Opinion ID: 1173523
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Do those words of section 170 apply to appellate judges?

Text: Fifty years ago, after noting that for thirty earlier years California had left the question of bias to be determined solely by the challenged judge, a commentator reported: Section 170 ... was changed by the Legislature in 1927 in a number of material respects, and particularly in regard to who is authorized to pass on the question of the disqualification of THE TRIAL JUDGE because of his alleged bias or prejudice. (Comment, Judges: Disqualification for Bias: Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 170 (1932) 20 Cal.L.Rev. 312, 313, emphasis added.) Yet the last paragraph of this court's per curiam opinion in Giometti v. Etienne (1934) 219 Cal. 687, 689 [28 P.2d 913] reads: Petitioners also suggest that section 170 of the Code of Civil Procedure does not apply to justices of appellate tribunals, and that the sole ground for this disqualification is stated in section 170a, providing that none may act in any cause which he tried in a lower court. There is nothing in the statute to indicate such a limited interpretation, and without express legislative exception, appellate judges must be deemed subject to the rules applicable to judges generally. (Italics added.) In that last sentence, what exactly was meant by the words appellate judges must be deemed subject to the rules applicable to judges generally? Clearly the court was discussing the grounds for disqualification, not the appropriateness of or requirements for disqualification procedures. (See the first of the two quoted Giometti sentences.) We have found no citable precedent where any Court of Appeal justice or justices undertook to disqualify a colleague. [2] Further, during the past 55 years  so far as we have been able to ascertain  only rarely have appellate justices who disqualified themselves made any declarations and filed memoranda pursuant to these words in the first unnumbered paragraph that follows Code of Civil Procedure section 170, subdivision 5: Whenever a judge or justice shall have knowledge of any fact or facts, which, under the provisions of this section, disqualify him to sit or act as such in any action or proceeding pending before him, it shall be his duty to declare the same in open court and cause a memorandum thereof to be entered in the minutes or docket.  (Italics added, and note particularly the words in open court.) The first sentence of Code of Civil Procedure section 170, and also of its subdivision 5, contain the phrase justice or judge. Together those two sentences read: No justice or judge shall sit or act as such in any action or proceeding ... 5. When it is made to appear probable that, by reason of bias or prejudice of such justice or judge a fair and impartial trial cannot be had before him.  (Italics added.) Appellate justices rarely conduct a ... trial of the kind the Legislature seems to have had in mind. Further, their formal proceedings are before a multiple-person court, not before him. The words trial, before him, before another judge, and some other judge nonetheless appear in all but one of the six unnumbered paragraphs. The penultimate paragraph of those unnumbered six concludes, when there are two or more judges of the same court, one of whom is disqualified, the action or proceeding may be transferred to a judge who is not disqualified.  (Italics added.) That clause certainly applies to trial courts only. If the words of section 170 were applied to an appellate judge, what exactly would be the progression of events? Pursuant to the third unnumbered paragraph, for example, should he file with the clerk his consent in writing that the action or proceeding be tried before another judge (italics added)? (See too the introductory clause of the fifth unnumbered paragraph.) Would the cutoff date for counsel's objection be the commencement of the hearing of any issue of fact in the action or proceeding before such judge (see fourth unnumbered paragraph; italics added)? Appellate justices rarely hear issues of fact. Similarly, were we to uphold Justice Burke's three orders, should our command (pursuant to the fifth unnumbered paragraph) be that the proceedings now therefore be heard and determined by another judge or justice not disqualified ...? (See sixth unnumbered paragraph.) Substantially all words in the fifth unnumbered paragraph seem to imply a legislative concern with single-judge courts only. (1) In sum, though section 170 has been amended more than 20 times since 1927, notwithstanding all those amendments (perhaps in part because of them) the directions as to procedure remain murky. Based on the bulk of the statute's words and reinforced by both contemporaneous comment and the history of their never having been applied to appellate judging from 1927 (when the words were enacted) until 1979, our interpretation is that all six of the unnumbered paragraphs affect trial judging only.