Lovern v. Brown

390 S.W.2d 448, 1965 Ky. LEXIS 350
CourtCourt of Appeals of Kentucky
DecidedMarch 12, 1965
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 390 S.W.2d 448 (Lovern v. Brown) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Kentucky primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Lovern v. Brown, 390 S.W.2d 448, 1965 Ky. LEXIS 350 (Ky. Ct. App. 1965).

Opinion

HILL, Judge.

The appellant, Division of Boating, adopted a regulation pursuant to KRS 235.-320 to become effective February 15, 1963, which provided, among other things, that:

“2. No vessel shall operate, moor or be used within 100 feet of the Kentucky Dam generator water exhaust chutes.”

The appellees, licensed commercial fishermen, filed this action in the Marshall Circuit Court, in which they charged the regulation in question was void and that they were entitled to injunctive relief against its enforcement. The appellees desire to conduct their commercial fishing enterprise within the restricted area because the fish are plentiful in this area and there is an abundance of feed in the form of cut up fish as they pass through the turbines. Appellees contend there is no hazard from boats operating within the restricted area.

The Marshall Circuit Court heard evidence in the case and entered judgment granting the relief sought. The Division of Boating, Glenn Lovern, Commissioner of Department of Public Safety, and other defendants, now appellants prosecute this appeal.

[449]*449We shall refer in this opinion to the appellants as Commissioner, and to the appel-lees, A. C. Brown, et al., as appellees.

The Commissioner assigns the two following grounds for reversing the judgment of the trial judge:

1. The regulation is a valid exercise of police power.

2. This regulation does not involve unconstitutional delegation of authority.

KRS 235.280 provides as follows:

“The division, with the approval of the Commissioner of Public Safety, shall promulgate rules and regulations to govern:
“(a) The fair, reasonable, equitable and safe use of all waters of this state by the fishing public and the boating public of whatever nature or activity involved;
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“(c) The safe use and operation of all boats, floating docks, skiing ramps, slides or similar devices on any waters of this state.”

KRS 235.320 empowers the division to make regulations as follows:

“The division, with the approval of the head of the department, may promulgate any rules and regulations not inconsistent herewith to carry out the purposes of this chapter.”

We should define at the very outset the scope of the power of the trial judge and this Court to upset a regulation of an agency, such as the Division of Boating in this case.

We start with the premise that the regulation, with which we are concerned here, is one in the exercise of the police power of the State. To be valid it must be within the limits contemplated by the above quoted statutes, and it must be reasonable. In American Jurisprudence 2d, Volume 2, section 296, under Administrative Law, it is said:

“It is stated as general propositions that rules or regulations of an administrative agency must be within the limitations of the law for the enforcement of which they are provided and must be reasonable; that the validity of a rule or regulation depends upon whether the administrative agency was empowered to adopt the particular rule and, if so, whether the rule, is reasonable; and that rules and regulations will be upheld where they are within the statutory authority of the agency and reasonable, or that they must be sustained unless unreasonable and plainly inconsistent with the statute. Only when discretion has been arbitrarily exercised, resulting in injustice or unfairness, do the courts intervene to strike down a rule promulgated by the proper agency designated to give appropriate effect to the provisions of the act involved.”

We conclude the regulation is a valid exercise of the police power of the State and that it is well within the contemplations and limitations of the statutes above quoted.

Appellees argue that the regulation in question should be invalidated because it is unreasonable, arbitrary and uncertain of determination, and because it violates Section 60 of the Constitution of Kentucky, which prohibits any law or regulation to take effect upon the approval of any authority other than the General Assembly.

It may well be said that the enormous growth of government the past few decades has witnessed a gradual liberalization of our construction of Sections 27, 28 and 29 of the Constitution of Kentucky. In State Racing Commission v. Latonia Agricultural Association, 136 Ky. 173, 123 S.W. 681, 25 L.R.A.,N.S., 905 (1909), the Court said:

“In all cases the Legislature selects the subject, and indicates the public [450]*450policy with respect thereto. The subject is thereby brought within governmental control. Its free indulgence is deemed harmful. To so determine is the exclusive prerogative of legislation. The selection of the persons, places, and times, and the regulation of the conditions upon which it is to be exercised, are matters of executive detail, which may be, and which are always, delegated to the ministerial body * * * ” See also Craig v. O’Rear, 199 Ky. 553, 251 S.W. 828 (1923); Sturgill v. Beard, Ky., 303 S.W.2d 908 (1957), and Sims v. Reeves, Ky., 261 S.W.2d 812 (1953), and Guthrie v. Curlin, Ky., 263 S.W.2d 240 (1953).

More recently the Court said in Commonwealth v. Associated Industries of Kentucky, Ky., 370 S.W.2d 584 (1963):

“Experience has demonstrated some of the power must be invested in other bodies so that the government may function in a world that progressively is becoming more complex. There is nothing wrong with this so long as the delegating authority retains the right to revoke the power. * * *
■ “We have decided we will meet this problem with full recognition that legislative power often has been delegated, with full court approval, and it is not necessary to disguise such action in form of expression or words which have no verity.”

Appellees may be assured we have considered Section 60 of the Constitution, as well as the eight cases cited by appellees.

It is our conclusion the regulation in question is not invalid because its effectiveness depends upon approval by an authority other than the General Assembly, as appellees contend.

Turning now to the evidence before the trial judge, keeping our eye on the squirrel to determine whether the regulation is reasonable, we find six witnesses testifying for the appellees. They were all licensed commercial fishermen.

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390 S.W.2d 448, 1965 Ky. LEXIS 350, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/lovern-v-brown-kyctapp-1965.