Opinion ID: 1129643
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: does the certification statute breach the separation of powers?

Text: The most critical problem in the case, however, is not whether the statute is permissive or mandatory, but whether the legislature has trespassed upon the judicial power by legislatively abridging the Supreme Court's authority to determine the nature and extent of the judicial power under the constitution. Does the statute seek to enlarge the Supreme Court's jurisdiction? And, What is meant by jurisdiction? Blanchard v. Golden Age Brewing Co., 188 Wash. 396, 63 P.2d 397 (1936), states, at 412: By jurisdiction is meant the power to hear and determine, regardless of whether the ruling made in the particular case be correct or incorrect. State ex rel. McGlothern v. Superior Court, 112 Wash. 501, 192 Pac. 937. That definition, for want of a better one, I still find acceptable. The ultimate power of this court as a tribunal derives from the people as prescribed by them primarily in their constitution, and from the Constitution of the United States, which all courts and judges must uphold. Courts, therefore, cannot arrogate unto themselves nor be charged by the legislative and executive branches of government with powers and duties not conferred by or imposed on them by the constitution. When the people, by means of the constitution, created this court, they endowed it with all of the authority necessary to fulfill its function as the highest court of the state, but they gave it powers peculiar to the judiciary only. First, the constitution created a judicial system for the exercise of the judicial power, declaring The judicial power of the state shall be vested in a supreme court, superior courts, justices of the peace, and such inferior courts as the legislature may provide. Const. art. 4, § 1. Then, designating the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court, the constitution stated: The supreme court shall have original jurisdiction in habeas corpus, and quo warranto and mandamus as to all state officers, and appellate jurisdiction in all actions and proceedings, excepting that its appellate jurisdiction shall not extend to civil actions at law for the recovery of money or personal property when the original amount in controversy, or the value of the property does not exceed the sum of two hundred dollars ($200) unless the action involves the legality of a tax, impost, assessment, toll, municipal fine, or the validity of a statute. The supreme court shall also have power to issue writs of mandamus, review, prohibition, habeas corpus, certiorari and all other writs necessary and proper to the complete exercise of its appellate and revisory jurisdiction. Each of the judges shall have power to issue writs of habeas corpus to any part of the state upon petition by or on behalf of any person held in actual custody, and may make such writs returnable before himself, or before the supreme court, or before any superior court of the state or any judge thereof. Const. art. 4, § 4. Next, the constitution prescribed the nature and extent of the jurisdiction to be vested in the trial courts, endowing superior courts of the state of Washington with virtually unlimited jurisdiction as may be seen in Const. art. 4 § 6, which declares: The superior court shall have original jurisdiction in all cases in equity and in all cases at law which involve the title or possession of real property, or the legality of any tax, impost, assessment, toll, or municipal fine, and in all other cases in which the demand or the value of the property in controversy amounts to one thousand dollars, or a lesser sum in excess of the jurisdiction granted to justices of the peace and other inferior courts, and in all criminal cases amounting to felony, and in all cases of misdemeanor not otherwise provided for by law; of actions of forcible entry and detainer; of proceedings in insolvency; of actions to prevent or abate a nuisance; of all matters of probate, of divorce, and for annulment of marriage; and for such special cases and proceedings as are not otherwise provided for. The superior court shall also have original jurisdiction in all cases and of all proceedings in which jurisdiction shall not have been by law vested exclusively in some other court; and said court shall have the power of naturalization and to issue papers therefor. They shall have such appellate jurisdiction in cases arising in justices' and other inferior courts in their respective counties as may be prescribed by law. They shall always be open, except on nonjudicial days, and their process shall extend to all parts of the state. Said courts and their judges shall have power to issue writs of mandamus, quo warranto, review, certiorari, prohibition, and writs of habeas corpus, on petition by or on behalf of any person in actual custody in their respective counties. Injunctions and writs of prohibition and of habeas corpus may be issued and served on legal holidays and nonjudicial days. The state constitution in this fashion prescribes the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court and the superior court. Any language purporting to grant to the legislature a power to curtail or enlarge the jurisdiction of the courts is singularly lacking in the constitution. The Supreme Court came into being with all powers and capabilities essential to the exercise of an appellate, revisory and a specified original jurisdiction  along with certain inherent powers traditionally said to belong to the courts  as an equal, independent, but co-ordinate organ of government ordained by the constitution to execute that portion of the people's sovereignty known as the judicial power. Endowed by the people with adequate authority to fulfill its functions under the constitutions of the state and of the United States and to carry out the judicial power, the Supreme Court has neither a surplus of power nor a deficiency thereof to trespass or be trespassed upon by the executive or legislative branches of government. Although, at its outermost edges of power, the executive authority may seemingly merge with the legislative power and the latter coalesce at its periphery with the judicial power, the mainstreams of the three have been kept separate, distinct and viable in this country for nearly two centuries. It is this separation of powers, the division of all authority of government into the executive, legislative and judicial and the allocating to each its appropriate share of the people's sovereignty which, perhaps even more than the Bill of Rights, has been the greatest bastion of individual liberty and national strength yet devised. Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137, 2 L.Ed. 60 (1803), holding that it was not within the power of Congress to confer upon the Supreme Court of the United States jurisdiction additional to that vested in it by the constitution, remains a basic statement of the doctrine of the separation of powers. Similarly, as this court said, in Winsor v. Bridges, 24 Wash. 540, 547, 64 Pac. 780 (1901): The distinction drawn between the federal and state governments in matters of legislation, that the former is one of delegated powers, while the latter is one of limitations, does not affect the reasoning in Marbury v. Madison, supra, [5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137] as applicable to the case at bar, that this court's original jurisdiction must be measured by the constitution of the state from which it derives its existence and power. None of the co-ordinate branches of government, under the separation of powers doctrine, may delimit or denigrate the others by assuming any of the others' basic functions and powers, nor saddle the others with functions and duties they can neither constitutionally nor organically perform. [6] The legislature, therefore, cannot impose upon the judicial branch functions and duties outside of and beyond its constitutionally prescribed powers and duties nor disparage such powers by placing them elsewhere. See North Bend Stage Line, Inc. v. Department of Public Works, 170 Wash. 217, 16 P.2d 206 (1932), holding unconstitutional a statute purporting to authorize direct appeals to this court from orders of the Department of Public Works which grant or deny certificates of convenience and necessity because such procedure bypassed and ousted the superior court. Similarly, a statute which attempted to impose upon a constitutional court the duties of a board or commission was held unconstitutional because it imposed nonjudicial duties and powers on the court. Peterson v. Livestock Comm'n, 120 Mont. 140, 181 P.2d 152 (1947). The duty to give legal advice, of course, is vested in the Attorney General and I would think that the legislature is without power to transfer that duty to the Supreme Court. Since the constitution of the state, in vesting all powers essential to the exercise of the appellate, revisory and original jurisdiction, has neither directly nor indirectly included among such functions a duty to render opinions to the federal judiciary nor any branch of the federal government, the legislature, I think, cannot constitutionally impose such a duty either.