Title: State Board of Optometry v. Lee Optical Co. of Ala.
Citation: 226 So. 2d 623
Docket Number: N/A
State: Alabama
Issuer: Alabama Supreme Court
Date: September 18, 1969

226 So. 2d 623 (1969)
STATE BOARD OF OPTOMETRY
v.
LEE OPTICAL COMPANY OF ALABAMA, Inc., et al.
3 Div. 266.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
September 18, 1969.
Thos. F. Parker, Theodore H. Hoffman and Richard A. Billups, Jr., Montgomery, for appellant.
Ball &amp; Ball, Montgomery, for appellees.
LAWSON, Justice.
The State Board of Optometry filed a bill of complaint in the Circuit Court of Montgomery County, in Equity, against Lee Optical Company of Alabama, Inc., a corporation, and against thirteen practitioners of optometry and one physician.
For present purposes, it is sufficient to say that the bill of complaint alleged, in effect, that all of the respondents were engaged in the unlawful practice of optometry in this state, in that the individual respondents were practicing optometry in *624 stores or establishments operated by the respondent Lee Optical Company under contracts of employment, agreements or arrangements with Lee Optical Company.
Aside from the prayer for process and the prayer for general relief, the bill prayed:
Lee Optical Company filed a plea in abatement. The other respondents jointly filed a plea in abatement.
The trial court rendered a decree sustaining the pleas in abatement, dismissing the bill of complaint and taxing the costs against the complainant. From that decree the State Board of Optometry, the complainant below, appealed to this court.
In brief filed here on behalf of appellees, the respondents below, it is said:
After submission in this court, the appellant filed a "Motion to Remand" the cause to the Circuit Court of Montgomery County because of the provisions of Act No. 509, approved September 7, 1967, Acts of Alabama 1967, Vol. II, p. 1225. Act 509, which became effective after the appeal in this case was submitted to this court, reads, including its title, as follows:
We denied the motion to remand, but such action did not indicate that we should not consider the provisions of Act 509, supra, in disposing of this appeal, because in connection with our denial of the motion to remand we provided as follows: "Appellant allowed 30 days to file supplemental brief on applicability of Act No. 509, 1967 Regular Session, Alabama Legislature to this appeal. Appellees allowed 20 days from service of Appellant's brief within which to file reply brief."
Act 509, supra, with the express provision that it is to be applied retrospectively, is obviously a curative act, designed to give the State Board of Optometry and similar regulating bodies the right to institute proceedings in the courts of this state to enjoin persons and corporations from the "unauthorized or unlawful practice of any profession, occupation, or calling."
If the said Act is to be given retrospective application, then we need not consider the action of the trial court in sustaining the pleas in abatement on the grounds (1) that the State Board of Optometry was without authority to sue in its own name, and (2) that injunction was not the proper remedy.
We have said that the legislature may, under the exercise of its police power for the protection of the public health and welfare, regulate the practice of optometry. McCrory v. Wood, 277 Ala. 426, 171 So. 2d 241.
But we are confronted with the question as to whether the legislature could make the provisions of Act 509, supra, here pertinent, applicable to the instant litigation, which was pending in this court at the time said Act was enacted into law.
Section 95 of the 1901 Constitution of Alabama provides, in pertinent part, as follows: "* * * After suit has been commenced on any cause of action, the legislature shall have no power to take away such cause of action, or destroy any existing defense to such suit." (Emphasis supplied)
We have held that the provisions of § 95, supra, which we have italicized above apply only to matters of substance and not to matters of form or to statutes which are remedial in nature. Skains v. Barnes, 168 Ala. 426, 53 So. 2d 268; Fuqua v. Fuqua, 268 Ala. 127, 104 So. 2d 925; Grand International Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers v. Green, 210 Ala. 496, 98 So. 569.
We entertain the view that a retrospective application of the pertinent provisions of Act 509, supra, would not affect any vested right of any of the respondents below; that said Act is remedial in nature, applying to matters of form, not to matters of substance. Skains v. Barnes, supra; Grand International Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers v. Green, supra; Fuqua v. Fuqua, supra; Cutter v. Waddingham, 33 Mo. 269; Berry v. Kansas City, Ft. S. &amp; M. R. Co., 52 Kan. 759, 34 P. 805; Holyoke v. Haskins, 9 Pickering (Mass.) 259.
In § 2218, Sutherland Statutory Constitution, 3d Ed., Vol. 2, pp. 144-145, it is said in part as follows:
The case of Bowles v. Strickland, 151 F.2d 419, is in some respects factually similar to the case at bar. There the Price Control Administrator brought suit against Strickland without the authority of the Secretary of Agriculture, although the federal law provided, in effect, that no such suit could be maintained by the Administrator or any other person without the prior approval of the Secretary of Agriculture. The United States District Court for the Middle District of Georgia granted Strickland's motion to dismiss the suit brought against him by Bowles, the Price Control Administrator, because said suit had been brought without the approval of the Secretary of Agriculture. The Administrator appealed to the United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, asserting error on the part of the District Court for reasons not here necessary to discuss. The United States Circuit Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit, reversed the District Court without considering the argument advanced for reversal by the appellant. The reversal was based on the ground that pending the appeal the Congress of the United States had enacted legislation which authorized the Price Control Administrator to institute such suits without the approval of the Secretary of Agriculture. We quote from the opinion of the United States Circuit Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit, as follows:
We hold, therefore, that the legislature in making the provisions of Act 509, supra, retrospective did not run counter to the provisions of § 95 of our Constitution which we have italicized above.
Our holdings in Horton v. Carter, 253 Ala. 325, 45 So. 2d 10; Land v. Cooper, 250 Ala. 271, 34 So. 2d 313; and Goulding Fertilizer Co. v. Blanchard, 178 Ala. 298, 59 So. 485, are not controlling here.
In view of the provisions of Act 509, supra, which we have concluded apply to the litigation presently under consideration, we remand the cause to the Circuit Court of Montgomery County, in Equity, with direction to set aside its decree sustaining the pleas in abatement.
LIVINGSTON, C. J., and MERRILL and HARWOOD, JJ., concur.