Title: In re VT Supreme Court Admin. Directive No. 17

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

NOTICE:  This opinion is subject to motions for reargument under V.R.A.P. 40
as well as formal revision before publication in the Vermont Reports.
Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Vermont Supreme
Court, 111 State Street, Montpelier, Vermont 05602 of any errors in order
that corrections may be made before this opinion goes to press.
 
 
                          Nos. 90-102 and 90-122
 
 
In re Vermont Supreme Court                  Supreme Court
Administrative Directive No. 17
and Harriet and Donald Smith,                Original Jurisdiction (90-102)
et al.
 
           v.                                On Appeal from
                                             Chittenden Superior Court (90-122)
The Vermont Supreme Court,
The Honorable Frederic W. Allen,
The Honorable Louis P. Peck,                 May Term, 1990
The Honorable Ernest W. Gibson III,
The Honorable John A. Dooley,
The Honorable James L. Morse,
in their Individual Administrative
Capacities as Justices of the
Vermont Supreme Court
 
 
Alden T. Bryan, J. (90-122)
 
John F. Evers of Langrock Sperry Parker & Wool, Middlebury, Jerome F.
  O'Neill of O'Neill and Crawford, Burlington, and Deborah T. Bucknam,
  St. Johnsbury, for petitioners/appellants
 
Jeffrey L. Amestoy, Attorney General, and Robert W. Gagnon and Marilyn
  Skoglund, Assistant Attorneys General, Montpelier, for respondents
 
 
PRESENT:  Gibson, Dooley and Morse, JJ., and Barney, C.J. (Ret.) and
          Keyser, J. (Ret.), Specially Assigned
 
 
     BARNEY, C.J. (Ret.), Specially Assigned.   Petitioners brought a
petition for extraordinary relief under V.R.A.P. 21 seeking a declaration
that an administrative directive of this Court ordering the delay of most
civil jury trials until after July 1, 1990 for budgetary reasons is
unconstitutional.  Petitioners were also plaintiffs in a superior court suit
seeking substantially the same relief and have appealed the dismissal of
that action.  We dismiss the petition for extraordinary relief and affirm
the dismissal of the superior court action.
     On January 11, 1990 this Court issued Administrative Directive No. 17,
entitled "Temporary Postponement of Civil Jury Trials," which stated as
follows:
         The resources available to the Judiciary have been
         drastically reduced for the remainder of fiscal year
         1990.  Accordingly, each superior and district court
         judge and clerk is hereby ordered to postpone until
         after July 1, 1990 any civil jury case for which the
         jury has not yet been drawn.
 
         The administrative judge is hereby authorized to permit
         the trial of any given case where justice requires, but
         it is envisioned that nearly all civil jury cases will
         be delayed.
 
         This directive shall become effective on January 22,
         1990.
 
     There is no dispute over the motivation for the issuance of
Administrative Directive 17.  Financial problems within the State of Vermont
caused the Governor and Legislature to order rescissions -- that is,
reductions in the preexisting appropriations for government agencies.  The
Governor ordered a 2% reduction in appropriations shortly after the fiscal
year began.  In January, 1990, the House of Representatives cut the current-
year budget of the Judiciary by another $127,000.  In anticipation that this
further cut in appropriated funds would be adopted by the Senate, as it was,
the moratorium was adopted along with a number of other cost-cutting
measures because the funds available were not enough to cover the
anticipated costs for the judicial department's programs.
     In Docket No. 90-122, litigants in thirteen superior court cases
throughout Vermont brought individual actions and a class action in the
Chittenden Superior Court pursuant to V.R.C.P. 65 and 75, purporting to
represent all individuals with civil cases pending in the Vermont superior
and district courts and whose cases were, or would be, affected by
Administrative Directive 17.  Plaintiffs asked the court to declare the
Directive invalid and to direct the restoration of civil jury trial cases to
the affected calendars.  Defendants were the Supreme Court itself, the
justices in "their individual administrative capacities," the Court
Administrator, and each superior and district court clerk.
     The evidence before the superior court was sparse.  There was no
testimony on the effect of the moratorium on the individual plaintiffs or on
the average length of time between readiness for trial and the trial date.
There was no proof that any of the plaintiffs sought, as was explicitly
permitted, an exception from the order for their individual cases.  An
expert witness for the plaintiffs testified that the moratorium would have a
significant detrimental effect on the lives of many of the plaintiffs
because they will forego needed health care in order to take care of
themselves and their families.   Administrative Judge Stephen B. Martin
testified that of the approximately 400 cases at issue, only a relatively
few would be set under the exceptions clause in Administrative Directive 17.
He also emphasized that after the moratorium expired on July 1, 1990, an
emphasis would be placed on jury work so that he expected any delay in
holding jury trials would disappear by January 1, 1991.
     Upon completion of the evidence, the trial court granted defendants'
motion to dismiss on a number of grounds, including that the superior court
lacked authority to grant relief in the nature of mandamus as to an order of
the Supreme Court.  Although the court did not reach the issue of
constitutionality, it concluded that the Directive did not create a blanket
moratorium.  The present appeal followed.
     In addition to the appeal from the superior court decision, the same
plaintiffs filed an original action in this Court, Docket No. 90-102,
seeking extraordinary relief pursuant to V.R.A.P. 21 and a declaration that
the civil jury moratorium was unconstitutional.  The complaint described the
circumstances of the individual plaintiffs.  In two cases, the complaint
alleged that a request for an exception from the moratorium had been made
but not acted upon.  In one case, the complaint alleged that such a request
had been denied.
     The defendants in this action were the Court and its members "in their
individual administrative capacities."  In an earlier opinion, this Court
denied a motion to disqualify members of the Court from sitting on the case
and dismissed the claim against the Justices of the Court as individual
parties.  We consolidated the appeal in No. 90-122 and the petition for
extraordinary relief in No. 90-102 for hearing on May 14, 1990.
     Before addressing the specific issues raised by petitioners, it is
helpful to set out what this case is not about.  At argument, the
petitioners asserted that this Court has the inherent power to order the
Legislature to appropriate money for "reasonably necessary" expenditures of
the Judiciary and could have done so in this case.  See Note,  The Courts'
Inherent Power to Compel Legislative Funding of Judicial Functions, 81
Mich. L. Rev. 1687 (1983); see also In re Union County Judicial Budget
Impasse, 87 N.J. 1, 2, 432 A.2d 807, 807 (1981) (following hearing before
fact-finding panel, Supreme Court directed county board to amend budget of
county judiciary to implement recommendations approved by the court).  While
this proposition may be true, no party has sought to bring the legislative
or executive branches into this controversy, and the complaints are solely a
challenge to this Court's power to issue the Administrative Directive.
Thus, the power of the Legislature or of the Governor to reduce the
Judiciary's budget is not before us.
     Similarly, there is no dispute about the emergency and temporary
circumstances that brought about Administrative Directive 17.  A retroactive
reduction in appropriation to support the courts necessarily means that
there must be an immediate reduction in expenditures in some way.  On the
other hand, as the administrative judge testified, the Directive under
challenge is effective only until July 1st, and scheduling after that date
can shortly bring the processing of civil jury trials to the point where it
would have been if the Directive had not been issued.  Thus, this case
involves a temporary delay in the availability of civil jury trials, not
either a permanent waiting period between readiness for trial and the start
of trial or a denial of jury trial.
     Having eliminated what is not before us, we can focus on what is before
us.  For this purpose, we will treat the case before us as the petition for
extraordinary relief filed directly in this Court.  Except to draw from its
limited record, the parties have all but ignored the appeal from the
superior court dismissal, which as we indicated above, was not on the merits
of the case.  Since the superior court appeal adds nothing to petitioners'
arsenal, it is unnecessary to treat the jurisdictional and procedural issues
raised therein.
     At issue in this case are the scope and meaning of the two Vermont
constitutional provisions that relate to the availability of civil jury
trials in the State.  Chapter I, Article 12 of the Vermont Constitution
provides as follows:
            That when any issue in fact, proper for the
         cognizance of a jury is joined in a court of law, the
         parties have a right to trial by jury, which ought to be
         held sacred.
 
     Chapter II, { 38 of the Constitution provides: (FN1)
            Trials of issues, proper for the cognizance of a Jury
         as established by law or by judicial rules adopted by
         the Supreme Court not inconsistent with law, in the
         Supreme Court, the Superior Court and other subordinate
         courts, shall be by Jury, except where parties otherwise
         agree; and great care ought to be taken to prevent
         corruption or partiality in the choice and return, or
         appointment of Juries.
 
     The central substantive question before this Court is whether
Administrative Directive 17 denies the right to trial by jury or fails to
keep it "sacred" as required by Chapter I, Article 12 or Chapter II, { 38.
     In order to reach this question, we must find that petitioners are
properly before this Court in their V.R.A.P. 21 petition.  Extraordinary
relief is a flexible procedure that provides an avenue "for relief when
other avenues are foreclosed."  Crabbe v. Veve Assoc., 145 Vt. 641, 643,