Rowe, Judge of the Seventh Judicial Circuit.
Writ granted.
Hull, Landis & Whitehair, of De Land, for petitioners.
M. G Rowe, of Daytona, in pro. per.
October 22, 1930, E. L. Mickle, as liquidator of the Merchants' Bank & Trust Company, filed in the circuit court of the Seventh judicial circuit of Florida a petition for an order approving a compromise adjustment of a debt between said Merchants' Bank & Trust Company and Merchants' Holding Company; the said debt being evidenced by a note and mortgage executed by Merchants' Holding Company. Simultaneously with the filing of the petition as above application was made to Hon. M. G. Rowe, judge of the said Seventh judicial circuit, for an order of disqualification to consider the said petition or make any order thereon, which order of disqualification the said M. G. Rowe did then and there refuse to make.
On petition of relators, alternative writ of mandamus was granted by this court commanding the said M. G. Rowe to forthwith make an order certifying his disqualification to consider the said petition for an order approving the compromise adjustment of the debt between Merchants' Bank & Trust Company and Merchants' Holding Company. The return to the alternative writ admits the material allegations thereof and states as a fact that respondent has consistently held himself disqualified in the past and that he will in the future refuse to exercise jurisdiction in any matter in which the Merchants' Bank & Trust Company is a party, but that he refused to sign the order of disqualification therein because he felt that the matter should be set at rest by an adjudication of this court.
The sole question raised by the pleadings herein is whether or not respondent as judge of the circuit court of the Seventh judicial circuit of Florida can be required to certify his disqualification to exercise jurisdiction in the matter of the compromise adjustment of the debt between Merchants' Bank & Trust Company and Merchants' Holding Company was commanded in the alternative writ.
Section 2525, Revised General Statutes of 1920 (section 4152, Compiled General Laws of 1927), defines the disqualification of the judges in this state and is as follows:
'No judge of any court shall sit or preside in any cause to which he is a party or in which he, or any person related to him by consanguinity or affinity within the ninth degree is a party, or is interested in the result thereof; nor shall any judge sit as a court in any cause in which he is related within the third degree of consanguinity or affinity to either of the attorneys or counsellors of either party to any cause.'
The alleged disqualification of Judge M. G. Rowe in the instant case grows out of the fact that at the time the Merchants' Bank & Trust Company closed he was a depositor therein, though said deposit amounted to not exceeding five or six dollars. The record also shows that Judge Rowe...
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Livingston v. State
...and place the judiciary in a compromising attitude which is bad for the administration of justice. State ex rel. Mickle v. Rowe, 100 Fla. 1382, 1385, 131 So. 331, 332 (1930). In Florida, there are four separate expressions concerning the disqualification of trial judges, which are set forth......
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Peters v. Jamieson
...State ex rel. Douglas v. Superior Court, 121 Wash. 611, 209 P. 1097; State v. Brown, 8 Okl.Cr. 40, 126 P. 405; State ex rel. Mickle v. Rowe, 100 Fla. 1382, 131 So. 331. These were the issuance of a memorandum by the judge which in effect invited motions for separate trials and to which ther......
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Spencer v. State
...cold neutrality of an impartial judge," and a court has the duty "to scrupulously guard this right." (quoting State ex rel. Mickle v. Rowe, 100 Fla. 1382, 1385, 131 So. 331 (1930) )); J.L.D. v. State, 4 So.3d 24, 26 (Fla. 2d DCA 2009) ("The requirement of judicial impartiality is at the cor......
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Spencer v. State, 2D14–316.
...cold neutrality of an impartial judge,” and a court has the duty “to scrupulously guard this right.” (quoting State ex rel. Mickle v. Rowe, 100 Fla. 1382, 1385, 131 So. 331 (1930) )); J.L.D. v. State, 4 So.3d 24, 26 (Fla. 2d DCA 2009) (“The requirement of judicial impartiality is at the cor......