Sacharoff v. Murphy

182 Misc. 235, 44 N.Y.S.2d 117, 1943 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 2398
CourtNew York Supreme Court
DecidedSeptember 8, 1943
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 182 Misc. 235 (Sacharoff v. Murphy) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New York Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Sacharoff v. Murphy, 182 Misc. 235, 44 N.Y.S.2d 117, 1943 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 2398 (N.Y. Super. Ct. 1943).

Opinion

Walter, J.

A preliminary question arises, however, as to whether the claim that there was no competent proof of the fact of fee-splitting makes it necessary to transfer the case to the Appellate Division for hearing by it; and that question, although apparently merely one of practice, raises two substantial questions of considerable importance: 1. Did petitioner have a statutory right to a hearing? 2. If not, is he entitled to a judicial review of the legal competence of the evidence adduced against him?

Section 1296 of the Civil Practice Act specifies seven questions as the only ones involving the merits which can be determined in a proceeding in, this court against a body or officer exercising judicial, quasi-judicial or administrative or corporate functions. After first enumerating five questions it provides: “ Where the determination under review was made as the result of a hearing held, and at which evidence was taken, pursuant to statutory direction, the following questions shall also be determined.” Then there follows the enumeration of the sixth and seventh questions, the sixth being ‘‘ Whether there was any competent proof of all the facts necessary to be proved in order to authorize the making of the determination.” The section further provides that where only one or more of the first five issues are raised the court to which the application for relief is made shall itself dispose of the cause on the merits, and that “ Where one of the other two issues is raised, the court shall make an order directing that the proceedings be transferred for disposition to a term of the appellate division held within the judicial department embracing the county in which the proceeding is instituted.”

It is entirely clear that the direction that the sixth and seventh questions “ shall also be determined ” is applicable only where the hearing was had " pursuant to statutory direction ”. If [239]*239a hearing has been accorded as a favor only, and not pursuant to statutory direction, there is no requirement that the question whether there was any competent proof shall be determined. But what is meant by the provision that where that question is “ raised ” the court shall order the proceeding transferred to the Appellate Division? Does that mean wherever a party to the proceeding in fact makes the contention that there was no competent proof? Or does it mean only when the section’s direction that such question shall be determined is applicable, i.e., where the hearing was had pursuant to statutory direction? If the former be the correct meaning then transfer or non-transfer depends upon the act of the parties in making or not making a certain contention, whereas if the latter be the correct meaning then transfer or nontransfer depends upon the nature of the proceeding as being one to review a determination made as the result of a hearing pursuant to statutory direction.

The consequences of a decision one way or another as to the correct meaning of the word “ raised ” as so used in section 1296 are more fundamental and far-reaching than might appear at first blush, for as I view it the question is, not merely whether the Appellate Division makes the review in the first "instance or this court makes it subject to a later appeal to the Appellate Division, but whether a party affected by a determination made as a result of a hearing not held pursuant to statutory direction has any right to any review at all of the question whether there was competent proof of all the facts necessary to be proved in order to authorize the determination. The result thus may be that if the hearing which was accorded petitioner was not held pursuant to statutory direction, then he cannot question the existence of any competent proof. That, of course, would not mean that he is entitled to no judicial review at all of the action of the Commissioner, but it would mean that he could successfully review it only by showing that it was arbitrary and capricious as distinguished from showing merely an absence "of legal evidence.

Article 78 of the Civil Practice Act, under which proceedings of this sort are brought and which contains section 1296 above referred to, was enacted to provide a uniform and simplified method of obtaining at least three entirely different kinds of relief from at least three entirely different kinds of acts by boards and officers exercising judicial, quasi-judicial, and administrative functions; but just as the abolition of forms of action nearly a century ago has not eliminated the substantial differ[240]*240enees between actions at law and suits in equity, so, too, the great procedural reform accomplished by the enactment of article 78 has not abolished substantial differences arising out of different substantive rights. Judicial action and administrative action are still two different things which cannot be put in the same mould; and the necessity for avoiding undue judicial interference with administrative discretion and at the same time protecting individuals from unauthorized administrative action still makes it necessary to make sharp distinctions between things which are essentially unlike although having similarities which • sometimes lead the unthinking-to regard them as the same. The fact that many businesses, professions and occupations have been brought by the State under some form of administrative control does not mean that all are or should be controlled in the same way or to the same extent. I think it safely may be said that no citizen in respect of any of his substantive rights is outside the pale of judicial protection from arbitrary or capricious action on the part of administrative officers. I think, too, that administrative action taken without some basis Which would lead a reasonable and honest man to such action is to be regarded as arbitrary and capricious. But it does not follow that no administrative action by such officers can be taken except upon such legal evidence as would justify a finding of fact in a judicial proceeding before a judge or jury.

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Related

Hood Restaurant, Inc. v. Wallander
186 Misc. 254 (New York Supreme Court, 1945)
Sacharoff v. Murphy
268 A.D. 765 (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York, 1944)
Schiffman v. Corsi
182 Misc. 498 (New York Supreme Court, 1944)

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Bluebook (online)
182 Misc. 235, 44 N.Y.S.2d 117, 1943 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 2398, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/sacharoff-v-murphy-nysupct-1943.