Case Name: McDERMOTT v. MAYOR & ALDERMEN OF SAVANNAH
Court: Court of Appeals of Georgia
Jurisdiction: Georgia
Decision Date: 1916-06-27
Citations: 18 Ga. App. 308
Docket Number: 7374
Parties: McDERMOTT v. MAYOR & ALDERMEN OF SAVANNAH.
Judges: 
Reporter: Georgia Appeals Reports
Volume: 18
Pages: 308–309

Head Matter:
7374.
McDERMOTT v. MAYOR & ALDERMEN OF SAVANNAH.
Judicial cognizance of ordinances of the City of Savannah, not set out in the petition for certiorari or in the answer, could not be taken by the ' reviewing court where it was sought to review by certiorari, a judgment of the recorder of that city in the case of one convicted of violating such ordinances; and the judge of the superior court did not err in dismissing the certiorari, on motion based on the failure to set out the ordinances.
Decided June 27, 1916.
Certiorari; from Chatham superior court — Judge Charlton. November 9, 1915.
The certiorari was dismissed by the judge of the superior court on motion based in part on the ground that “the ordinances, for the violation, of which the plaintiff in certiorari was tried in the municipal court, are not set out in the petition, either literally or in substance, and it is not alleged that there were no such ordinances.”
Robert L. Golding, for plaintiff in error,
cited the Code of 1882, § 4872, as to judicial cognizance of ordinances of Savannah, and Collins v. Russell, 107 Ga. 432.
R. J. Travis, D. 8.- Atkinson, contra, cited:
Mayor &c. of Savannah v. Jordan, 142 Ga. 409, 414; Hill v. Atlanta, 125 Ga. 697 (5 A. & E. Ann. Cases, 615, note): Woolley v. Louisville, 114 Ky. 556; Petit v. May, 34 Wis. 666; Central Sav. Bank v. Baltimore, 71 Md. 515; Winona v. Burke, 23 Minn. 254; Harker v. New York, 17 Wend. 201; Hall v. International &c. R. Co., 98 Tex. 100; International &c. R. Co. v. Hall, 35 Tex. Civ. App. 545; Collins v. Dalton, 12 Ga. App. 119; Howell v. State, 13 Ga. App. 74; Porter v. Thomasville, 16 Ga. App. 313; Grubbs v. Quitman, 16 Ga. App. 503; Davis v. Dublin, 17 Ga. App. 737.

Opinion:
Hodges, J.
In the recorder's court of the City of Savannah the plaintiff in error was convicted of the violation of certain ordinances, not disclosed by the record, and it is insisted on the part of the defendant in error that, these ordinances not being in the record, this court can not hold that the judge of the superior court erred in failing to sustain the certiorari. The plaintiff in error insists that under the charter of the city the ordinances of the City of Savannah are cognizable as State statutes. This court is bound by the decisions of the Supreme Court of the State, and in the ease of Mayor &c. of Savannah v. Jordan, 142 Ga. 414 (83 S. E. 109), in which counsel for both the plaintiff and the defendant cited an ordinance of the City of Savannah as throwing light on the question at'issue; it was held: "This court can not take judicial cognizance of the existence of the ordinances of a municipality, on demurrer, where such ordinances are not pleaded or set out." Therefore the ordinances should have been before the reviewing court in order that the court might intelligently pass upon the case. Hill v. City of Atlanta, 125 Ga. 697 (54 S. E. 354). The court did not err in dismissing the certiorari.
Judgment affirmed.