Grimball v. C. W. Parham Co.
Grimball v. C. W. Parham Co.
Opinion of the Court
The opinion of the Court was delivered by
This was an action in the Civil and Criminal Court of Charleston commenced February 26, 1912, for damages for the taking of certain personal property and for punitive damages. The cause was tried before *445 the Judge of the said Court and a jury on December 3, 1912, and resulted in a verdict in favor of the plaintiff for $150, and judgment being entered thereon the defendant appealed to the Circuit Court, and the cause was heard by his PTonor, Judge Shipp, and judgment affirmed. Defendant appeals and asks reversal of the same.
Exceptions one and two are as follows:
1. “Because an act entitled ‘An act to amend sections 1423, 1425, 1429 and 1433 of volume I of the Code of 1912, as amended by an act entitled “An act to amend an act entitled ‘An act to establish a Civil and Criminal Court in the county of Charleston, to be known as the Civil and Criminal Court of Charleston,’ ” in that said act, creating the Court, together with all acts amendatory thereof, are unconstitutional, null and void, for that the same is in conflict with article V, section 1, of the Constitution of 1895, and, therefore, said Court had no jurisdiction to hear or determine said cause or to render judgment therein.
2. “Because the defendant, having raised the point that the Civil and Criminal Court of Charleston was a Court organized and constituted without authority of law, said Court had no jurisdiction to hear and determine said cause, and the judgment thereof should have been overruled and reversed.”
“All Courts from which an appeal lies are inferior Courts in relation to appellate Court before which their judgment may be carried, but they are not, therefore, inferior Courts in the technical sense of those words. They apply to Courts of special and limited jurisdiction which are erected on such principles that their judgments, taken alone, are entirely disregarded, and the proceedings must show their jurisdiction.”
“We think, therefore, that the term ‘Inferior Court,’ as used in the Constitution, is to be accepted as referring to the technical language usually employed to designate it, and not to be understood as importing that it is inferior only bécause its judgments may be corrected by an appellate tribunal. It does Hot, however, follow that such ‘other 'inferior Courts’ are to be of a more ■limited jurisdiction than the Courts of justice of the peace. It is by the authority of the Constitution that they are to be establshed and if by the same section it had already provided for a Court, which is already recoginzed as an inferior one, it clearly *448 shows an intention not to limit such Courts to one expressly named, but to1 leave it to- the discretion of the legislature to multiply them if in its judgment necessary.” * * *
“No matter what inferior Courts are established by the Constitution and it makes no difference in this respect whether 'other’ is to refer to the Court of a justice of the peace or to 'municipal Courts’ power is given to the General Assembly to establish inferior Courts to any extent they may deem necessary.” This is not a county Court.
We think this is conclusive and these exceptions are overruled.
Exception three is overruled for the reasons assigned by Judge Shipp in his Circuit decree.
Judgment affirmed.
Reference
- Cited By
- 2 cases
- Status
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- Syllabus
- 1. Civil and Criminal Court of Charleston — Statutes.—The act of 1913 amending the act of 1912 creating the Civil and Criminal Court of the county of Charleston can have no effect on the validity of the Court as constituted under the act of 1912 in the trial of a case therein before the enacting of the amendment. 2. Ism. — Constitutional Law. — The Civil and Criminal Court of the county of Charleston is not a county Court but an “inferior Court” in the sense in which those words are used in the Constitution, and is authorized by section 1 of art. Y of the Constitution of 1895. 3. CoNTiKUAitCE. — The defendant did not bring himself within the rule in his motion for continuance in not showing the witnesses had been duly subpoenaed.