City of Birmingham v. Edwards

93 So. 233, 18 Ala. App. 459, 1922 Ala. App. LEXIS 147
CourtAlabama Court of Appeals
DecidedApril 4, 1922
Docket6 Div. 895.
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 93 So. 233 (City of Birmingham v. Edwards) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Alabama Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
City of Birmingham v. Edwards, 93 So. 233, 18 Ala. App. 459, 1922 Ala. App. LEXIS 147 (Ala. Ct. App. 1922).

Opinion

BRICKEN, P. J.

Appellee, Edwards, was prosecuted upon a warrant returnable to the recorder’s court in the city of Birmingham. The warrant charged that the defendant “did treat, or offer to treat, the disease of a human being, without first having obtained a certificate of qualification from the State Board of Medical Examiners, contrary to and in violation of section 7564 of the Code of Alabama as amended by an act of the Legislature of Alabama approved September 22, 1915 (Acts 1915, p. 661), against the laws and ordinances of the city of Birmingham.” To this charge the defendant filed pleas as to the jurisdiction of the recorder’s court, the substance of the pleas being that the punishment fixed by the ordinance of the city of Birmingham (section 691 of the City Code) and the statute of this state (section 7564 of the Code) were inconsistent and repugnant each to- the other, and, second, that there was no ordinance or law of the municipality which authorized any punishment to be inflicted by the municipal court as for the offense charged. 'The cause was decided adversely to the appellee, or defendant in the recorder’s court, and he appealed from the decision and judgment to the circuit court of Jefferson county.

On appeal the city filed a complaint in the circuit court consisting of two-counts, which the reporter will set out in the statement of facts. To this complaint the defendant moved to strike the first count, because it was a departure from the original complaint or affidavit in the recorder’s court, in that the complaint in the recorder’s court was for a violation of the municipal ordinance, and that the first count of the complaint in the circuit court was for an offense against the laws of tlie state of Alabama, and on the further ground that the recorder of the city of Birmingham had no jurisdiction to try offenses against the state statutes. The circuit court sustained the motion to strike the first count of the complaint, to which action of the court the city of Birmingham excepted.

The defendant thereupon filed numerous pleas to the jurisdiction of the court and refiled the pleas which he had in the recorder’s court. These pleas sought to raise the question that the circuit court had no jurisdiction because the defendant was tried in the recorder’s court for a violation of the municipal ordinance, and also sought to have him tried in the circuit court as for a violation of a state statute. The city of Birmingham moved the court to strike the pleas from the file upon the ground that they were immaterial and frivolous, and that they set up no facts to constitute (a'plea as to the jurisdiction of the court, and that the pleas showed on their faces that the circuit court did have jurisdiction.

The court overruled the city’s motion to strike the pleas, and the city then demurred to the remaining pleas, all of which went to the jurisdiction of the court to hear the cause, and the court overruled the city’s demurrer to the pleas and sustained the pleas to the jurisdiction of the court, and. dismissed the prosecution, from which action, orders, and judgment of the court the city of Birmingham prosecutes this appeal.

We are constrained to hold that the circuit court erred in overruling the city’s demurrers to defendant’s pleas, which went to the jurisdiction of the court to hear and decide the prosecution against the defendant. There can be no doubt that the recorder of the city of Birmingham and the recorder’s court of that city had jurisdiction as to the person and subject-matter of the prosecution instituted against the defendant in the municipal court. Sections 1213-1229. These sections, being parts of the municipal Code of Alabama, and applicable to the city of Birmingham, vested the recorder with full jurisdiction in criminal and quasi criminal matters, and authorized such recorder to impose the penalties which were prescribed by ordinance for the violation of ordinances, and they also conferred upon the recorder the power of an ex officio justice of the peace and judge of county courts.

*461 These statutory provisions also confer power upon the recorders, upon conviction, to impose fine and imprisonment and sentence to hard labor. Likewise there can be no doubt-that the circuit court on appeal, which was prosecuted by the defendant (appellee here) had jurisdiction both as to the person and subject-matter of the prosecution. On appeal the statute provides that the case shall be tried de novo, and the judge of the appellate court may impose punishment by line, imprisonment, in the city jail, or other place of confinement, or hard labor for the city, or by fine and imprisonment, as the ■court or jury may deem proper, and as may be authorized by law.

The defendant having voluntarily appealed to the circuit court, he could not question the jurisdiction of the court to hear and -determine the appeal; but, of course, the prosecution being de novo, he had a right to ■demur to the complaint or file any proper and appropriate plea either in bar or abatement of the suit The Supreme Court of this state has settled the question, so far as this court is concerned, that section 691 of the City Code of Birmingham is not void. SlossSheffield Co. v. Smith, 175 Ala. 260, 57 South. 29; Fealy v. City of Birmingham, 15 Ala. App. 367, 73 South. 296; and Bracely v. Noble, 201 Ala. 74, 77 South. 368. It is expressly decided in these cases by the Supreme Court of this state that reference statutes are not void. The statutes of this state have authorized municipalities to provide that a violation of any misdemeanor statute of the state may be made a violation of the municipal ordinance of such municipality. Ordinances so providing have been held valid by the Supreme Court in the above cases. It was also decided in these cases that the fact that a municipal ordinance provided that a person guilty of a misdemeanor under state statutes should be guilty of a violation of the municipal ordinances also did not render the ordinance void merely because there may be misdemeanors, violations of the state statutes, which would be inapplicable to the exercise of municipal authority. The ordinances in such cases would not be void in toto, but void or inapplicable only in so far as the statute would be inapplicable to the ■exercise of municipal authority.

It has been likewise decided by the Supreme Court that the mere fact that the punishment for a violation of a municipal ordinance was different from the punishment for a violation of a state statute for the same acts or omissions which constituted a violation of both the ordinance and the state statute did not render the ordinance void in toto. To apply the principle to this case, the fact that the punishment as for a violation of section 7654 of Code 1907 is not identical or the same as that for the violation of the municipal ordinance in question would not render the ordinance void in toto, so as not to authorize any prosecutions thereunder in the municipal court, or in the circuit court on appeal, though the wrongful act or omission charged against the defendant was the same in both cases; that is, if the defendant did the apts charged in the affidavit or complaint in the recorder’s court, and also those charged in the complaint in the circuit court, the acts or omissions being the same, the mere fact that the ordinance prescribed a different punishment from that prescribed by statute did not render the ordinance void to such extent that it would not support a prosecution.

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Jones v. City of Daphne
519 So. 2d 587 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Alabama, 1986)
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93 So. 922 (Supreme Court of Alabama, 1922)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
93 So. 233, 18 Ala. App. 459, 1922 Ala. App. LEXIS 147, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/city-of-birmingham-v-edwards-alactapp-1922.