The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1907-07-23
THE COBWEB IN
A LEGAL MAZE
Application Refused; Shall 1t
Be ReOpened or
Reheard?

Perry IN the matter OF the applicdIloH
of NJ. c. Olvera for license for the
Cobweb saloon on Aiakea street. At
the public hearing on Olivera s ap-
plication no testimony was offered on
| his behalf because there were no pro-
tests nor objections that he knew of.
| The Board, however, refused his ap-
plication assigning the usual reason
i that in its opinion such action was in
the interest of the public welfare. This
was July TO- Soon afterwards Judge
| Perry. on behalf of Olivera, filed a
motion for a reopening of the case,
and in this application he stated as
grounds for its reopening that the
Board had acted on misapprehensions
of fact; that he been inadvertently
led into offering no evidence because
there had been no adverse communica-
tions or protests received by the Board,
so far as he knew; nor had there been
so far as he knew any complaint
against him at his former location on
Punchbowl, near Pauoa road. If the
case were reopened he offered to prove
that he had been a saloonkeeper for
two years on Punchbowl and had al
ways strictly complied with the law
nor had there ever been, so far as he
knew, any complaints to the police, of
his place; that the building where he
sought a license to do business was a
fit building for saloon, but that any
changes needed, in the opinion of the
Board, he would make; that the local
ity where he proposed to carry on a
saloon was a suitable locality, and that
the only other saloons near there were
those designated on map which he
made a part of his application; that
Robert Cation s objection to his ap-
plication was because Mr.. Cation was
opposed to saloons anywhere, and not
because he was opposed to saloons in
that locality more than anywhere else,
or because he thought that saloon would
be less desirable than the four other
SALOONS nearby.
This last statement in the appliea-
tion was put in because, while on the
record the application had been re-
fused "for the public welfare" it
had been stated that members of the
Board were opposed to the application
because of Cations objection.
In filing this application for re-
opening of the case, Judge Perry asked
for a time to be set when he could |
appear before the Board and argue the |
matter. The Board took the applica |
tion to be for rehearing of the case,
and not for a reopening of it, and
without appointing time for an oral
hearing denied the application. There
upon Judge Perry protested against a
decision of the case without an oppor-
tunity to be heard, and the Board di-
rected that the secretary should write
him stating that if he fled an applica-
ton for rehearing together with a
statement of whatever reasons he had
why a license should be granted, it
would be heard. Judge Perry, how
ever, appeared before the Board yes
terday to press his motion for re
opening of the case. He told the Board
that such motion was an ordinary and
a proper one in any tribunal, whether
court or commission, where the ascer-
tainment of fact and the application
of law was the duty of the court or
commission. In reply to the question
why he did not apply for a rehearing,
which was provided for by the law
while reopening of the case was not
he said that the law did
not make a rehearing the only way to
reach the matter; that reopening of
the case was an appropriate proceed
ing, used in all cases and more fitting
for this where the object was not to
hear the case de novo, but simply to
reopen it for the introduction of testi-
mony that. for reasons, was not pre-
scented on the original hearing
Surprising in the case where this
Board sat until midnight in a public
hearing" said Judge Perry, cit had,
after the hearing decided to grant my
client application; but before the
meeting dispersed Reverend or any
other man had got up and said that
the applicant had been guilty of run
ming a disreputable place, that knowl-
edge of this had just come to him,
and that he had three witnesses who
would testify to it, what would your
Board do2 What ought it to do but to
reopen the case and hear this new testi-
mony? Now, what you would do for
one side you should do for the other,
and that is what am here for. to ask ,
you to hear me and the argument l
offer why You should reopen this case.
If can convince you that you ought
TO reopen it, then I shall ask you to
set q time Whom oap ,,r,.o,+ 49,