Wederath v. Brant

• Decision Date: 23 January 1980
• Docket Number: No. 62248,62248
• Citation: 287 N.W.2d 591
• Parties: Leighton A. WEDERATH and Edna Wederath, his wife, Appellees, v. Larry BRANT and Anita Brant, his wife, Appellants.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

Page 591

287 N.W.2d 591

Leighton A. WEDERATH and Edna Wederath, his wife, Appellees, v. Larry BRANT and Anita Brant, his wife, Appellants.

No. 62248.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Jan. 23, 1980.

Robert L. Horak, of Reading, Pauley, Horak & Mumma, Jefferson, and David L. Phipps, of Whitfield, Musgrave, Selvy, Kelly & Eddy, Des Moines, for appellants.

David E. Green, Carroll, for appellees.

Considered en banc.

REYNOLDSON, Chief Justice.

We granted further review of a court of appeals decision which affirmed a district court decree awarding plaintiffs damages against defendants for holding over after the alleged termination of a farm lease. We vacate the court of appeals decision and remand to district court for dismissal.

Defendants were tenants on plaintiffs' Greene County farm under a written one-year lease which by its provisions terminated March 1, 1975. Defendants later asserted the lease was for three years and the lease did not conform to the agreement of the parties.

February 7, 1975, plaintiffs commenced a forcible entry and detainer action in Carroll County, alleging defendants had breached the lease contract by failing to pay a $4292.50 cash rental installment due November 1, 1974. February 18, 1975, defendants appeared specially and moved for a change of venue to Greene County pursuant to section 616.1, The Code 1973. This motion was granted February 24. Plaintiffs failed to cause the papers to be filed in Greene County within twenty days as required by Iowa R.Civ.P. 175(b). The record reflects this was not accomplished until April 24.

Nonetheless, plaintiffs filed a motion for summary judgment in Greene County on March 13, 1975. April 4, 1975, defendants filed a resistance to the motion and an answer denying the lease was for one year. The answer was amended on April 14. None of these instruments directed the court's attention to the rule 175(b) violation.

April 14, 1975, district court, Judge Ed J. Kelley presiding, sustained plaintiffs' motion, ordering "that the plaintiffs have judgment of removal . . . and the plaintiffs (be) in possession."

Defendants filed notice of appeal on April 18 and applied for a stay of the district court judgment. We granted the stay on condition that the defendants post supersedeas bond. They posted a $20,000 bond in each of the two years the appeal was pending.

March 16, 1977, we dismissed defendants' appeal as moot because even under defendants' three-year lease theory plaintiffs were entitled to possession.

May 2, 1977, plaintiffs filed notice of claim and lien on the two supersedeas bonds. A week later they filed a motion for adjudication of law points seeking to establish that they were entitled to possession as established by the 1975 district court judgment. They asserted that judgment was now "the law of the case" as our dismissal "was the same as an affirmance in favor of the Plaintiffs-appellees." This application was resisted. Plaintiffs additionally claimed for double rental value during the alleged holdover period under the provisions of section 562.2, The Code 1973.

September 14, 1977, district court, Judge Albert L. Habhab presiding, ruled the 1975 summary judgment, followed by our dismissal of the appeal, fixed the rights of the parties and foreclosed the issue of the duration of the lease. The court held plaintiffs were entitled to recover the reasonable rental value of the farm from the date of the judgment on April 18, 1975, to March 1, 1977, when possession was voluntarily surrendered by defendants.

April 6, 1978, plaintiffs filed a limine motion requesting the court to limit the trial evidence solely to the reasonable rental value of the farm during the holdover period. When trial commenced on April 19, 1978, this motion was sustained by district court, Judge Leo F. Connolly presiding. In the subsequent decree trial court did not award double damages for willfully holding over, but did award plaintiffs judgment for reasonable rental value of $18,700 for the crop year ending March 1, 1976, and $22,950 for the crop year ending March 1, 1977.

Defendants appealed, asserting trial court erred in foreclosing the issue of lease duration and right to possession. They claim the underlying summary judgment was void because plaintiffs' failure to comply with the rule 175(b) change of venue requirements deprived the Greene district court of jurisdiction and authority to enter the judgment. Defendants alleged other trial court error relating to damages which we need not consider. Plaintiffs cross-appealed, claiming trial court was wrong in not awarding double damages. The court of appeals affirmed, one judge dissenting.

I. Issue of district court jurisdiction.

Defendants contend the court of appeals should have reversed the district court's decree because the underlying judgment for removal was void, there being no action pending when the court made its ruling.

This rationale wells from Iowa R.Civ.P. 175:

175. Action brought in wrong county.

(a) An action brought in the wrong county may be prosecuted there until termination, unless a defendant, before answer, moves for its change to the proper county. Thereupon the court shall order the change at plaintiff's costs, which may include reasonable compensation for defendant's trouble and expense, including attorney's fees, in attending in the wrong county.

(b) If all such costs are not paid within a time to be fixed by the court, Or the papers are not filed in the proper court within twenty days after such order, the action shall be dismissed.

(Emphasis supplied.)

The parties agree the action was brought in the wrong county. Plaintiffs do not contend the Carroll County papers were filed in Greene County within twenty days from the order granting the venue change as required by rule 175(b). The record before us clearly shows this was not accomplished until two months later.

Our cases interpreting predecessor statutes to this rule hold that failure to file the papers within the time fixed results in dismissal of the action "by operation of law." See Halse v. La Crescent Grain Co., 231 Iowa 231, 236, 1 N.W.2d 202, 204 (1941); Chariton Finance Co. v. Wennerstrum, 226 Iowa 464, 466-67, 284 N.W. 375, 375-76 (1939); State ex rel. Havner v. Associated Packing Co., 216 Iowa 1053, 1058-60, 250 N.W. 130, 133 (1933); Hall v. Royce, 56 Iowa 359, 9 N.W. 295 (1881).

There is nothing in the record to show defendants raised this issue when the district court was considering the summary judgment motion in Greene County. The issue was raised in defendants' prior appeal from the resulting eviction judgment. Unfortunately, in a per curiam unpublished opinion, Uhlenhopp, J., dissenting, we dismissed the appeal on the ground of mootness.

Plaintiffs' defense to this jurisdictional contention is two-pronged: They assert this issue was not raised in trial court and therefore could not be raised on appeal, and second, when we dismissed the prior appeal the district court judgment "stood as a verity and would be res judicata until set aside, modified or reversed."

It is true, of course, that this controversy originated as a matter of venue, not jurisdiction. Venue itself is not jurisdictional, as "(a)n action brought in the wrong county may be prosecuted there until termination, unless a defendant, before answer, moves for its change to the proper county." Iowa R.Civ.P. 175(a) (in part). See also O'Kelley v. Lochner, 259 Iowa 710, 712, 145 N.W.2d 626, 627 (1966) ("Jurisdiction, as contrasted with venue, refers to the power of a court to decide an issue on its merits, whereas venue refers to the place where the cause sued upon should be tried.") (quoting Hulburd v. Eblen, 239 Iowa 1060, 1064, 33 N.W.2d 825, 827 (1948)); Iowa R.Civ.P. 103-104. We also recognize that subject matter jurisdiction ordinarily means the power to hear and determine cases of the general class to which the proceedings in question belong, not merely the particular case then occupying the attention of the court. Mauer v. Rohde, 257 N.W.2d 489, 495 (Iowa 1977).

Although the failure to comply with rule 175(b) may not invoke a subject matter jurisdiction situation in the traditional sense, we have held in such cases trial court had no authority or power to do anything other than to dismiss the case. Halse, 231 Iowa at 236, 1 N.W.2d at 204; Chariton Finance Co., 226 Iowa at 466, 284 N.W. at 376; Associated Packing Co., 216 Iowa at 1060, 250 N.W. at 133. In Chariton Finance Co., we annulled a writ of certiorari to the district court based on an order granting a change of venue, where the papers were not timely filed in the proper county, without considering whether the issue had been raised in district court.

Our cases decided under Iowa R.Civ.P. 215.1 are apposite. In those circumstances we have held "that when the time for (a 215.1) dismissal arrives, the case is dismissed automatically without formal action by either the court or the clerk. Failure to note the dismissal of record does not save the case." Brown v. Iowa District Court, 272 N.W.2d 457, 459 (Iowa 1978). In Werkmeister v. Kroneberger, 262 N.W.2d 295 (Iowa 1978), trial court proceeded to trial and judgment for plaintiffs in a case automatically dismissed under rule 215.1. No order of dismissal had been entered and the clerk had failed to delete the case from the docket. We reversed and remanded for judgment dismissing plaintiffs' petition, stating:

We do not reach the merits of this controversy because we decide the district court was without authority to entertain the suit following dismissal of the case under Rule 215.1, Rules of Civil Procedure.

Id. at 296. Our decisions have treated the rule 215.1 cases as involving the jurisdiction of the district court. See Baty v. City of West Des Moines, 259 Iowa 1017, 1022-23, 1026, 147 N.W.2d 204, 208, 210 (1966); Kutrules v. Suchomel, 258 Iowa 1206, 1212-13, 141 N.W.2d 593, 597 (1966).

Analyzing the case before us in light of the above...